Thursday last the Schenectady Club held another in the series of casual summer events. This time out it was a Game in 10 round robin of six players. Overall, this may have been the strongest of all. We had leading the seeding list Philip Sells, followed by Peter Henner and Tim Wright from the Albany Club. Joining them were Richard Chu and Cory Northrup of Schenectady and a visitor, Tom Clark of Voorheesville.
Henner and Sells began by winning their games in rounds one and two. They met in the third round and Sells won that game. He handily took his points in rounds four and five finishing with a perfect 5 - 0 score. This was the first time the highest rated player prevailed in one of our Just for Fun events. An excellent result in which Mr. Sells demonstrated his skill at speed chess.
Following was Peter Henner, just back from several weeks in Mongolia, scoring 3 - 2. Besides his loss to Sells, Peter was upset by Tom Clark in a last minute fumble. This kept alive the pattern of upsets of higher rated players in the summer series. The aforementioned Mr. Clark and Tim Wright were next at even 2 ½ - 2 ½ scores. Our president, Richard Chu came next at 1 ½ - 3 ½. Cory Northrup this week was the tail ender getting to just ½ - 4 ½. This half-point was important. It came in his game with Chu. These two have been battling all summer with Cory holding a significant lead in the score between them. This time Richard held the draw. These summer events have not had many draws in them. Mr. Chu set the record this week by notching three(!) in one tourney.
When I saw Peter Henner at the Albany Club on Wednesday evening and had the opportunity to invite him to the doings on Thursday, there was the chance to say something I never imagined getting to say: How are things in Mongolia? Look for Peter’s comments, maybe about Mongolia and certainly about chess in his column in the Altamont Enterprise, a weekly newspaper for the Hilltowns of Albany County.
This Thursday’s event is the last one planned for the summer. Despair not, because John Barnes is directing a Game 5 Minute tournament on August 18 at the Schenectady Club. Details, registration, prizes, etc., will probably be in one of Bill Townsend’s Saturday columns in the Schenectady Gazette. And, if you haven’t heard, there is casual chess under the Arcade at Proctor’s Mondays during the lunch hour just in case you need a midday chess fix.
The little local boom of chess opportunity continues to roll along. All clubs welcome visitors and are happy to find new members. There are opportunities to play at Albany on Wednesdays, Schenectady on Thursdays, the Guilderland Public Library on Fridays, in Saratoga Sunday nights, Troy, the Uncle Sam Chess Club, Wednesday evenings. Those I am sure of. There are couple of more. The East Greenbush Club meets on Wednesdays and the Greenwich Club meets Thursdays. Details, addresses and contact information is set out under the title “Clubs” at this web site. So, other than a dark day on Tuesdays and having Saturdays free for lawn mowing or the occasional weekend Swiss, you can find chess around the Capital District. Go out and play!
More soon.
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