News

We have published the (draft) schedule for Term 1. The dates are correct but however not completely confirmed due to the dates of our internal chess events (ABR and ADW chess tournaments held here at the ACC) are yet to be established. Same as last year, when there is a clash between the session and an internal tournament, we will run that session on a Friday (instead of Saturday) for that week.

We are starting on Saturday 1st February. I have opened the sign-ups via Trybooking. The cost is $40 per term.

Schedule: https://www.aucklandchess.nz/junior-club/
Sign-ups via Trybooking: https://www.trybooking.com/nz/VML

Happy New Year 2025! We reopen the club with a Waitangi Blitz on Monday Feb 3, then the Waitangi Weekender will be run from Feb 6 to Feb 9, on Thursday Feb 6, then Saturday and Sunday Feb 8-9. The Summer Cup starts on Feb 10 and will run for 7 rounds.

The Waitangi Weekender is an open tournament, please register for it on New Zealand Chess News.

The Waitangi Blitz and Summer Cup are Monday club events. Please register at https://www.trybooking.com/nz/events/landing/14420 (bookmark this page for the year, too).  

The blitz event is FIDE-rated, with 9 rounds of 3+2 blitz. The Summer Cup is FIDE- and NZCF-rated, with 7 rounds of classical chess over 7 weeks starting from Feb 10.  The time control is 60+30, we’re trialling out this format to see if parents and schoolchildren will have a better time, going home earlier by at least 30 minutes.

We recommend not registering if you know in advance that exams or travel plans will make you skip more than 1/3 of the rounds, to give space for somebody else.  Summer Cup has 7 rounds, so that’s skipping 3 rounds.  Taking byes due to sickness or emergencies is OK.  The policy is about prior knowledge of plans.  This policy also doesn’t apply to those who represent NZL in international events.  They need practice, and ACC is one of the best places to find it 🙂

If you hold any of these titles – FM/IM/GM, or WFM/WIM/WGM, and want to play, you can play for free without registration via the link above.  Only write us an email so we can reserve a spot for you before all spots run out.  This applies to all club events (except the opens – AklAnniv, Waitangi, ANZAC, Merv).

The full calendar of club events on Mondays and other days, like ABR, ADW (btw, what is ADW, why not ACW?) and other events to be added there soon — https://aucklandchess.nz/calendar

Congratulations to FM Alphaeus Ang who finished the 2024 Australasian Masters with a 7 out of 9 score, making his second IM norm! This result was achieved in a fighting game against the tournament leader IM James Morris. It was no simple last-round draw, see https://lichess.org/broadcast/2024-australasian-masters/round-9/aKA7Lccm/MQo0wKb8

More tournament info on https://chessnews.asia/2024-australasian-masters/

Hi everyone, we have just finished our prizegiving tonight. Here are the list of prize winners and some photos to share.

Prizegiving Awards:
Most Valuable Player – Gregory Borsh
Most Consistent Player – Amy Hawke
Most Improved Player – Tyler Rust
Most Improved Player – Sheldon Fan
Most Improved Player – Leo Swash

Spring Rapid – 1^st= Place Khang Bui 5.0/6
Spring Rapid – 1^st= Place Claytin Su 5.0/6
Spring Rapid – 1^st= Place Gregory Borsh 5.0/6

Blitz Night 1 – 1^st= Place Amy Hawke 3.0/3
Blitz Night 1 – 1^st= Place William Moore 3.0/3
Blitz Night 1 – 3^rd= Place Sheldon Fan 2.0/3
Blitz Night 1 – 3^rd= Place Adithya Anegondi 2.0/3

Queenless Battles – 1^st Place Amy Hawke 6.0/6
Queenless Battles – 2^nd Place Gregory Borsh 5.0/6
Queenless Battles – 3^rd= Place Tyler Rust 4.0/6
Queenless Battles – 3^rd= Place Brooklyn Sun 4.0/6
Queenless Battles – 3^rd= Place Claytin Su 4.0/6

Blitz Night 2 – 1^st Place Tyler Rust 5.0/6
Blitz Night 2 – 2^nd= Place Amy Hawke 4.0/6
Blitz Night 2 – 2^nd= Place Sheldon Fan 4.0/6

Thank you for coming to our prizegiving. I wish you all a great holiday. We will resume on Feb 1st 2025. Merry Xmas and Happy New Year! Love from Alex.

CM Isabelle Ning won the 2024 Merv Morrison Memorial with a score of 5.5/6 ahead of a big group of strong players. FM Alphaeus Ang finished second on 5.0/6. CM Kendrick Zhang, CM Alex Huang, Daqi Mao, Matthew Ashton (Hawkes Bay) and Swiss player Hassan Roger Sadeghi all shared 3rd place on 4.5/6.

The Merv Morrison Cup for U1800 players was shared between Daniel Winsley, Brogan Powlesland, Timothy Ha, Martin Zhou and Ryan Hwang. Only some were available for photos, and Daniel certainly had the best pictures with the trophy!

New Zealand Chess News has many photos from the event — please use the links https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?vanity=NZChessNews&set=a.977618974397094 and https://newzealandchess.nz/merv-morrison-memorial-2024/ for all information about the event.

Hi everyone, we started to form a collection of lecture recordings (three and counting) from our ACC Junior Club tutorial sessions. All available on YouTube. We decided to put it into a single playlist (updateable). Check out our latest recording:

Auckland Chess Centre Junior Club Term 4 Lesson 2 What is Strategy? – CM Alex Huang (Oct 25th 2024): Link

Full Playlist: Link

The playlist has been added to our Junior Club page.

Have a great weekend!

Hi everyone, a friendly reminder we are running The ACC I Love Chess Rapid Tournaments (November Edition) on Sunday 10th November. This is the last one for this year, and we are running it on a Sunday, while avoiding the December holidays where people may have their own family plans. We have added an additional prize for Best U200 for this tournament, as we will transition into a new format for next year. Once again I would like to invite you all to play at our event. As usual, it is open to all junior players from our Auckland Chess Centre, juniors from The Sky Dragon Chess Club, students of I Love Chess and all invited players.

The ACC I Love Chess Rapid Tournament (October Edition)
Date: Sunday 10^th November 2024
Venue: Auckland Chess Centre, 17 Cromwell Street, Mt Eden
Restrictions: Juniors only (Under 18)
Rounds: 6 rounds, NZCF Nationally rated
Time Control: 15+5
Schedule: Tournament starts at 9:30am and to finish by 1:45pm **
Cost: $20 per player

Entry Form: Link
Entries: Link

**Please note that last time our tournament finished slightly later at 2PM (than the advertised 1:30PM), but only one game was still fighting on by around 1:45PM. Players can go once they finish their last game, without waiting for prizegiving if they wish to.

If you would like to register, please let me know as soon as possible. Thanks.

Regards,
Alex Huang
National Arbiter & Tournament Organiser

We are running our junior club this week on Friday. This is due to the Merv Morrison Memorial chess tournament running this weekend at our chess centre.

Hi guys, we are starting our Junior Club next week on Saturday 19th October. The schedule for term 4 has been created. We have a new sign up link for this term.

Schedule & Info: https://www.aucklandchess.nz/junior-club/
Sign up (via Trybooking): https://www.trybooking.com/nz/UKA

The 2024 Club Champs is almost over, with rounds 8 and 9 today and next week. The registration for the Spring Cup (7 rounds, NZCF-rated only, Oct 21 – Dec 9) has started.

Please check your registration at https://www.vegaresult.com/vega/2903 — we emailed club players the TryBooking registration address.