JH Nationals. Thursday: Problem Solving Day

Meet some of the hard-working, puzzle-solving members of the IS 318 Under Sections Team! I spent a beautiful Thursday stumping 1100s with problems from Ray Cheng (Practical Chess Exercises) and Jeff Coakley (Winning Chess Exercises for Kids).

Michael, Vincente, Adam, William

Krystian, Austin

Isaiah, Chris, Jacob

Adam, William, Edmond

Edmond

William

Stefek, Michael, Adam

Stefek, Michael

Sebastian

Zanea, Humriah, Summayah

Ashe, Zanea, Humriah, Summayah, Edeli, Jamye

Jamye

Humriah and Summayah

Patryck and Justin

We just won the blitz tournament with 42 out of 48 possible points, making IS 318 both High School and Junior High School blitz champions. :)

We  have 50 students here: 28 in open, 14 in Under 1250, 6 in Under 1000, and 1 in Under 750. I'm forgetting someone somewhere, I know.

Results throughout the weekend will be here.

Girls Nationals, Saturday

 Maya, Mariah, Shanniah, Edeli, Anita, Haby, Yuxin doing pre-tournament tactics

 Edeli played well to beat a 1300 in round 2.

Maya, 2-0

I'm in Chicago with 7 girls for Girls Nationals. Maya, Mariah, Yuxin and Anita are in the 16 and Under section (they are all 13 or 14). They face a team from Hunter of Lilia Poteat, Sophia Flanagan, and Julia Katz. Shanniah, Haby, and Edeli are in the 14 and Under section, but they are the only team in that section. Incredibly, they are all playing 3 hour games every round, so I'm sitting in my hotel room alone, pretty bored. I'm (re)reading Practical Chess Exercises by Ray Cheng-- really good.
 Results are here.  

Rachel Maddow!!

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

IS 318 wins High School Nationals

more soon

my match with Donny Ariel

My match with Donny Ariel has, at last, begun! It was conceived of 7 or 8 years ago, when several people were betting a total of $10,000 on whether I would manage to score 0.5/10 (a draw) or 1/10 (when "my backers" would win). Donny reconsidered at the last minute back then, but then nostalgically called me last week, and we played a g/90 9 second delay game yesterday.

(28) Spiegel,Elizabeth - Ariel,Donny [B22]

1.e4 c5 2.c3 e6 3.d4 d5 4.exd5 exd5 5.Nf3 Nf6 6.Bb5+ Bd7 7.Qe2+ Be7 8.Ne5 0-0 9.Nxd7 Nbxd7 10.Be3 c4 11.Ba4 Bd6 12.Nd2 Qc7 13.g3 Rae8 14.Bc2 b5 15.0-0 Ne4 16.Nxe4 dxe4 17.f3 f5 18.fxe4 fxe4 19.Rxf8+ Nxf8 20.Kg2 Nd7 21.Rf1 Nf6 22.Bg5 Qe7 23.a4 a6 24.axb5 axb5 25.Bxf6 gxf6 26.Qh5 Rb8 27.Qd5+ Kg7 28.Bxe4 b4 29.Qf5 Kg8 30.Bd5+ Kg7 31.Qg4+ Kh8 32.Bxc4 bxc3 33.bxc3 Qe3 34.Rxf6 Qxc3 35.Bd5 Be7 36.Rf7 Qd2+ 37.Rf2 Qg5 38.Qe4 Bf6 39.h4 Qg7 40.Be6 Rf8 41.d5 Be7 42.Rxf8+ Qxf8

white to move and win

I was about to make the excuse to you that I had only 20 seconds left here, but then I realized this happens to me in every endgame-- I don't know what to do; I spend a lot of time thinking about it, then I'm low on time and play badly and say "well, but what could I do; I had no time." The real problem is that I usually don't care anymore by move 35; I just want it to be over. I traded queens stupidly, (Qf5) but white has a great move here.

I let you think about it and then post the answer tomorrow, hopefully. I'm going to Minneapolis tomorrow for high school nationals. We'll have a team in open and in under 1600-- 19 kids.

has anyone noticed they took our rights away?

      The Supreme Court ruled today that anyone arrested on suspicion of any crime at all can be strip searched. You may have been busy celebrating the new year and not noticed, but on Dec. 31 last year, Obama signed away your right to not be arrested indefinitely without trial. (I wonder if they will change social studies textbooks, because I'm pretty sure the ones we use right now say America was set up so the government could never do that to its own people.)

Photos from MS 104 and Rule 12.5

     Remember the controversy about the underrated Washington State kids? They use their own rating system, which is fine, but it means their kids win all the under sections at Nationals. Ridiculous situations, like kids with 1400 ratings having USCF ratings of 400 and winning the under 600 or 900 or whatever it is at elementary nationals. Also the best school, Stevenson, won two under team sections two years ago with something like 24 and 24.5 points out of 28-- that's insanely hard to do. They have an amazing program, don't get me wrong-- they've produced large numbers of strong players over many years. My hat is off to them. But they had an enormous unfair advantage in the under sections.
   So the USCF made a rule (rule 12.5 of the Scholastic Regulations) 6 months ago that you had to have played 8 games in the 6 months previous to the tournament, or else you had to play up one rating section.
    And then Friday, two weeks before nationals start, they change it. Why?

I.S. 318’s Chess Team Lights Up the Silver Screen

Mar 21, 2012
by Andrew Cominelli

At about 4p.m. on Monday afternoon, Elizabeth Spiegel sits with two I.S. 318 students and a chessboard. Spiegel has a paper on which the boys have recorded every move from a just-completed game. She replays it, asking them to explain each decision, pointing out better options, challenging them to consider every possibility.
It’s just another day of practice for two of the nation’s best junior high school chess team members, and now indie-film stars.
...
...
Despite the team’s newfound silver-screen stardom, it’s business-as-usual for Spiegel and her protégés. As she reviews the game of Greenpointer Carlos Tapia, they discover a key flaw in his strategy. Spiegel plays a set of moves, illuminating Tapia’s mistake. Tapia realizes where he went wrong, and they smile at each other. As they finish, Spiegel is giddy.
“He’s a great player, but he just made a very instructive mistake,” she says of Tapia. “I’m very excited about it.”

read the full article

IS 318 tournament photos

Adam

Farai and Azeez play blitz; Rashawn spins a basketball while talking to Pobo; Mitch Fitzko looks in our classroom library.

Humriah thinks

Jack shows me his game. Haby watches. In the back, Alexis is putting his game into Fritz, William is sitting and Avery walking.

Jacob Barayev complains to tournament director Rochelle Ballantyne that the misrecording of his first round win as a loss means that he must now face a very weak player.

Kenneth: bundled up

Kamil played a very nice game in chess club today:

(358) Chmielewski,Kamil - Tapia ,Carlos [B14]
19.03.2012

1.e4 c6 2.d4 d5 3.exd5 cxd5 4.c4 Nf6 5.Nc3 e6 6.Nf3 Be7 7.Bd3 dxc4 8.Bxc4 Nc6 9. 0-0 b6

NPR review of Brooklyn Castle! also

SXSW Film: 'Brooklyn Castle' And The Looming Threat Of Commercial Success


If I could pick only one film from the South By Southwest film festival and bodily force everyone I know to see it, it would be Brooklyn Castle, a documentary directed by Katie Dellamaggiore that follows the chess team at I.S. 318, a New York junior high school that has become a superpower at national tournaments.

... I have a gnawing fear of seeing somebody like Charlize Theron (an actress I really like) as the woman who coaches the kids in chess.  (!!!!)


read it all

FLASH REVIEW: THE FANTASTIC PUBLIC SCHOOL CHESS DOC BROOKLYN CASTLE (SXSW 12)


oh, and MOVIES.COM:

"Also kind of a bummer, Brooklyn Castle still shocked nobody by picking up the audience award for the Documentary Spotlight section. It’s a favorite of many critics and clearly of many viewers, and I was delighted that it holds up to the hype. Part kid competition film about junior high chess players, part education system issue doc about budget cuts in New York City schools, Brooklyn Castle is very good at making you care about its characters, cheering for cute young kids you otherwise wouldn’t know triumphing over cute young kids you don’t know at all. I might have preferred less of the focus on winning and losing and more on the cause, which I find strange coming from me, since I rarely am crazy about issue docs. And this is the type that literally had people walking out saying, “that film was like a fundraiser.”"