Arlington Chess Club
ACC Events
- Friday Ladder:
May 4, 11, 18, 25. - DC Chess League: May 4, 18.
- ACC Saturday Action: May 12.
- ACC/ODC Scholastic: May 19.
- Friday Action: May 25.
- Friday Ladder:
June 1, 8, 15, 22, 29. - DC Chess League: None.
- ACC Saturday Action: June 16.
- ACC/ODC Scholastic: June 23.
- Friday Action: June 22.
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Tournament Reports
April 30, 2012
MD Open
As with many recent big tournaments sponsored by the Maryland Chess Association, the Maryland Open returned to the Rockville Hilton this year. The event is noted for many refinements offered by NTD and organizer Mike Regan including providing boards and sets for all players and clocks for the top section. In addition, Mike uses a 30-second increment instead of the standard 5-second delay to avoid some of the clock- pounding time scrambles often seen in tournament chess. This author can personally attest to the usefulness of this time control as my second round U2000 opponent and I took full advantage of it in our game. Mike also provides continental breakfast to all players on Sunday morning, "gratis" - a nice feature as the first round that day starts at 9am. Though this year, Rockville had some town marathon running down Rockville Pike and it caused severe delays for some tournament commuters as they ran down the center of Rockville Pike for miles, and miles - only easily circumventable to those who know Rockville well. Regan also added a fourth section this year making it "Open, Under 2000, Under 1600, and Under 1200" as well as increasing the prize fund to a total of $7250. This year, he also broadcasted the top two games live both in the skittles room and at mdchess.com. Todd Hammer provided a wonderful selection of books and equipment to peruse in between rounds. As for ACC member performances, GM Larry Kaufman won the MD Open on tie-breaks with a 4/5 score over FM Shelby Getz, Tegshsuren Enkhbat and Jared Defibaugh - though they all technically lost to non-Maryland resident GM Tamaz Gelashvili who won sole first place overall (4.5/5.0). IM Oladapu Adu and Kevin Wang etched 3.5 scores while Andy Samuelson got a 3.0. In the U2000 section, your author scored 3.5 to tie for 5th and split the U1800 prize. For an event that has seen its down times in recent years (when held at local community colleges), this has turned into a great local event! Another "well done" to Mike Regan.
April 17, 2012
Kingstowne Chessfest
The Kingstowne Chessfest (which is held near Springfield, VA) was host to nearly 60 players in 4 sections. This was the 10th straight year that Senior TD Don Millican has run this event for the Kingstowne Chess Club. This is a good two-day event with plenty of prizes in various sections (Open prizes are guaranteed) but it has become sparsely attended in recent years for some reason. Amongst ACC club players in attendance, Oladapu Adu topped Yuri Barnakov in Round 3 and drew Tegshsuren Enkhbat in the final round to win the Open section. Adam Chrisney in the Amateur section (U1800) lost in the final round yielding that title to Caijun Luo after failing the follow-through on a h7 sack. And Revanth Vejju won clear second in the Booster section (U1600). ACC's best effort was recorded by Evan Tait who ran the board with 6 wins to outright win the Novice section (U1200) gaining a total of 300 rating points!! Congrats Evan!!
March 17, 2012
VA Open
The Virginia Open for 2012 was held at the Double Tree Hotel – Dulles Airport which has quickly become a favorite venue for chess tournaments in Virginia. The event featured 155 players in two sections. One plus about being held in this section of the DC metro area is that it draws in more players from the Route 7 corridor who might not attend events held over along 1-95. Local book-seller Todd Hammer has added some hardware to his usual wares and provided a great offering of books, DVDs, chess sets and clocks for everyone’s perusal. Tegshsuren Enkhbat won the Open section and Clark Smiley secured the Amateur section, both with 5-0 scores. ACC members again represented the club well including Andrew Samuelson who joined Larry Kaufman, Macon Shibut and local phenom Jeevan Karamsetty in a tie for second place at 4-1. Andrew Rea secured a 3.5 score. In the Amateur, Adam Chrisney secured 4-1 while James Williams was one of sixteen players with a 3.5 score.
December 17, 2011
ACC / ODC Scholastic #1 (A.R. Chrisney)
ACC and the Old Dominion Chess sponsored their first SCHOLASTIC event on Saturday December 17th and the club surpassed expectations by securing nearly 30 entries for its first-ever event divided into three sections! A number of parents commented on how great the location, time and set up were for the kids. Trophies were awarded to the top 3 players in each section and performance medals were awarded to everyone else who won at least half of their games.
The attached photo
shows the winners of the top section and you can check the club
photos section for pictures of all players winning trophies or medals in each
section. The top section (K-12) was won by Camden Wiseman with Alex Song and Helen Tran securing 2nd and 3rd place. The middle section (K-6)
was won by Ben Guo followed closely by Adityasai Koneru and Abhishek Allamsetty. The junior section (K-3) was won by Anoop Nallangulagari
with Luke Jackins, Anusha Allamsetty and Siddartha Krishnan also winning trophies.
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May 6, 2012
ACC Apr. Wrap-Up
Wow! Another Battle-Royale was had in an ACC event as 18 mostly Experts and A-players battled each other for 5 rounds until John C. Meyer roared from behind to win first place outright (4/5). Notable performances were put in by Jason Carr and James Berrigan who each picked up a ton of points (about 80 and 100 respectively) – goes to show what can be earned in these events. The ACC Friday Action was also stocked with Experts and A-players battling it out for bragging rights. David McNeil topped all others including Vinay Doma in the last round for sole first place! Everyone else traded losses along the way. ACC’s weekly Ladder was won outright by Mike Kobily (3.0) who entered the final week tied with 5 other members who all either lost or drew their final games. Jerome Lindsay came in second (2.5). Finally, the monthly ACC Scholastic K-12 section was won outright by the little-man Jay Lalwani (4/4)!! And Bennet Jackins also recorded a perfect record (4/4) to take the K-6 section!! The tournament was notable for the all of the new players from the Manassas area – most playing in their first event.
April 2, 2012
ACC Mar. Wrap-Up
We had another respectable showing for ACC’s second-only Scholastic tournament. Just over 20 players attended spread out in two sections. Eric Passmore and Cliff Lin lead the K-12 section with scores of 3/4 with Seva Zhuravskiy and Andrew Mao scoring 2.5/4 to nab ACC performance medals. The K-6 Section saw Isaac Karachunsky sweep his opponents to a perfect 4-0 score followed by Yevgeny Dodzin, Kevin Le and Sundeep Ruprai all scoring 3/4. Five more kids secured ACC performance medals by winning at least half of their games in this section! ACC’s Friday Action saw more tumultuous play as Andrew Tichenor ran the board to win clear first 3-0 followed by Andrew Samuelson and Vinay Doma who tied in their last round game to follow Tichenor at 2.5/3. Notable performances were put in by Valentino Burke and Paul Psarakis to help each gain over 50 ratings points and break the 1800 level and become “A” players! The 5-round Saturday Action saw its usual fierce action as all the top players traded losses. The event was split by Andrew Samuelson and Andrew Tichenor each with scores of 4/5 followed by tough young Andrew Zheng who had a 3.5/5 record and was kept out of the tie for first place by drawing “yours truly” in the final round. Meanwhile, the weekly Friday Ladder prize was split by Michael Corallo and newcomer Stephen Schlager who each won 4 games to tie for first place. We’re going to have to give Stephen some stronger challenges. They were followed by the ever-improving Rahil Shah – as noted before, watch out for this little guy in near-term tournaments!
February 28, 2012
ACC Feb. Wrap-Up
Can you say "Whoa!" From record turnout to ... "poof" ... almost crickets! After by far our largest turnout in over two years to a record low ... 6 players turned up for the February Friday Action. Bummer. But we still had 50% of our players over 2000. Majur Juac beat all comers by knocking off both Andrew Samuelson and Michael Carollo, who both split the second place prize. The ACC Ladder saw Rahil Shah continue his domination from last month with a sole, first place finish. And he continued that rapid growth of his rating - watch out for this little guy in near-term tournaments, like the VA Open, chess fans! That was it for ACC events this month. Too many other large events this month so there was no Scholastic nor a Saturday Action, both return in March (on the 17th and 24th, respectively)!
January 27, 2011
ACC Jan. Wrap-Up
RECORD NUMBERS !! The January Friday Action grew by 50% as we saw 22 players enter the event! Happy, Happy! Joy, Joy !! (That's for any of you old Ren & Stimpy cartoon fans out there). We had 3 perfect scores as Kevin Wang, Andrew Samuelson and Majur Juac sliced through the competition with 3-0 records. On the ACC Ladder, A.R. Chrisney, Andrew Mao and Rahil Shah dominated with 3-0 scores. "Congrats" to both Andrew and Rahil who are beating all of their opponents and quickly raising their ratings! This month the new scholastic tournament had to be cancelled so no "news" on that front however this month's Saturday Action was held the morning after a very icy/stormy evening but we still had 14 intrepid players make it out (frankly, the roads were nearly perfect so "Boo!" on all of you who skipped the event). Oladapu Adu and Kevin Wang were each nicked along the way but held true to the end to record tie scores of 4-1 out of 5 games. As a matter of fact, all of the top boards were nicking each other with wins and draws so the outcome wasn't clear until the very last games were played. Thanks to all of you Masters and Experts for such a fine display of fighting chess!!
December 24, 2011
ACC Dec. Wrap-Up
In the December Friday Action, 14 players entered the event. Kevin Wang sliced through the competition with a 3-0 win by knocking off Joe Chen and Dino Obregon before polishing off Srdjan Darmanovic. This set up a four way tie for second amongst Darmanovic, Obregon, Majur Juac, and a surgent Karl Peterson. The event was notable for the effect that early withdrawals have on future pairings. On the ACC Ladder, Gary Rinehart charged from behind to secure 1st place all alone for the month at 2.5/4.0 for his SECOND outright ladder win of the year! Go to the "tournament" page to see the results for each month of the year. And the end of the year saw Rene Stolbach (19.5) capture the yearly Ladder contest followed by Aguirre (18.0), Rinehart (17.0), Menelik (15.5), Slack (15.5), Ehle (14.5), Hashim (14.0), Chrisney (12.5), Wilson (12.0), Muehl (11.5), Saunders (11.0), and Kousen (10.0).
December 23, 2011
ACC Holiday Party
Ladder games! An Action event! Puzzles, food, sodas, and chess! Over 30 club members showed up to have fun celebrating the holidays playing chess. A good time was had by all! Where were you? ACC's Ladder runs every Friday nearly every week of the year. Every month is run like a tournament with the player with the best record winning a $50 prize. To close out the year, Gary Rinehart came from behind to win the month with a score of 2.5/4.0. - his second monthly win of the year! We also had 14 players enter the Action event allowing us to award 3 top prizes plus an U1800 prize (see related article for results). Also, a few photos were added to the club photo section. It was a great end to the year!