News

Entries for the Spring Rapid will be going up soon. This will be 6 rounds of 25+5 Rapid in a single Grade.

We had a film crew in the Club getting some footage for a documentary on Club member Mike Steiner.

Vega Links: A Grade , B Grade

A Grade

Winter Cup A Grade Round 4 PGN by Ewen Green

A Draw on the top board between Alphaeus Ang and Bruce Watson means that Paul Garbett is now in the led by himself on 4 points out of 4.

On Row 2 Euan McDougall and Philli Park-Tamati continued their run of upset wins.

Upsets in A Grade Round 4

• Anya Thurner beat Rauen Le Grange
• Philli Park-Tamati beat Paul Macdonald
• Euan McDougall beat Clinton Wells
• Lewis Jordan drew with Daniel Runcan

B Grade

Alan Leach and Jacob Yuan are now the only undefeated players and share first place. Srenoy Pranav took advantage of a default to go into 3rd.

Upsets in B Grade round 4

• Lanjun Liu beat Sai Vivan Somaraju
• Anderson Chen beat Grayson Po’e-Tofaeono
• Vincent Cai beat Tracey Tang
• Eden Oshri beat Paul Kane
• David Zhu beat Hunter Po’e-Tofaeono
• Ethan Liu beat Sylvia McDougall

B Grade Interclub will be starting on Sunday July 19th. It is open to players with NZCF ratings below 2000. Please talk to Simon Lyall if you’d like to be on the team.

Winter Cup A Grade Rd 3 PGN by Ewen Green

Vega Links: A Grade , B Grade

A Grade

Boards 1-4 saw the top 4 players in the Grade beat all the lower rated players. But on board 5 recently-returned player Richard Taylor got an upset.

Bruce Watson, Alphaeus Ang and Paul Garbett share the lead on 3/3.

Upsets in Round 3

Anya Thurner drew with Louis Lim
Richard Taylor beat Daniel Runcan
Stephen Peak beat Andrew Michael
Jordan Lewis drew with Nigel Metge
Jeffrey Yu drew with Simon Lyall

B Grade

Jacob Yuan, Mike Steiner, Alan Leach and Eric Fan lead on 3 points.

Upsets in Round 3

Lanjun Liu beat Paul Kane
Pranav Shenoy beat Tyleah Po’e-Tafaeono
Michael Ma drew with Wayne McDougall

A reminder that club fees are due and should be paid by the end of the Winter Cup. Mike Steadman will be at the club at the start of most rounds.

Also a reminder that the club will be playing though the school holidays. Please text Simon (021 575 233) if you will be away and miss rounds.

Vega Links: A Grade , B Grade

Winter Cup A Grade Round 2 PGN by Ewen Green

A Grade

The 2nd round of the Winter Cup saw a few more upsets. Philli Park-Tamati managed his second upset in a row.

There are 7 players on 2 points.

Upsets in Round 2

• Anya Thurner beat Andrew Michael
• Philli Park-Tamati beat Nigel Metge
• Euan McDougall beat Nathan Goodhue
• Kenny Zhang beat Isabelle Ning

B Grade

Top seed Wayne McDougall was upset by Baraa Zara but most of the other top players survived this round.

Upsets in B Grade Round 2

• Anderson Chen beat Tracey Tang
• Wincent Cai beat Hunter Po’e-Tofaeono
• Baraa Zara beat Wayne McDougall
• Anas Zara beat Paul Kane

Interclub Chess is planned to start again in July. We are looking for B-Grade Players with a rating under 2000 on NZCF 2020-1 list.

Games are planned for Sunday evenings at Alexandra Park. Provisional dates are: 19 July, 2 August, 9 August, 16 August and 23 August.

If you would like to play on the team (you don’t have to play all rounds) then please contact Club Captain Simon Lyall on Mondays or via SMS on 021 575 233.

The First Round of the 2020 Winter Cup was held on June 22. This is the first tournament after Covid-19 lockdown. We have around 40 entries in each tournament.

A reminder that since the tournament is FIDE rated we cannot change the draw after a round starts. If you cannot make a round please text Simon before 6:40pm.

Vega Links: A Grade , B Grade

PGN for A Grade Round 1 by Ewen Green

A Grade

Only a few upsets due to the big rating range between opponents.

• Philli Park-Tamiti beat Jasmine Zhang
• Lakshmi Ravi beat Isabelle Ning
• Scott Treanor drew with Don Eade
• Grant Burrows drew with a recently-returned Richard Taylor

B Grade

Also only a few upsets

• Anderson Chen beat Paul Kane
• Sophia Feng beat newcomer Miles Ross
• Vincent Cau beat Grayson Po’e-Tofaeono
• Pranav Shenoy drew with Bevis Jiang
• Sai Somaraju drew with Adam Ali

Hi everyone, we are starting the new Saturday Junior Chess Night (runs every Saturdays from 6pm to 7pm and replacing the old Friday Night Chess) at the ACC this evening. It is a casual play event designed for kids from beginners to around 1400 play strength. Any adults or more advanced players are also welcome to come along to play. Registration starts at 5:50pm and play starts at 6:05pm or as soon as everyone is registered to play at the event for the night. The cost is a voluntary gold coin donation. Come and play chess whenever you have time! More details will be added to our website here. Alex

For the Chess Centre’s first night back after the Covid-19 Lockdown we had an unrated Blitz tournament. 36 players over 6 rounds of 3m+2s .

Top players were FMs Alphaeus Ang and Daniel Gong. Both players were undefeated for 4 rounds (although Alphaeus was a piece down against Felix Xie in round 4). Daniel won their pairing in round 5 and also won round 6 to be undefeated.

Vega link for tournament

Photo album from the Night

1st Daniel Gong 6/6
2nd= Alphaeus Ang, Philli Park-Tamati, Aaron Wang 5/6
5th Felix Xie 4.5/6

The Winter Cup will start on the 22nd of June. Registrations are now up and we have over 60 entries. The tournaments will be NZCF and FIDE rated.

We are now planning to restart Monday Chess and the Chess Centre from the 15th of June.

Over the next week we will be getting the centre ready to restart

• We will be doing a full clean of the rooms, including carpets and all pieces and boards
• The venue will be registered with the government Tracing App
• We will be adding Cleaning Stations, new paper towels and signs to remind people to wash their hands

On Monday the 15th of June we will be having a casual night. Probably a casual blitz or similar tournament.

On Monday the 22nd of June we will restart the calendar with the Winter Cup. This will be played as two Nationally rated Swiss Grades. Entries will open soon.

We would remind people not come to the Chess Centre if they are sick ( cough, running nose, or fever, etc).

A Junior Night will also start up on Saturdays soon and we are working on something for Friday.

In line with the NZCF Guidelines we are currently planning to open the Club for Chess once the New Zealand government’s Covid-19 Alert Level goes to Level One.

The exact events we will hold will depend on the notice given and days remaining in the year. For example we may hold some casual and rapid nights for the first few weeks.