Caissa Hong Kong Chess Club

chess in hong kong

National Blitz Championship 2015: four National Champions from Caissa

June 28th, 2015

HKCF National Blitz 2015

The Hong Kong Chess Federation 1st National Blitz Championship was an important event in various ways. It would, for the first time in decades, hand out formal National Champion titles and as such formal entitlement to represent Hong Kong in international events. Also, the event was FIDE rated and along the youth age categories there was this time also an Open section for adults.

And the event was a great success for Caissa players, young and old! We already alluded to the fact that some of our players were smoking hot on our chess party yesterday, such that prizes would seriously expected to be within reach, the actual results were better than we could expect.

NA Sydney Lai gives instructions to the youth section

In U8 we only had 2 Caissa students, Seth and Mahir. Mahir, among the youngest in this age group, played his first tournament and scored 3 points but gained lots of experience which is the only goal in your first tournament. Seth, whose strength lies in longer chess games, with 6 points out of 11 had a good tournament in a 3 minutes + 2 seconds time control.

Congratulations to the top 3, Steven, Zeth and Samach who all played in one of the Caissa YGP events and scored well there too. Here are all results of U8.

In U10 we had our hot shot students Samuel, Kevin, Meijing, Aaditya and Miguel Angel lined up with Caissa member Harold.

Miguel Angel proved to be strongest player in this age group: congratulations Champ! Aaditya ended 4th just one place out of a prize. Meijing became Girl Champion – there was unfortunately only one girl. We are very proud of all our students who scored many points. Also congrats to our long time chess friends Adrian and Gerent with their 2nd and 3rd place.

Miguel Angel National Blitz Champion U10!

Mei Jing U10 Champion Girl 2015

In U12 our Caissa gunners were Jay, Richard and Oliver. Jay has had very limited practice in 3 minutes + 2 seconds but still managed to score 4 points.

Although in the direct confrontation Oliver beat Richard, it was Richard who managed to stay on top after 11 rounds impressively defeating all other top 6 players. Oliver just fell out of prizes on 4th place and big congrats to Richard with his National Champion title.

Richard National Blitz Champion U12

All other players were pooled in the Open group. From Caissa we had Tejpal, Koji, Conrad, Melvin and Long participating.

Tejpal just (re)started chess recently and this tournament is for him to oil his engine. The 3.5 points scored is not bad after a very long time hiatus. Koji and Conrad managed to score 5 points, just short of 50% ending solidly in the middle range.

The U16 and other age categories higher than U12 were pooled in the Open and Melvin with 5.5 points ended 6th place overall but that score brought him the title of National Champion U16. Well done Melvin, we are proud of you!

In Open, Long, our 2 times in a row Caissa champion in our Friday evening cycles, ended 2nd place and was the only person to draw against the new National Champion Daniel. Well done Long! And congratulations to our friend Daniel too.

Melvin U16 National Blitz Champion

Long Open National Blitz Runner Up

HK Open Local 2014 – Typhoon Kalmaegi Impacts Round 3

September 16th, 2014

Last year around this time we organized the FIDE Trainers Seminar in Hong Kong when Super Typhoon Usagi hit town. Last Monday it was Typhoon Kalmaegi that paid us a visit – unfortunately in the late evening of the HKCF organized HK Local Open.

Typhoon Kalmaegi covering Hong Kong skies

It was announced just after 9pm that Signal 8 would be hoisted around 10.30pm, and we all know this means: the whole town would be coming to a stop by then in terms of e.g., transportation.

This year’s edition attracts a good crowd but from Caissa we only have two members playing, David and Michel – both of whom needed to get the 10pm ferry to Discovery Bay or get stuck until next morning in a “typhoon shelter” (bar) or so.

Coincidentally David and Michel, the players to have to travel probably farthest to get home were also the last to play. David, with white, after coming out of the opening well with his favorite Veresov Richter attack against highest rated FM Luen-Wah Luk, stood firm in the middle game and at the end of the middle game had a slighly better position, also on the clock. However, a draw was agreed also as to avoid the chance of getting stuck in Kalmaegi’s embrace.

Michel, with black, dominated the position until the end against Raymond Wu but under pressure to leave exchanged his bishop for a forward pawn when Raymond didn’t agree to a draw – nonetheless Michel had to forfeit the game as there was no time to continue in order to be back in time.

Brian Wong, against Joe Lau, and Alberto Muniz (against Jonathan Ho) won their games and are the only players with 3 points – meeting each other next week. Another interesting game next week will be between Luen-Wah Luk and Chor-Yuen Chong both among the highest rated players.

HK Open Local 2014 attracting a good crowd (photo from round 1)

Cross Table Ranking after Round 3 and Pairing Round 4

Richard Takasumi wins HKCA Student Challengers U12 and Michael Yang wins HKCF Open

October 29th, 2013

HKCA Student Challenger

Last Saturday and Sunday the Hong Kong Chess Association held the October 2013 edition of their Student Challengers Tournaments in which youth players up until 18 years are mixed in one group but play for prizes in their specific age groups.

Winner U18 and overall winner was Raphael Chang with 7.5 points out of 8 games. Overall numbers 2 and 3 were James Kwong and Ronald Choy who ended numbers 1 and 2 in the U9 age category, both with an impressive 6 points.

In the U12 age group, Ernest Cheung, Benjamin Oh and Caissa’s Richard Takasumi ended with 5.5 points but Richard claimed first prize on tie-break. Congratulations Richard and to all other prize winners!

Richard Takasumi Wins 1st prize U12

See here for full results: HKCA Oct 2013 Tournament_Results

HKCF Hong Kong Open Local

On a dramatic last Monday Andrew Leung, who had been on top position for several weeks, lost his game against Christopher Masters. Because Michael Yang beat Jake Chan, Michael was able to recover his loss from round 4 against Andrew to end first position with 5.5 points, half a point more than Andrew. Congratulations Michael! Also congrats for Andrew, Christopher and Ritesh Mahajan for their top spots.

Luen-Wah Luk, after a “false start” climbed at cost of Lin Wai Kit to 6th position just under Jake Chan. Joe Lau lost his 3rd consecutive game against earlier mentioned Ritesh and as Hysan Wong drew against Pak Tuen Cheung they all ended with 4 points in the top 10.

The number 10 position was for Caissa’s David Garceran Nieuwenburg who after a deep descent in the first few rounds managed to climb up, in the last round against Sang Tsz Tang who in the late middle game had the better position but lost track of the right way forward in the endgame with some time pressure.

Final Cross Table Hong Kong Open 2013

Hong Kong Chess Championship 2013 Preliminaries – Participant List Published

January 25th, 2013

The list of registered players counted 46 for the Hong Kong Chess Championship 2013 Preliminaries. Round 1: Monday 28 January.

Alberto Muniz Pardino - Sportmanship

Last year’s top players, Hong Ki Tsang, Andrew Koenigsberg, Bryan Lee and Alberto Muniz Pardino were pre-qualified for the Finals. Alberto, however, opted out of his right to pre-qualify and he will play again, all the way from the bottom. That mindset we appreciate! With already so little play in Hong Kong, missing out 9 games of chess in these preliminaries seems a waste of an opportunity. Alberto has a true chess heart. And he runs (or ran?) Marathons …

By the way, ‘all the way from the bottom’, doesn’t mean a walk in the park. With Brian Dew, Luen-Wah Luk and Chak Man Chan we have three masters participating.

Also, 19 of the 46 players are rated and of the non-rated players there are a some strong performers from various tournaments held last year, including some talented youth players.

From Caissa we have Peter Whalley, Hannah Ball and David Garceran Nieuwenburg participating who together with Jean-Sebastien Bret will be tasked to defend Discovery Bay’s honor.

We’ll do our best.

Hong Kong Juniors Open 2012 – Participants List Published

November 23rd, 2012

One of the yearly main event organized by HKFC is the Juniors Open. In 4 age categories, U18, U13 (on December 1 & 2), U10 and U7 (on December 2 only) Hong Kong’s youth will compete for the age categories titles.

Caissa has 8 players participating. In the U13 category with 46 players Sophie Whalley will play her first tournament and it will be an exciting experience to participate in one of the main youth chess events in Hong Kong as a first time tournament experience.

In the U10 category we have Bryant Chong, Ruaidhri Neville, Chor Wei Tang and Franz Herrmann all sure to score some points from among the 87 players in this age category.

In the U7 group of 38 players Miguel Angel Garceran Wang and his sister Mei Jing together with Aleesha Naqvi will compete for honor and glory.

Stay tuned!

Hong Kong Open Chess 2012 Round 6

October 23rd, 2012

As this competition takes place over just 7 rounds, the 6th round last Monday turned into an evening with impact. To start with, Caissa’s David Garceran Nieuwenburg with white could not get his rhythm into the game against Alberto Muniz. The queen’s pawn opening, responded to by black with 1 … g6, turned into a Sicilian which was a strong weapon enough in the hands of Alberto to hand David his first defeat.

L.W. Luk (FM), with white also, accumulated incremental positional advantages such that C.K. Yeung found his pieces too loosely coordinated to stop white’s victory. In the last round next week we have the pleasure of anticipating some fireworks between L.W. Luk and Alberto – the winner becoming the champion. A draw, however, still offers David G.N. and Sydney S.W. Lai perspectives to claim the title as well if they would win their games next week.

And Sydney is in hot steaming form, very fast on the clock and creatively aggressive, as Aravind Mahadevan experienced well last Monday, losing with the white pieces.

Brian Shin climbed up to 5th place by defeating Michael Yang and he will face David G.N. next week.

Billy Lo climbed up to 7th position by winning from Ian Scott; Ian’s first loss over the board. Seth Levine beat Jake C.L. Chan and next week we can expect another firework match between Seth and Billy.

It’ll be interesting next week.

Rank after 6 rounds and pairing for round 5 in Hong Kong Chess Open 2012

Hong Kong Open Chess 2012 Round 4

October 10th, 2012

After a couple of weeks after round 3, on Monday 8 October round 4 was played in the Hong Kong Open 2012 at Queen Elisabeth Stadium. The round started a little later than 6.30pm due to missing boards, but it went on smoothly after that.

Seth Levine, the rank leader after 3 rounds, saw his position deteriorate against Luen-Wah Luk quickly and had to admit defeat rather soon.

Billy Lo’s loss to C.K. Yeung and the win of David Garceran Nieuwenburg against Sydney Lai (in a Veresov (against) French with Nf6), couples David now to C.K., both with 3.5 points at the top of the table, to a match next week in round 5.

Alberto Muniz put his white pieces such that Brian Shin on the black side had no more good moves left despite the board being full with pieces. Alberto’s 3rd straight win keeps him at a 100% score and he will meet Seth and the young talent Michael Yang, who also scored his 3rd win, will meet the unbeaten Leun-Wah in round 5.

From the bottom we see two forces emerge, both Ian Scott, who missed the first 2 rounds, and Peter Whalley, who was rusty the first 2 rounds, are gradually moving up to where they belong … but in round 5 they will meet each other first …

Rank after 4 rounds and pairing for round 5 in Hong Kong Chess Open 2012

Hong Kong Open Chess Round 2

September 11th, 2012

In round 2 we unfortunately saw a couple of empty boards and consequently some regulatory wins and losses: too bad.

A board that remained empty for a long time was Sydney’s who arrived with only 30 minutes left on his clock, and despite his opponent being FM Luen-Wah, the game resulted in a draw!

Another remarkable game was played between Seth against Michael. Michael is clearly a very talented youth, but as he was multi-tasking and reading his book when Seth was in deep thoughts to find the best moves, he did not put up serious resistance enough on the board to neutralize Seth’s kingside attack.

Perhaps the most remarkable game was played between Caissa’s Peter and Aravind. Peter had pushed his pawns on the kingside up to pressure his opponent into a very defensive position.

Peter plays 0-0-0 ...

The position looked more or less like the diagram above when Peter found an in principle logical move, castling long to get more firepower behind his advanced king pawns. Yet, it turned out to be a checkmate in 1, to himself, when Aravind responded to 0-0-0 with Rc8xc3+…

Next week we will follow Caissa’s members in round 3 when Peter will play against Joe Lau and David will face Billy Lo.

Ranking after 2 rounds:

Hong Kong Chess Open 2012 Ranking after Round 2

Round 1 Youth Competition 2012-13

September 7th, 2012

After having warmed up since June, finally the first Thursday of September had arrived … to start the competition.

We had a special evening because the Discovery College squad to participate in the Quarry Bay ESF organized chess tournament had joined for their chess practice.

Full House Round 1 Caissa Chess Club Hong Kong Youth Tournament

Max smiling as Miguel and Krijn (foreground) and the two Aryans (background) meet on the board

Round 1 was fireworks all over the place. Etienne had just a lonely king but Connor did not know how to move his pieces into a check mate plan and because of repeat of moves this game resulted in a draw. Something similar happened with Bryant and Chor Wei, when Bryant won on time but with only a king left, without check mate potential, the game ended in a draw. After the game Chor Wei was explained how to give check mate with two rooks (extra) and next time a situation like this will definitely result in a win.

Aleesha, who preferred to stand and was a bit far from the clock … lost on time against Lucas and because Meijing lost against Jonathan it was Manon who saved the girls’ honor by winning from Julien who tried out chess for the first time. Well done Manon, but also very good effort from Julien – keep it up!

Despite a good fight Jay could not hold Wilson and Krijn could not stop Miguel Angel from winning. Max lost a bravely played game against Aryan Shetty and Aryan Jain beat Ginu in a tough game.

Finally Ruaidhri beat Vaibhav and Mees scored a point against Franz.

Ranking after Round 1

Caissa Has New Hong Kong Champion Blitz Chess Under 8 Years Old

May 26th, 2012

On what started as a rainy Saturday 26 May 2012, the Hong Kong Chess Federation organized its first youth Blitz tournament in three age groups: under 18, under 11 and under 8 years old.

In the category under 8 Caissa’s Miguel Angel Garceran Wang played an excellent tournament and pushed the competition, including top seed like Marco King Buet Ching, Peter Daiyang Zhao and Ben Jabal, off the board after 6 rounds and 6 wins. Perhaps the knowledge he was already number 1 and champion no matter the result of the last round took away the necessary adrenaline to beat his last opponent as well – but with 6 out of 7 Miguel Angel proved to be a special talent!

The final ranking after 7 rounds.