THANK YOU AND HAPPY HOLIDAYS

I just wanted to thank all of you who for attended the December 13 Fall Weibel Quads #3 and wish you all an enjoyable holiday break.

As many of you have already learned, the results and photographs from the 220 player event are posted from the links found at: http://www.calnorthyouthchess.org/photographs.html You can download any of these photographs at will. If you want one of my photographs in the original resolution, simply write to me and let me know. I do not have Richard Shorman’s full resolution photographs.

You might have heard me say or read it in one of my notes that I will not be running my usual Spring Quads due to an overload of major events I am committed to attend. However, I do want to remind you of the largest CalNorth Youth Chess tournament—The Eighth Annual Age Level. CalNorth organizer Carl Moy is holding this year’s tournament at the Ohlone College Newark Campus on Sunday, February 8. Two hundred and fifty young players are already registered putting this yearly event on track to once again break the 500 player mark. http://www.calnorthyouthchess.org/AgeLevel2015/

Tied to this tournament are the CalNorth Youth Invitational Chess Championships for high rated players who need longer time controls and hope to obtain or improve their international rating (FIDE). This event is divided into two age divisions—4 to 9 and 10 to 13. The winner of the 4 through 9 year old division will receive the Kirshner Cup. The winner of the 10 through 13 section will obtain the Orwig Cup.

Carl wants to make it clear that these events were not named after the two individuals due to financial considerations as have occurred in other "legacy tournaments." He named these tournaments after the two individuals who have contributed the most to the creation of the competitive youth chess atmosphere in Northern California. The Championships will be held on Saturday and Sunday, February 7 & 8. http://www.calnorthyouthchess.org/AgeLevel2015/AgeLevelInvitational.html 

WEIBEL CHESS TEAM HOLIDAY BREAK INFORMATION

Let me start out by wishing everyone an enjoyable Winter break.  If you celebrate any holidays during this period of time I hope they are very fulfilling.  I am writing this note to remind all the Team members of what obligations, if any, they have during the break before we return to Weibel on Friday, January 9.

1)   Your child does not have to do any homework.  Any puzzles they do will be counted as extra credit.  Are the cheers I am hearing coming from the students, their parents or both?

2)   All Team members, unless they are Play Option Only, must have completed three tournaments by January 15, 2015.  I am very pleased to say that almost all our Team players have already done so & more.  The few that have not will receive extra notes from me.
  a)I have attached an Excel sheet that Carl Moy, our Parent Coordinator, distributes every few months so you can see your child’s progress in U.S. Chess Federation events as well as the number of tournaments they have competed in since June 1.  I am thrilled with the progress so many of our Team members are making.  This is a building year and we are building well as proven by our great results at the State Grade Level .  I know we will do even better at the Spring States as long as you and your children continue to take chess seriously while having fun playing the game.  Next year when we go to Nationals we will have our best Teams ever.
 b)The following youth tournaments are available for your child’s participation before January 15.

December 27, 2014 (Saturday)Milpitas Chess for Less Kids Swiss & Quads, Milpitas

January  2, 2015 (Friday)
New Year’s Youth Championships, Burlingame
New Year Quads, Santa Clara

*January 3, 2015 (Saturday)
"Ger" Youth Center's 3rd Scholastic Quads, Oakland,

January 4. 2015 (Sunday)
Milpitas Chess for Less Kids Swiss & Quads, Milpitas

January  10, 2015 (Saturday)
Let’s Play Chess, Santa Clara
Milpitas Chess for Less Kids Swiss & Quads, Milpitas

*January 10, 2015 (Saturday)
Game Castle Scholastic Quads, Fremont,

January 10-11, 2015 (Saturday & Sunday)
Game of Thrones Tourney, NorCalHouse of Chess, Fremont

January 11, 2015 (Sunday)
Cupertino Kid’s Quads & Swiss
Fremont Kid’s Quads & Swiss

 The starred events are to be found at http://www.CalNorthYouthChess.org/Tournaments.html  I strongly recommend these tournaments.

All other events can be found at  http://www.calchess.org/scholastic_calendar.html

c) If your child is rated over 1000, you might want to consider the following events due to their longer time controls.

January 2-4, 2015
New Year’s Championshjps, Burlingame

January 10, 2015
15th Bob Burger, Mechanics in San Francisco

January 16-19, 2015 (with 2 day through 4 day options)
6th Annual Golden State Open, Dublin (THIS SHOULD BE A MUST FOR ANY OF WEIBEL’S VARSITY TEAM)

Info for all at http://www.calchess.org/regular_calendar.html

3)   I still have one youth small & a few youth large T-shirts available.  The cost is now $15.

4)   Fremont keeps expanding its chess community. We already have two active Clubs in our city with Ken Zowal’s Fremont Chess Club (http://www.newfremontchessclub.org) and Ted Castro’s NorCal House of Chess (http://www.NorCalHouseofChess.com).  A third chess Club will make its appearance on January 17 near Pacific Commons, Demetrius Goins’  Shore View Chess (http://www.shoreviewchess.com/)  All these Clubs offer free play, tournaments and special instruction and lectures.  And, some people wonder why Fremont has become the hub of chess in the Bay Area in recent years!

5)   Gaurang Mehta, one of our teachers, is head chess instructor at the Indian Community Center in Milpitas in case you want to travel out of Fremont. They offer different level chess classes from January through November every Sunday in the early afternoon. (http://www.indiacc.org/sites/default/files/icc_web12-12-2014.pdf)

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Chess is Forever!
Alan

REPORT ON THE SECOND DAY OF THE CALCHESS STATE GRADE LEVEL CHAMPIONSHIPS

As many of you know, I am down in San Diego awaiting the birth of a new grandchild.  I figured it was an acceptable reason not to be at the second day of the CalChess Grade Level State Championships.  Tigran Darbinyan, my Assistant and Gaurang Mehta , Weibel Chess’ senior instructor, handled the 4th, 5th and 6th grade teams for their second and final day of competition. 

The report I received indicated that our Weibel Chess Teams had another good day, although not without some disappointments and tears.  Even though our very strong Sixth Grade Team got hammered by Mission San Jose Elementary School, our three girls scored higher than the higher rated Weibel boys and got all our points.  These three girls were on last years Under 12 Girls National Championship Team--Shivangi Gupta, Enya Mistry and Anvi Surapaneni.  My hope is they will return to Chicago in April to win the Under12 title again this year.

Our Fifth Grade Team finished a half point out of first with the usual chess players mantra, “we coulda, we woulda, we shoulda.”  I believe one fifth grade player deserves special mention —Sumukh Murthy.  Although Sumukh enter the tournament as the lowest rated of all our players he had the highest score on the fifth grade team.

Our amazing group of fourth grade students did it all.  They proved they were champions.  The Team won the Fourth Grade State Championship.  Oliver Wu, the chess wonder kid, accomplished what he said he would—he obliterated the opposition to become the 2014 Fourth Grade Champion. Louis Law, whose sister finished second in Second Grade yesterday, upset the top Mission San Jose player whose national chess rating is 700 points higher, took a second to Oliver.  I figured he wasn’t about to be outdone by his younger sister, Erin.  Eshaan Mistry proved to be another stand out player.  He received 4 points--a half point behind Louis.  He could have been higher if he hadn’t had the misfortune of having to play his own teammate Oliver in the fifth round of the six round event since he stood alone as the second highest player.

Kudos to all the Weibel players, their parents and their coaches who spent the weekend in Stockton at the University of the Pacific.

Alan

RESULTS OF THE FIRST DAY AT THE CALCHESS STATE GRADE LEVEL

Let me start out by saying our young teams did far better then I expect & you have mostly happy players and happy parents plus a happy coach.  While the 4, 5, 6 grade Teams do not finish until tomorrow our K, 1, 2, 3 grade teams shined today.  Our 3 rd grade and  2nd grade Teams are State Champions tying with Mission San Jose Elementary School not teams in both division had 10.5 pts.  Mission San Jose Elementary School came in as top seed by far.  They did take the first place trophies on tie-breaks, but both teams are State Champions.  Tie-breaks, in short, are based not on how well your team plays, but how well the people they played did.  So if player one and two have same points and player one’s opponents won a total of 12 games while player two’s opponents one 13 games, player two would get the first place trophy, but since they had equal individual scores they are both State Champions..  Mission & Weibel years back continued to tie for first and often we took the tie-breaks.  One year the coach from Mission knowing that we tied for first but not yet knowing the tie-breaks, challenged me to an arm wrestling match for the first place trophy.  I suspect he was the only person in California that didn’t know what the outcome would be.  He has not challenged me to an arm wrestle for first place since, although I wish he had today. ;-)

The one thing I was fairly sure of is that our Kindergarten Team would win first place and they did not disappoint.  They one the titled of State Champion. We set up a special Kindergarten Team directed by Serafina Show with four other Junior High and High School students.  Our kids did great and besides they were cutest children in the whole meet.  One Kindergarten child, Edward Miu,  was not in the special Kindergarten class.  I realized, that thanks to early preparation by his parents, he had a solid foundation in chess so I put him in my team class.  I told him Friday that he would be the next State Kindergarten Champion.  He proved me right going undefeated and winning a trophy as tall as himself.

I do not have the names from the results of all, and their were a lot, of our trophy winners.  I will pass those on when I receive them.  However, one player does stand out, Erin Law.  She took second place in the Second Grade Championship far ahead, in points, of many player with far higher ratings.
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Chess is Forever!
Alan