Gold medal

The World Youth chess festival wrapped up in Brazil this week. The U.S. delegation turned in a phenomenal result, capturing the gold medal in the U8 Open and the silver medal in the U10 Open sections. Awonder Liang and Ruifeng Li, respectively, accomplished these remarkable feats. (Incidentally, I still outrate Liang by more than one hundred points, but seeing as he's seven years old, I don't think that's all that impressive!) Other top American finishers were Sarah Chiang (Girls U14) and Jeffrey Xiong (U12 Open). Congratulations to all of the competitors, and thank you to the trainers, coaches, and families for all of their support of U.S. chess in general and these U.S. chess players in particular!

Speaking of chess, I would be remiss for failing to mention that the New York Knights won a dramatic U.S. Chess League championship match last weekend. This is their first title since 2009 and second overall (not bad for a league that's only in its seventh year!). Top board GM Georgi Kacheishvili also won Game of the Week honors for his victory over Chicago GM Mesgen Amanov, which he concluded in fine style with the rare and difficult bishop-and-knight versus king checkmate. Congratulations to the Knights!

As for me, I don't have any tournaments scheduled for the near future. I may play a match sometime next month, but otherwise I will just wait and see what the tournament calendar brings my way. There are a couple upcoming events that look interesting, but for various reasons the scheduling won't work out. It's a bummer, but I'm trying to use the time to study and improve so that when I do return to tournament play I will be stronger than when I entered my winter hibernation.

And while I'm at it, a hearty congratulations to my friend Dave Carter, who last month was once again crowned Vermont State Chess Champion following his perfect score at the Vermont Open in Middlebury, VT. Way to go, Dave!