February 2010
We closed out 2009 in high spirits with a highly successful Holiday Party on 12/18/09. Everyone who came brought so much pizza and so many delicious desserts, snacks, and soda that we were all floating in food within an hour. We ran a 3-Round Game/10 tournament,
which Max Chiu-hsin Lu won with a perfect score of 3 points; we followed that with a team quad Bughouse tournament., which Team I (Todd Chase and Hao-yuan Pai) won with a perfect score of 3 points. This is certainly the first Bughouse Tournament WCC has held for a long time, if ever, and I look forward to many more. Thanks to everyone who came, brought food, and played.
The Waltham Chess Club meets every Friday evening from 7 PM through the evening, sometimes burning the post-midnight oil. Our website is http://walthamchessclub.org, including directions to our site at the IBM Building (404 Wyman Street in Waltham), and our schedule of events (which can also be found on the MACA website calendar).
Some highlights from the last few months:
- Tomas Girnius took first place in the Festival of Lights G/60 in December, with a score of 2 points.
- Frank Sisto took first place in the First Friday in January with a score of 6.5 out of 7 points.
- We were delighted to welcome International GM Arthur Bisguier, and welcome back Edward Epp, to the MLK G/60 in January. Todd Chase and Matthew James Webber took first and second prizes with scores of 2 points and 1.5 points respectively.
- Todd Chase took first prize in the January G/25 with a perfect score of 3 points, while George Comeau took the first under-1500 prize with a score of 2 out of 3 points.
- We are honored to welcome SM Denys Shmelov to our club. In a tough field that included Gregory Kaden, Todd Chase, and Frank Sisto, Denys took first prize in the First Friday in February with a score of 6 out of 7 points.
- In our first Wild Card event in February, we held a 5-Round G/15. We were pleased to have Patrick Sciacca join us that night, and he and Tomas Girnius took first and second prizes with scores of 5 and 4 points respectively. We were also happy to welcome back Barbara Peskin. Free pizza was served that night, and I thank everyone who made donations to cover the cost.
Finally, I intend to publish regularly in Chess Horizons one featured game from a WCC tournament. If you have a score of a game that you’d like to see in print, turn it in to me and I’ll write up an article. Annotations are welcome but not necessary.
Thanks to all those who have come to Waltham on Friday night and helped our club to grow and prosper. |