Chess Info Sites

The best place to find out about chess in and around Victoria are at the club websites. Chess Victoria's website has some information, but it is tough to navigate and focuses mainly on events that Chess Victoria runs itself. However, there are useful sites to find out about chess news in Victoria.

At least 2 clubs that I know of create excellent newsletters. Box Hill Chess Club has been producing it's newsletter under the editorship of Gerrit Hartland for quite a while now (though I'm not sure exactly how long....at least 5 years I would say). This is a weekly publication, which is a truly remarkable effort by the Box hill and Canterbury Junior chess clubs! As club newsletters are a combination of voluntary contributions put together by a devoted editor, the content can vary. There will always be club information in Box Hill's newsletters, including recent results and upcoming tournaments. There are sometimes games, and sometimes analysis. I think IM Michael Gluzman was annotating some games, though perhaps that was last year? A great benefit of this newsletter is that anyone can subscribe to it by joining the Box Hill mailing list and the newsletter will be sent directly to your email for free. Just contact the club by email.

Noble Park Chess Club also produce a newsletter. So far this has been one of the outstanding publications in Australian chess, at least to my mind. The newsletter will give results and detailed tournament reports including games analysis. It is a very attractive publication, colourful and with plenty of photos. It is produced about 5 times per year, roughly coinciding with the start of each of their main tournaments (though I wouldn't be surprised if there is a special newsletter for the club weekend event next week!).

IM Robert Jamieson also produces a newsletter, called "On The Move". Working with the Chesskids organisation, Robert has revived a publication that the Victorian Chess Association formerly published. This is published every 2-3 months in pdf form but hard copies are produced and sent to clubs. Hopefully some of you would have seen some of them. Robert also produces a junior newsletter for chesskids, called Knight Times. While the articles are directed at Juniors this is still a newsletter for everyone. Like Box Hill's newsletter, the main distribution of these newsletter's is by email, so contact chesskids and get these for free!

A couple of other places to find out news and information about Victorian Chess are the ACF newsletter and the Australian Junior Chess League's newsletter, both of which can be subscribed to for free. The ACF newsletter is currently not being produced while a new editor is sought, and the AJCL's bulletin is not a regular publication. However, when produced, both of these give excellent information, some of which is pertinent to Victoria.

I very much enjoy reading these local publications and especially seeing photos. I wonder if any other clubs are producing newsletters in Victoria?

Sources of Information

This blog will only ever be as good as the information it presents. At the moment, I am trawling through club websites, the State Association website and other organisations to try to find information to put on the calendar, and to write posts about. But I'm only one person, and this site would be a whole lot better if others contributed information about events, stories, news or anything related to chess in Melbourne and Victoria. Last week I received an email from Nigel Barrow about a school tournament in Bendigo which I immediately put up here. As long as the material is not offensive (there isn't usually much offensive to do with chess tournaments or hangouts) I will happily promote Victorian chess events here.

Today, I met with Chess Victoria President Leonid Sandler for a coffee and a chat. We regularly meet up to talk about the local chess scene, and chess generally. The upcoming Olympiad was the main subject of discussion. Leonid and I are both immigrants to this country and will both be following our countries of birth closely (Latvia and England), but we will of course be hoping for Australian success. While there are no Victorians represented in the men's team, we have Sally Yu representing the women's team and many of our youngsters representing Australia at the youth Olympiad which is being run alongside the main event. We wish good luck to all Australian Olympians!

Leonid and I did have a mild disagreement about this site, and the Chess Victoria website. I have been very critical of the CV website and Leonid explained that their website had been hacked 3 times and they were having difficulty recovering after these attacks. I don't know why anyone would want to attack a chess site or whether it was part of a hack on a wider scale. But at least for the moment, Chess Victoria's website is suffering a little. He assured me that all the necessary information can still be found on website, and that was where the main disagreement occurred! Look, I hope that CV get a good website together, and I would certainly be willing to pass on all the information from this site AND still write a news blog here.

Leonid also pointed out that FM Nick Speck has made a comeback to competitive chess in Malaysia. Nick scored 6.5/9 on board 1 in the Rapid teams event, and will hopefully be another Victorian IM soon. Nick didn't play for the Australian team in the tournament, but played in a team with fellow Victorian resident Wang Sheng Lee (Singapore).

Melbourne's Chess Week 27/08/2012-2/09/2012

Winter is a great time to be playing chess, and there is a lot of chess happening around the Melbourne area at the moment. The clubs are all active, junior chess is flourishing, and some of our players are representing Australia at the Olympiad in Turkey starting Monday 27th.

Find links to where you can play chess in Victoria here, and check out the calendar to see if there are upcoming events near you. I will be trying to update these regularly, but please tell me if there are things missing or wrong by email on carl.coffeehousechess@gmail.com.

Thanks

Carl

Mon 27 Aug 2012 
19:00 - 23:30 E. Malitis Memorial
Where: 66 Leicester St, Fitzroy

Tue 28 Aug 2012 
09:00 - 14:00 chesskids interschool Pakenham

09:00 - 14:30 chesskids interschool, Bacchus Marsh

19:30 - 23:00 HBCC Koshnitsky Cup
Where: Hobson's Bay Chess Club

19:45 - 23:45 Box Hill Masters
Where: Box Hill Chess Club

Wed 29 Aug 2012
09:00 - 14:00 chesskids interschool, Melton

Thu 30 Aug 2012 
09:00 - 14:00 chesskids interschool, Williamstown

18:00 - 19:00 Croydon Junior Club Cahmpionship
Where: Croydon Chess Club

19:30 - 23:00 Frost, Croydon Chess Club
Where: Croydon Chess Club

Fri 31 Aug 2012 
09:00 - 14:00 chesskids interschool, Cheltenham

19:45 - 23:45 Box Hill Club Championship
Where: Box Hill Chess Club

Sat 1 Sep 2012 
10:00 - 12:00 Junior Coaching
Where: 66 Leicester St, Fitzroy 

14:00 - 17:45 Allegro
Where: 66 Leicester St, Fitzroy 

15:00 - 19:00 Noble Park Masters and Challengers
Where: Noble Park Chess Club

19:00 - 20:30 Blitz!
Where: 66 Leicester St, Fitzroy

Sun 2 Sep 2012
Fitzroy Skittles
Where: 66 Leicester St, Fitzroy

Warrnambool Weekender announced

President of Chess Victoria, Leonid Sandler has just announced the Warrnambool Weekender will be run on the weekend of 17-18 November in partnership between Warrnambool Chess Club and Chess Victoria. Details of the event and online registration can be found on Warrnambool Chess Club's website.

Chess Victoria President Leonid Sandler, as seen on his website

Live Chess at the MCC

The Melbourne Chess Club has been holding a play off match for its Club Championship between IM Guy West and FM Dusan Stojic. These 2 ties for the Championship earlier in the year, and are now playing a 4 game match for the title. Tonight is the last game with the score standing at 2-1 in favour of Dusan Stojic. So a draw will guarantee Dusan the title, while a win for Guy will take the match into faster games play off. The game can be seen here, and I'll post it later.

Great chess poster, courtesy of Jean Watson

Well, it was a tense finale. Guy tried to unbalance the situation, but Dusan was always up to the task of countering Guy's threats. Perhaps there were some chances that Guy missed, but nothing so obvious or seemingly much better. So finally, Dusan came out the victor of the game, and the winner in the match and is the 2012 Melbourne Chess Club Champion.

Best in the West

Hobson's Bay Chess Club ran the 30th edition of their Best in the West Weekender in the Western Melbourne seaside suburb of Altona this past weekend. It was also the biggest turn out for this event with just under 50 players competing in the 5 round event. The tournament was arbited by David Cordover who had a trouble free weekend as the tournament was played in friendly fashion.

Top seed was visiting FM Greg Canfell from Sydney, and Greg won the tournament with a picket fence 5/5.

Tournament winner, FM Greg Canfell

Young MCC member Jack Puccini had a great tournament finishing clear second on 4.5, ahead of a group of very strong players: FM D. Dragicevic, FM D. Stojic, Tan, Matheson and Penrose. The top local player was Dean Hogg who was among the next group on 3.5.

Most of the games were collected using the tornelo management system, and I've collected them together. My favourite game from the event follows, but you can see all the games here. You can then download them using the "export" button

Melbourne Chess Week 21/08/2012

Here's a list of what's happening around the state this week, or at least all I could find. If anyone wants to publicise events or activities, then contact me at carl.coffeehousechess@gmail.com.

My aim is to produce a comprehensive weekly round up of upcoming events and activities in Melbourne and Victoria. So far I have the been helped by Melbourne Chess Club, Noble Park Chess Club, Chess Kids, Australian Junior Chess League, Hobson's Bay Chess Club and I have trawled the net to find out information myself, but I've no doubt missed much and for that I'm sorry. Please help to keep this up to date by sending me information that should be here.

Thanks

Carl

These events and future ones can be found on the Calendar while news is available from various organisations which can be found on the links page.


Chess Events 20/08/2012-26/08/2012

Mon Aug 20, 2012
9am - 2pm Chesskids Interschool
Where: Hampton Primary School

12pm - 5pm Chess Victoria Interschool
Where: Scotch College

7.15pm-11.30pm MCC Edwin Malitis Memorial
Where: MCC

Tue Aug 21, 2012

7.30-11.00pm HBCC Koshnitsky Cup
Hobson's Bay Chess Club

7:45pm - 11:45pm Box Hill Masters
Where: Box Hill Chess Club

Wed Aug 22, 2012
9am - 2pm Chesskids Interschool
Where: Kerrimuir Primary

7:30pm - 11:30pm MCC Championship play off
Where: MCC

Thu Aug 23, 2012
9am - 2pm Chesskids Interschool
Where: Ballarat

6pm-7pm Croydon Junior Championship
Croydon Chess Club

7.45pm-11pm The Frost Winter Warmer
Croydon Chess Club

Fri Aug 24, 2012
9am - 2pm Chess Victoria Interschool
Where: Weedon Primary

9am - 2pm Chesskids Interschool
Where: Yinnar, Gippsland

7:45pm - 11:45pm Box Hill Championship
Where: Box Hill Chess Club

Sat Aug 25, 2012

2pm-5pm MCC Allegro
MCC

3pm - 7:30pm Noble Park Masters and Challengers
Where: Noble Park Chess Club

Sun Aug 26, 2012
1pm - 5pm Chesskids RJ Shield
Where: Doncaster

1pm - 5pm Chesskids RJ Shield
Where: Bentleigh

Victoria's top rated players

Chess in Victoria is not just about quantity but quality also. A look through the Australian rating lists shows a number of highly rated players in Victoria.

Top Victorians

1. 2473 D. Johansen (GM)

2. 2412 I. Goldenberg (IM)

3. 2385 M. Baron (FM)

4. 2375 B. Cheng (FM)

5. 2350 E. Teichmann (FM)

6. 2342 G. West (IM)

7. 2339 J. Morris (IM)

8. 2311 C. Wallis (FM)

9. 2311 D. Stojic (FM)

10. 2307 D. Dragicevic (FM)

Also IM Mirko Rujevic heads the lists of Senior players, Sally Yu is 5th in the women's list and 2nd in the girls list, Bobby Cheng is 2nd in U-20, 1st in U-18 and U-16, Karl Zelesco is 2nd in U-14, Enoch Fan is 2nd in U-12 while Ethan Lim is 2nd in U-10.

Features of the site

Check out both the Calendar and the Links. I'll do my best to update these, but I'm only one person so bear with me!

Calendar

You can access this from the tab at the top of the page, and it will eventually give a comprehensive guide to all chess events happening in Melbourne and Victoria. I'll even throw in some Australian and New Zealand tournaments, and some World events that may hold interest for Australians. Sorry if an event isn't on the calendar that you know of or are organising, but just send me the details and I'll put it on.

Links

Again, I'm looking for a comprehensive listing of links to do with chess. I'm starting with clubs and organisations, but I'll add individuals and other chess interest sites that are important to Melbourne and Victoria. If I've missed something, then please feel free to message the link to me and I'll put it on.

Melbourne Chess News

Welcome to my new guide to chess in Melbourne and Victoria. The aim of this project is to provide players old and new with comprehensive details of upcoming events, places to play chess, news and information about chess in Melbourne and Victoria.