Weekend Roundup

Some highlights from Saturday's tournament at Fulton Elementary, courtesy of chess mom Teresa Parker:

I missed the Youth Chess Foundation of Chicago tournament at Fulton, but got I a report on it from chess dad Peter Margulis and pix from Teresa. Phillip Parker-Turner was the tournament's overall winner, Andy Margulis won a trophy in the intermediate division, and George Vassilatos had a good day, coming close to a trophy himself. I believe our neighbors at Ancona walked away with the team trophy.

It was the last YCFC tournament of the school year. Hats off to those guys for another great year of free chess tournaments in the Chicago public schools.

In other action, Ray's Sonam Ford battled with the titans of scholastic chess at the national K-6 championships in Pittsburgh, finishing an excellent 64th in a K-3 field of 209 very serious chess players from all over the country.

In the big virtual matchup in the K-3 team division that the whole chess world is watching (whether they admit it or not) the banned Lincolnshire school district beat all the big New York schools, finishing second nationally, a half point behind Stevenson High Elementary School in Washington State. Correction hat tip to Chessdad64, who has the story here; backstory here.

The Virtual Chess Team

At this moment the national K-6 chess championships are under way in Pittsburgh (Ray School being ably represented by Sonam Ford, incidentally). At that tournament, an egregious injustice is being perpetrated against the great state of Illinois and several of our top young chess players, and while we here at Castle Kimbark have been remiss in reporting about it, Chessdad64 is on the case.

It comes down to this:

“The Illinois State K-3 Championship team from School District 103 in Lincolnshire, Illinois, perhaps the strongest K-3 squad in the nation, is being denied the opportunity to compete as a team by the USCF’s Scholastic Council.”

Fortunately, Chessdad has a brilliant and mischievous solution, one that exploits the ability of the Internet and citizen media to undermine abuses of power by arrogant elites. His plan: recompute the standings throughout the tournament, treating Lincolnshire as the recognized team it should be, see how they do against the other top recognized teams, and report the results.

Right now Lincolnshire is ahead. Follow the action as it unfolds at the 64 Square Jungle.