THOUGHTS OF A CHESS ADDICT

I've been toying with the idea of starting a Seniors vs Juniors match some time in 2014. This is to gather the old war-horses to return to play for a cause, to show they still have what it takes a play a decent game. Of course, we have to allow the old war-horses time to polish up. Offering Thomson sessions on Fridays for them. Those who are keen please drop me a line at my email ?

As the year ends, it is time to do a post-mortem of the events gone by and my intending projects next year. I say goodbye to some of my students this year having taught them for the last 2 years. It is never my intention to hang on to them once they've covered the syllabus that I've set out. The materials have been imparted and its up to them to make use of it. If they see value in it to help them play better, that's good but if not, that's ok too as I'm sure that they would have learnt other life-long values from their time with me. 2014 is probably going to be moving at jetspeed so I'd really have to prioritise my time. Much as I'd like to take more students, it becomes difficult with many schools going full-day and students only have the later afternoons and evenings on weekdays for lessons. Weekends are precious and I'm trying not encroach into them as they remain the quality time for parents to catch up with their kids. So hence, we may need to reso

Toa Payoh West held its annual Rapid Chess Tournament on 1 Dec Sunday and attracted a very strong Open Section field, with 86 players, including 2 IMs, 1 FM and even inactive junior champions who decided to try their hand at the competition. Possibly because its not rated?? Just thought I'd feature the hardworking team led by Kenny Chern who normally assisted in the Cairnhill tournaments at this time of year, but due to the forthcoming renovations to the CC, the event was cancelled. Thanks to Chris the chief arbiter (he's camera shy), Hafiz , Chong Peng and Samuel for helping us out.  Quite a few of my students participated in the Open, namely Royce Tan, Adrian Yeo, Bryan Sow, Tan Zhong Kai and Lee I Shiuan. In the Junior  there was U13, Caleb, Nicholas Low the U10 group saw Lee I Shiang, Malcolm Sow, Tan Qi Xuan, Naython Tan and Cadence Low the only girl. Sue Lyn did not turn up.  The Open Section was in my opinion the strongest turnout that I've seen at Rapid tournaments

At the recently concluded Singapore vs Malaysia annual chess match, the final scores ( Rd 1 and 2 are classical games, 3 and 4 rapid games) Round 1: Malaysia 23    - 13    Singapore Round 2: Malaysia 20    - 16    Singapore Round 3: Malaysia 21.5 - 14.5 Singapore Round 4: Malaysia 14   -  22    Singapore Overall  : Malaysia 78.5 - 65.5 Singapore A close scrutiny of the rounds indicate that our girls were not playing in their own category, especially the U14 and U16 sections. These were filled by our U10 and U12 girls who were forced to play up for the first 2 rounds. The other sections were evenly matched.  The  Veteran's honour was defended by stalwarts IM Giam, IM Leslie Leow ( who agreed to play even though he was on holiday) and Lim Chye Lye. Giam even took a game off IM Jimmy Liew, which was a surprise to many. Leslie for all the years of chess inactivity managed to hold off Nicholas Chan in the rapid games.  I don't think we should read too much into the result of this ma

Another year with newer students taking part in this year's National Age Group held at Jurong East Sports Hall. The students taking part in the various sections include: Girls U-8   -  Cadence Loh Boys U-8   -  Naython Tan, David Tan, Emmanuel Lim Rei Girls U-10 -  Grace Ho, Cheong Sue Lyn Boys U-10 -  Caleb Loh, Jonathan Tan, Malcolm Sow, Jaryl Seah, Elliot Lim Han, Jaden Rabind Charles Boys U-14 -  Lee I-Shiuan, Tan Zhong Kai, Keith Khoo, Rohin Singh, Adrian         Yeo, Bryan Sow THE GIRLS The 3 female students that took part did reasonably well. All were playing in the first-ever long time-control of 1.5 hrs per side. They managed to stay in the game for about 1-2 hrs which is commenable. Though Cadence has just started with me, Sue Lyn showed the most promise having beaten the likes of Lisa Tan, R Shahana and Grace and achieving a performance rating of 1224. There is great potential for this girl if she takes the game seriously and works hard. Th

To take part in this 1 day event at TOA PAYOH WEST CC on 1 December, Click Here I urge my students who cannot bear the strain of the 3 day National Age Group to consider this event.

The SCF and other organisers do their best in providing ample opportunities for players to take part in competitions, as is their objective in creating a healthy chess scene. However this does not mean that the players themselves should try to play in every single tournament. Playing in a tournament should be viewed with achieving the following objectives. TESTING OUT IDEAS IN OPENINGS AND MIDDLEGAMES After drawing up lessons for losses in previous games, the player should review carefully the losses derived and determine their causes. Improvements should be made and digested, so as to avoid the same mistakes made when playing the next tournament. New ideas derived from the study of lost games should be tried out as well in the next tournament and the cycle of analysis and refinement continuously applied till the player is confortable in the positions appearing before him/her. Ultimately, the player should not be surprised by any opening novelty that has not been researched or played a

Each year the 3 chess queens of Hungary, namely the Polgar sisters, return to their native Budapest to hold a chess festival which aims to spark interest in chess amongst the young children. This year, Garry Kasparov joins them in their 7th edition. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3MzNe1f-5_o Something we can learn perhaps in organising chess events involving children?

The October SCF Ratings list may be the last SCF Ratings list published by the Federation in view of the intended move to the FIDE ratings list wef 2014. So in summary, I list the ratings changes from Jan 2013 till now for my active students who played this year. Congratulations to all who have made big strides in their ratings! Especially Royce, Zhong Kai and Shi Hao who have done well this year. My newer students are gradually improving, though with modest gains. Generally the ones with negative ratings require review of their lessons with me, plus lots more practice online to catch up.

The 2013 National Age Group takes on a new format - 9 rounds of grueling 3 hr games (1.5 hrs per side). Stamina counts for these games and fitness is of course very important. I have seen players leading up to Rd 6 in tournaments of this nature, only to falter at the last 3 rounds due to fatigue. Hence to my students : Know your limits and if you choose to sign up for this, prepare yourselves physically by exercising regularly after your exams. It will be necessary to put in at least 45 minutes of exercise a day to achieve good physical shape to stay alert for the whole 3 days. Kindly contact me of your decision so I can make the necessary training plans to support. Thanks.

If you have views to contribute on how we can promote chess in schools, I will see you this Friday , 7.30 pm at Singapore Chess Federation located at Bishan St 13, Singapore Intellectual Games Centre (opposite the Bishan Bus Interchange) 2nd Floor conference room. Please email hweekhim@singaporechess.org.sg if you can come. Looking forward to a fruitful discussion and ideas. Rgds John Wong

We see a resurgence in the use of chess in education all around the world..surely Singapore shouldn't be left behind??

Recently there was a post by English GM Danny Gormally who laments about his woes as a chess professional. By that he hopes to be able to make a living doing what he loves, playing chess. As he'd described in his post, found here  , the cash returns from winning tournaments in England are dwindling in view of a weakened EU economy, not forgetting the deluge of Eastern European and former Soviet GMs who now reside in Europe thus heightening the competition. So the few avenues left open to the GMs who wish to eke out a living from chess are to consider teaching students or write books/produce instructional videos. Unfortunately he's not interested in these activities, hence he finds himself stuck in a rut as he put it. There are 2 main points in his post, ie a) He chose to be a GM, hoping to make his livelihood through playing chess and not willing to consider other chess-related forms of income, and b) There is no way he could turn back the clock and do something else to make en

As we have over 5 million recorded games of chess known to man, they present a huge reservoir of ideas and precedents of what has been played, correct or wrong. It would be useful to look at past games to derive ideas and innovate on what's played to try something new yet based on solid fundamental ideas played by the past players. Somehow in the games I've played with the juniors, I can discern that they have played lots of games and hence their practical ability to spot tactical threats is strong. However, when it comes to making strategic decisions to steer the game in their favour, they seem to hit a blank. I attribute this to spending too much time studying variations but not full games. One of the main areas of study in my opinion for a competitive player is not just to learn the variations but also the games of how the variations may turn out. Playing over master games based on the variations will allow the player to have a preview of what's to come, what positions

It's no secret really. Ask any older player what it takes and invariably you boil down to 3 things: USE YOUR TIME CONCENTRATE THINK CHECKS, CAPTURES & THREATS Somehow I find the chief failings of our young players (based on my observations at the recent Serangoon Inter-team tournament) is that their level of concentration is generally lower to that of the older players. When a player concentrates, he starts to work out relationships between his pieces and his opponents. He will be aware of what can happen when one of his pieces leaves a square, which can be occupied by his opponent if there is insufficient control of it. I am guilty of this in my first game whereby I lost a Queen, so really it can happen to anyone. No excuses! I could have paid dearly for it but I was lucky. That lesson woke me up real fast and for the remaining games I concentrated hard for every game and it was amazing how much the mind's eye can see once in that mode. I didn't waste any time working

Since so many parents are reading right now, perhaps time to re-issue an old post? http://www.chessfood4thought.blogspot.sg/2010/10/importance-of-reading.html

At the recent Serangoon Inter-Team competition where I partnered my students, I had the chance to cross swords with several of the juniors from the other teams. As I do not get the chance to play in tournaments often, there are few opportunities to meet them over the board. Here are some of my first impressions of their play  (I hope the parents reading about their children do not take it too personally). My first encounter was round 2, playing White against Steffi Lim. She's played in many competitions, generally quite calm, but tends to give up easily when things do not work out her way. One of the most important qualities in a chess-player is to be resilient and always being resourceful out even when things do not work out. Only this way can one improve and succeed. PGN   My next junior opponent is Carwyn Yeo, an aggressive young man who has got ambition on his eyes. He concentrates well and was eyeing me for breakfast that morning. I feel that I have to tread very carefully as

Spend the last weekend with my students at the Serangoon Inter-Team tournament and we called ourselves the JW's Musketeers, in the company of teams like 152, ChessKids New Generation to form a total of 19 teams. It was time to play chess for fun and enjoyment rather than worry about the result. So much fun I was having when I realised I blundered a Queen against a very scared Royce Ho (whose brother Josh had lessons from me 2 years ago). I managed to compose myself and grinned throughout the game, laughing at my carelessness and trying to calm my team-mates that everything was under control. Soon the boy lost on time in whirlwind complications and I told myself its going to be a fun-filled day! Saturday's 4 rounds earned me a perfect score, so I was looking forward to extending that when I met WIM Gong Qian Yun from 152. This was her first chess outing I think after a long time, so with perfect peace of mind I started: PGN Though I lost this game, I was very happy to have had t

Some time ago (about 5 years maybe?) I stumbled on the idea of converting my old copy of  " STUDY CHESS WITH TAL" which was a great classic written by the World Champion in collaboration with his then trainer Alexander Koblenz. I'm often curious as to who the guy in the old cover is. Koblenz wrote many great books on tactics and strategy in Russian but so far this has been translated to English: It took me close to 10 years in hunting down the out-of-print book from an old bookseller in UK who offered it used at  US$15, where most second-hand booksellers were pricing it way above US$50. Naturally I treasured the book and thought many times if I should want to undertake the project to convert the notation from descriptive to algebraic. A painstaking job no less - finally I decided to start work on it last year during this time when my students are having exams and I had a little more spare time on my hands. But lo and behold! I found this! Someone at Batsford must have rea

The annual Merdeka Team Tournament in KL marks the largest team competition in ASEAN region, with participating countries from ASEAN as well as the competitiors who have taken part in the Malaysian Open. Singapore has been sending teams to this event, notably present were the players from Chess-Kidz and 2 other teams, QY+3, (all NUS team members) plus IM Chan Peng Kong who stayed on to play for Brian Jones's team. AMS Bolih contained 2 Singaporeans, Jimmy Ng and Lee Wang Sheng (who may be Australian by now).  My visit to the  Festival this year was fruitful in many ways, with some observations and lessons that we can draw from should we in Singapore attempt such a feat. SCALE It is undoubtedly true that without scale of participation, no media would want to cover such an event. The latest Merdeka Team Tournament held last week attracted 473 players, with 8 GMs, 11 IMs and 12 FMs in the fold. For such a tournament to be held in Singapore, a decent hall the size of the wedding banque

On 2 August, a landmark meeting was convened between the SCF and interested parties to discuss key pressing issues regarding the popularity of chess in Singapore and its continued survival. Led by VP Leonard Lau, he correctly assessed that the number of children playing chess, especially in secondary schools, has dwindled and this needs to be addressed. Other areas of concern include the current branding of chess amongst Singaporeans, the education of chess ethics to the young chessplayers' parents instead of players themselves, beefing up the chess organising infrastructure in terms of new organisers and staff, eg arbiters and volunteers and so on. Many ideas were offered and feedback sought amongst those who attended, a number of them stakeholders such as chess schools, trainers, arbiters and parents. It was felt that that the current chess tournament calendar was a little too intense, with little opportunities for one to play casually. Some opined that the present Grand Prix sys

Tan Zhong Kai, a 13 year old student from Victoria School has won the Challengers Section of the Whampoa Open Rapid Chess Tournament held over the weekend with 6/7 pts, finishing ahead of several seasoned and higher rated competitors. My congratulations go to him as he has put in diligent work towards his game. Well done!

The July ratings reflect some healthy increases in ratings for the ones who have worked at their game, Royce Tan once again gained 127 pts from his last rating to increase 150 since his January rating. Hui Ling was taking part in more competitions this year and has done well in the last 2 tournaments to gain a hefty 89 pts from April to total 122 pts gained since January. It was a slide for last quarter's top performer I Shiuan, whose performance in the Serangoon and Teck Ghee tournaments caused him to lose pts mainly due to unfamiliar opening play from his opponents. Hopefully we've patched that and the decline should cease. Malcolm and Bryan made modest gains, but with correct thought processes shaped during our sessions they should make bigger process. A few have dropped out of the list owing to O Levels and PSLE which made them inactive. Finally Tricia Koh joins the list after a long wait of 2 years! Hopefully she would find more time to play and improve her rating.

This year's National Inter-Schools is slated to begin 31 August - 1 September. As usual, going by statistics over the last 3 years: BOYS U14      TEAMS SCHOOLS     PLAYERS 2010 18 15 90 2011 13 10 65 2012 12 9 54 SEC OPEN 2010 31 25 149 2011 29 18 136 2012 30 24 146 OPEN 2010 16 10 73 2011 10 8 48 2012 12 8 55 Note that the Secondary Open section is combined with the Girls U16 category, otherwise the numbers will drop if we are to measure only boy's participation. I am sure the number of ladies playing in secondary school has dropped but will need to work out the statistics at another post. The trend that fewer schoolchildren engage in chess for school competition after they turn 16 years of age shows a gradual erosion of interest (seen from the number of players still playing in the Open). This could also be due to the fact t

The Standard Chess event started on Saturday 8 June at the Imperial Mae Ping Hotel in Chiang Mai Thailand. Singapore has the largest contingent of trainers here, working hard round the clock to guide the players before each game and post-mortems after. I was taking care of my 3 charges, 2 of which were ill from flu and recovering from fever and cough. But I am very proud of them as they showed good spirit, played their games with grit and managed decent scores. Royce Tan is currently on 2.5 out of 3 points, scheduled to meet the Indonesian 4th place finisher at Hue last year. Our preparations have been most useful in anticipating the positions that we are confident in scoring. Most U10 players do not pay much attention to their openings so it is a great boost of confidence when we see our preparation yield results. I am counting on 2 more wins today from Royce so that he gets the award of going to the next AAG with a 50% subsidy as promised by SCF President Ignatius Leong! Hui Ling sco

The turnout of 73 players was less than satisfactory, probably because there is still a week of school before the holidays begin on 1 June. Nonetheless, the tournament went ahead with the best playing conditions for the participants and we truly thank those who came to play. Some of my students took part, all except 3 won prizes. For the Silver section, Nicholas Low finished 11th while Zhong Kai and Nicholas Teo came in 17th and 6th respectively. Adrian Yeo won Best Performance for Gold Section (as he was rated below 1600 and came in 13th).    I managed to persuade my new student to play and he enjoyed his tournament making friends in between games.                                     The games at the Gold Section were fiercely contested, with Tan WeiLiang and Jared Neubronner (both our past winners) leading the pack at Round 3, but fortunes started to change at the 2nd day. Weiliang could not convert his attack against Robert Suelo and lost, crashed against Cyrus the next round which

Closing date for Thomson Cup International Chess Championships this Wednesday 23 May. Those who have not submitted your entry please hurry.

The Malaysian Chess Festival is usually held on the last week of August to coincide with the Merdeka (or National Day) celebrations, but there are some shift of dates this time: The following tournaments played in Standard time control will be held between 9-16 August: 1) 10th IGB Dato Arthur Tan International Open Chess Championship 2013 2) 4th KLK Tan Sri Lee Loy Seng International Seniors Open Chess Championship 2013 3) 8th AmBank Malaysia Chess Challenge 2013 while the Open Team event will be on 17-18 August weekend and the Age-Group event on 13 August and the Blitz event on the 16th.  Entry forms can be downloaded from the official website here

Please note that the Chess Club will be closed on 3, 10 and 24 May. We will resume from 31 May.

The dates for the Thomson Cup International Chess Tournament 2013 will be on 25-26 May 2013. We have decided not to FIDE rate the tournament, however it will be SCF rated. The entry form link to SCF here

The SCF April rating list has just been published.  For this quarter, the top performer is Lee I Shiuan who has been studying with me since 6 Jan 2013 this year. I had revamped his opening repertoire to allow his strengths in the endgame to shine, while curbing his urge for sacrificial fancies which were most times unsound. This brought about an increase of 86 pts, mainly based on his good performance at the Hong Bao Rapid and National Schools' Individuals. He has been diligent and followed my instructions, generally a good student.  Others have chalked up close to 30 rating points, which is meeting the targets set for the year. There were 3 new students which made their debut in the April list. I will monitor their progress from now on. To slip 20 rating points is a small warning sign which should not be taken lightly. Jaryl has just started changing his repertoire so he will need some time before he gets to winning his games once he familiarises with the moves. However, I feel th