Chess Parents who also play chess

Questions: how many chess parent(s) themselves play competition chess? I have been curious about this question. When I first got into chess parenting and was scouring the Internet for chess information and resources, I came across this website: 50 Chess Games for Beginners (http://www.50chessgames.freeserve.co.uk/) by father and son team, Douglas and Ian MacGregor. If you enter their website and scroll down the menu toolbar on the left, there is a bit of a write-up about the MacGregors. It is interesting to note that Ian (son) has progressed to about Elo 1740 in 2006 whilst Douglas is sort of hovering at Elo 1200. "To begin with Douglas helped Ian with his chess. Now it is the other way round !" Sound familiar?



In Sydney, I know of several father and son/daughter chess playing combinations. There is Jason Koh (ACF 1359) and Clarise (ACF 1090) and Cedric Koh (ACF 1474) (St George Chess Club), Tony Lau (ACF 1307) and Joshua Lau (1643), Jean Pretorius (ACF 986) and Jana Pretorius (ACF 751) and Helen Pretorius (ACF175??), Vladimir Smirnov (ACF 2324) and Anton Smirnov (ACF 1495), Denis Wan (ACF 1524) and Kinto Wan (ACF 1402), Konrad Zielinski (ACF 1600) and Dane Zielinski-Nicolson (980). Any others? What about mother and son/daughter?



With all these exemplars, for this year I thought it was about time for me to take the plunge and start playing competition chess. So I started playing in club competitions at Ryde Eastwood Leagues Club Chess Club together with my son. First there was a 9-rounds Rapid (25') over three weeks. My results weren't that good, 1.5/9 but with the consolation of scoring my first win with White. Of course, my son was a different story altogether, him scoring 5/9. Next was (and ongoing) the Club Championship Preliminaries (90' for 40 moves + 30' for rest of the game). I have played four rounds so far and I am afraid it is 0/4. Ouch!!! My son is standing on 3/4. Sigh!!!



Turning overseas, and on a different plane to us mere mortals (at least I mean me, merely ACF 900-1000 (??)), at the recent 7th Gibtelecom Chess Festival, the tournament bulletin ran the story of chess kids whose parents are chess Grandmasters. There is Anna (mother is GM Pia Cramling and father is GM Juan Manuel Bellon), and Weronica Socko (GM Bartosz Socko and GM Monika Socko).

(l-r: GM Pia Cramling, Anna, Weronika)


There is also Tommy Polgar, son of GM Susan Polgar, eldest of the world famous Polgar sisters. Of course, Judit took time off chess to have two children. Hmmmmm! And Sofia, the middle daughter, has two children as well. Hmmmm! The next generation of Polgars ready to conquer the world, again!?

I wonder if there is any story of the reverse situation, that of parent and child becoming grandmasters either together or the parent becoming a GM after the child? The parent being inspired by the child's achievement? Anyone game to try?

Juniors from other countries

Following on from the previous post, I thought I will do a brief and very cursory round up of the leading juniors worldwide.

Of course there is Magnus Carlsen (came so very close to winning at Corus, 3rd at Linares and currently leading in Blindfold but 3rd overall in Amber) and Hou YiFan (who inexplicably crashed in the last rounds of the recent 1st Women's Grand Prix) but enough have been written about them. If you wish to find out more, just google ......

An amazing story is that of FM Anish Giri, from Russia but presently living in the Netherlands, who has recently garnered his 3rd GM norm at the Corus Chess tournament in Wijk aan See at the age of 14 years, seven months and two days and is currently the youngest GM-elect in the world. Anish has also achieved the very rare feat of jumping straight from FM to GM. Another former junior who achieved the same feat was former World Champion, Vladimir Kramnik. http://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=5188 His mother is Russian and his father Nepalese. He came joint second in Corus C with GMTiger Hillarp Persson with 8.5/13. (Pinoy junior GM Wesley So won the event with 9.5/13.) He was also guest annotator for Chessbase for the recent Linares tournament together with GM Mihail Marin when GM Rogozenko became ill (http://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=5258).

Another amazing 14 y.o is IM Ray Robson from the USA. In Jan-Feb, he accompanied his coach, GM Alexander Onischuk to Russia to participate in the 2009 Moscow Open. (Onischuk's article from USCF Chess Life Online which includes an annotated game by Ray himself: http://main.uschess.org/content/view/9119/517/) Following his coach, Ray then competed in the very strong Aeroflot Open 2009 but only managed 3.5/9 coming 61st/78 ahead of many other GMs. (GM Wesley So only managed 5/9.) Ray has been hunting for his GM norm and was unsuccessful in this recently concluded tournament, SPICE Spring Invitational (March 16-22, Lubbock, Texas): http://www.depts.ttu.edu/spice/SPICE_Spring_Invitational.php Here is an article on how Ray got his third IM norm back in Dec 2007: http://main.uschess.org/content/view/8068/427/ Included is an interview with his father, Gary Robson. Yes, Ray is a gifted kid, home-schooled (then in 2007), spends 3-5 hours a day on chess. He achieved his three IM norms in three months (Oct-Dec 2007)!

Another junior to keep an eye out for is Ukrainian 12 y o IM Illya Nyzhnyk currently rated at Elo 2503. He came into prominence when he won Gp B at the Moscow Open 2007 when he was only 10 with a score of 8.5/9 and a rating performance of 2633 (http://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=3655). He is the 2008 EYCC U16 champion. At the recent 10th European Individual Chess Championship 2009, he scored 6.5/11 and came 71st/306. Here is a link to a video of Illya conducting a simul carrying his white teddy: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bGwDRgVOhZs. And here is his personal website: http://www.dril-chess.com/ BTW, any idea how to pronounce his name? Perhaps we should stick to his nickname, dril?

Applications for Junior International Events

Things have been a bit busy since semester began at Uni. There was a reminder from a reader on the fact the last posting was a month ago. Yipes! Well, if I get more readers leaving comments, I might be encouraged to post more regularly.

Anyhow, on with the blogging ......

In case you have not been informed, currently the Australian Junior Chess League (AusJCL) has made the call for applications for Junior International Events. The original deadline was 22nd March but this has now been extended to 29th March. Get in while you still have time.

Some events on offer:
World Youth Age Championships (U8-U18) November 11-23 Turkey
Asean Youth Championships (U8-18)
Asian Youth Age Championships (U8-U18) June 10-19 Vietnam
World Junior Championships (U20) October 16-29 Argentina
Asian Junior Championship (U20) May 20-28 Sri Lanka
Commonwealth Championships (U8-U20) July 19-27 Ipoh, Malaysia
(All of these have both an open and a girls division)

World U16 Olympiad which is an open teams tournament TBA Turkey

Some of these events have their own websites. AusJCL also has a new website (http://www.australianjuniorchess.org.au/) with extensive information on international junior tournaments. I think it pays to go through the rather lengthy and unwieldy web page but is worth it.

Personally, I have never taken my son to participate in any international junior events. One factor is the cost involved. But a more niggling factor is the playing strength of my son. Somehow, I am of the opinion that he is not playing at sufficient strength to warrant the cost of overseas tournaments. I have followed the various international juniors events closely and one observation I offer: some countries are very serious and their juniors are very strong.

It is interesting to read AusJCL ratings guidelines for overseas play:

U8 Open and U8 Girls - No rating restriction

U10 Open - ACF rating 700+

U10 Girls - ACF rating 500+

U12 Open - ACF rating 1200+

U12 Girls - ACF rating 900+

U14 Open - ACF rating 1400+

U14 Girls - ACF rating 1000+

U16 Open - ACF rating 1600+

U16 Girls - ACF rating 1200+

U18 Open - ACF rating 1800+

U18 Girls - ACF rating 1500+

U20 Open - ACF rating 2000+

U20 Girls - ACF rating 1600+

Of course, if your aim is to let your child has fun and experience of playing overseas, then these ratings are a good guide. But if you are serious about chess and want your child to competitive, then I am afraid these ratings guide are inadequate.

Contrast this with Singapore CF's guidelines for their National Youth Squad (Silver) (2nd ranked squad):

Age Expected FIDE/SCF Rating (whichever is higher)
17 - 2300 and above
16 - 2200-2299
15 - 2100-2199
14 - 2000-2099
13 - 1900-1999
12 - 1800-1899
11 - 1700-1799
10 - 1600-1699
9 - 1500-1599
8 and below - 1400-1499
(Girls are considered at 200 rating points below the above guide)

In my reading of the recent history of Australian juniors overseas, only Raymond Song has managed a credible result in 1995 World Youth. (see my previous post on this.)

However, this year, we ,may possibly see two very strong U12 NSW players heading overseas (if selected), Sean Gu (as Australian U12 National Champion) and Anton Smirnov. I wish them luck.