Galway Junior Chess

This years chess camp ..  a fun new chess game called ” Beat a Grand Master “, using new software we attempt to find better moves than GM’s .. After morning chess session it’s .. PingPong.  .. Kids will get some new chess software (free) .. Not totally unrelated .. Irish u-14’s team are the 5 nations champions once again this year.    :o)

Here’s a screen print of our players currently rated with the Irish Chess Union ..

  there’s more  ..

Rapid play event (20 min’s on the clock for each player).  On  Saturday the 1st of July, 2017.

Fee is €10 and the venue is the West County Hotel , Ennis, Co. Clare.  (1.00 pm to 7.30 pm)  with entries to John Cassidy (phone –  087.2495913).

ChessOssity puzzle champion for 2017 is Andrew Finnerty of St. Patricks N.S. Galway .. 2nd was Jools Doherty , 3rd was James Cox both of St. Catherines N.S. Dublin.The Swap-chess competition was dominated by the St. Catherine students .. Max & Adam 1st, Ely & Jools 2nd, and Eithne & Oisin in 3rd place.The competition was held in the Menlo Park Hotel, Galway. Special thanks to April Cronin & Ian Finnerty who helped with the running of the days activities !

on Tuesday 16th of may ..

The ChessOssity finals is on  in the Menlo Park Hotel .. we’ll have a max of 80 players in this event..

Played on Saturday 22nd April, in Gonzaga College (Dublin).  There were two events running side by side ..

(i) Primary school finals:

Representing Connaught were Ballinlass N.S. and Craughwell N.S. .. they finished just outside the prizes in 4th and 5th places.  The top 3 were .. St. Marys, Haddington Road , St. Conleths (both of Dublin) and 3rd were Ennis.

(ii) Secondary Schools finals:

The Connaught teams fared better in this event, which was once again dominated by hosts, Gonzaga college.  In the u-19 section St. Geralds of Castlebar finished in 2nd place (behind Gonzaga) .. the pattern was repeated in the u-16 final, with St. Mary’s of Galway 2nd to Gonzaga and with another silver medal were St. Josephs (the bish) in the u-14 section.  Overall a big improvement in last years finals  .. with Connaught teams taking 3 silver medal places.

Thanks to organisers Daniel Lynch and Lukasz Goralski of Leinster Schools Chess Assoc.

Twenty secondary school teams competed for no prizes on Thursday 6th April .. a just for fun event.  However, at the last minute 2 massive easter eggs appeared as prizes and were taken home by .. the 2 boys with a perfect score of 6/6 .. 

.. highlight of the day (for me) was the canteen, nice food fantastic value !

Being held this year in Sligo .. full details on www.icu.ie  .. in addition to the ‘serious‘ finals there is a fun day of chess planed for  …

The overall champions are Ballinlas , 2nd were Craughwell and in 3 place were Claregalway .. below are all team scores and placings.  Both Craughwell & Ballinlass qualify to represent Connaught at the All-Ireland team finals in Gonzaga college on Saturday 22nd April.   

In the girls section Craughwell were 1st and Clairnbridge were 2nd (again) with the Ballinlass Girls edging out Briarhills girls in a blitz play-off.    

In the Challengers section well done to the players from Craughwell who also won this section, they won a hotly contested play-off to edge out Briarhill (who were were 2nd), and in 3rd place were the lads from Clairnbridge.   Thanks to the Menlo Park Hotel , the teachers and parents who supported the event giving up their time and energy.  And a big welcome to Claran n.s. who were playing in their first chess finals,  we also welcomed back scoil Iognoid and scoil Fhursa this year .. all were a credit to their schools & hope to see ye all at the next big chess day out. 

 .. the next big schools event is on 16th May .. same venue .. it’s the Chessossity.com all Irelands in Swap-Chess & Puzzle solving !