2nd Annual Le Jardin Academy Chess Tournament Results

Aloha Hawaii Scholastic players, Coaches, Parents and friends,

For those that were able to make it to this year’s tournament, there was plenty of action and we hope to see even more players at the next five tournaments and USCF tournaments. LJA had a total 43 players and Mililani Chess Day (USCF) tournament had only 9 players! So where were you guys, I know football, soccer, swimming, sailing maybe! Not at the movies or just playing video game’s or watching TV this past Saturday (Sept 24)!! Note: If you want to play better chess games, besides studying / practicing you got to get out there and play in our tournaments! Especially if you’re interested and want to qualify for the HICL’s end of year awards, no play no awards!

We had a lot close battles for both teams and individual players in the Open, Novice and Parent section, we had to use tiebreakers to determine the award winners. Le Jardin High / Intermediate won the Team trophy and so Le Jardin’s perpetual team trophy has return to its home of origin. Thanks Maryknoll for taking care of it! Hanahau'oli Intermediate (another team that I help coach) was tied for 1st came in 2nd and Maryknoll Intermediate came in 3rd via tiebreakers!

The Individual players Open section had another three way tie and William (Billy) Swartworth (Le Jardin Academy) even though he lost the his last round game to Aaron Bright (Moanlua High) who came in 2nd. Billy manage to win via tiebreaker. Kris Aldenderfer (Le Jardin Academy) President of LJA chess club also was tied for 1st and got 3rd place trophy. Board #1 on the stage was displayed via A/V equipment lend to us by Le Jardin Academy and the two wood leather boards I provided were made by Katherine Louise http://www.katherinelouise.biz/gallery.html .

Trenton Lum (Roosevelt) and Kimberly Kidani (Maryknoll) tied for 1st in the Novice section and John Mussack (Holy Family Catholic Academy - Coach) won 1st place in the new Parent section!

For additional details ratings and status please visit www.chess-express.com and if you do not remember your log-in or password just email and I will email back this info. This is HICL’s second season and so only the current “35 open section players” will be listed in the HICL roster until Nov 2005! This is when scholastic players will have the next scheduled scholastic event. So be sure to keep playing and practicing. Remember you need a minimum of 18 games to qualify for the end of year awards. Last year winner’s received some really nice awards and all thirteen had free entries to the Hawaii State Championship and we like to do it again. Donations are welcome to continue to provide these awards, please email to get additional details to frank713@windwardchess.org Last year Le Jardin Academy club, Assets School’s and Windward Chess Club’s Awards were made by Marian Hawkins from Kailua. I also like to thank the Le Jardin Faulty, teachers, chess player’s parents, friends and of course our scholastic players for making this a successful tournament. I made a few mistakes and I promise I will improve on that. Wade Okumura was my TD assistant and we like welcome him to the ranks of TD world; hmm forgot to get him to fill-out a USCF TD form! We’ll just email him a copy!

HICL is a local rating (Only for HCF scholastic tournaments) that I generate via the WinTD pairing program and all players start rating is 1200 each season. We also use CXR Chess Express, Inc. a National chess rating system that updates a player’s rating and also has over 40 plus stats to assist (each player, coach, and parent); into understanding a players strong / weak areas of their play. But to be correct you have to play often, and not just in tournaments, you can also have club games rated via CXR just contact Russ Mollot President of CXR at info@chess-express.com or myself and we will explain how to do it. Bottom line there is no additional cost, just each player’s annual dues, your current CXR accounts can easily be transferred when you start your own CXR rated chess club. If you play at Windward Chess Club or any other CXR affiliate chess club you can have you’re name listed at each of these clubs at no additional cost either. Each club will have their own administrator /deputies and they process player’s games and add new players, paid dues via www.paypal.com etc

We had one Hawaii Chess Board member Larry Reifurth visited us on official business to have me sign the new improved constitution / bylaws to help get HCF the 501(c)3 status to help us make chess events even better! I am also the Windward Chess Club Director and club meets on Wednesdays from 5:30PM to 8:30PM approx and so a HCF board member. Larry also is a STD (is the Senior Tournament Director for U.S. Chess Federation) and runs the Sept Labor Day weekend Hawaii State Championship every year; he gave us some good points for making improvements. Next year we expect to have a larger group, and maybe some more fans to help keep us stay cool. The rain on Friday made things a little humid, I could not stop sweating and was not working that hard either! If I left anyone out I did not mean too!

Oh yes, a big hand to Russ Mollot President of CXR – Chess Express, Inc. and Jean Troendle (Cajun Chess www.cajunchess.com – New Orleans) she is still not operational to selling chess equipment, but promises ASAP she will be back in business. Also to HCF - Hawaii Chess Federation for promoting our tournament via their web site at www.hawaiichess.org, check here often to see when the next tournament is scheduled. And just to update you my dad ended up staying in Houston and only his backyard wooden fence got blown down, Houston, Texas was very lucky indeed!

Mahalo to everyone for your outstanding support to scholastic chess,

Frank Alejandro
WCC Director
LJACC Chess Coach

What is CXR? How do some Hawaii Chess clubs use it?

Chess Expess, Inc. CXR (Chess eXpress Ratings) is a chess rating & statistical service. CXR is in the business of providing you with the most complete set of personal performance metrics possible, to help you track and improve your play. CXR service is available through CXR-affiliated chess clubs and tournament directors. CXR is the fastest-growing chess rating authority in the English-speaking world, and has been recognized by many masters, grandmasters, TDs, club officials, and players as the new standard in chess metrics.

Now who uses CXR in Hawaii, Le Jardin Academy CC (LJACC). Maryknoll School CC (KNOLL), Assets School CC (ASSET). Windward Chess Club (WMCHI / WCC), Kaneohe Scholastic Chess Club (KSCHI), and (HICL) - Hawaii Interscholastic Chess League. Any club that has a minimum of 8 players can start a CXR club at no additional charge beside the annual membership dues, you do have to a admin person such as a coach, parent or team leader that updates records, and enters game, this can be delegated to deputies!

Have you noticed there seems to be new scholastic chess club in Kaneohe, well actually since we were getting so many new scholastic members without there own "home clubs" and have been initially placing them in the Windward Chess Club I decided to put all scholastic players that had no home club in the so called Kaneohe Scholastic Chess Club, so basically they are Windward Chess clubs players and chess players who play in the HICL "without home clubs". The other nice thing is that players can be imported in to whatever clubs they play by the admin person of that club, but they have only one home club! So those scholastic players who do play at Windward Chess Club occasionally will also show up on the WCC roster! And when their name appears on a Top 30 or Hot list** that home club will appear next to their name and rating, etc.!

Two new Hawaii Chess Champions!!!

Aloha,

Ohana East Hotel was the place to be on Sept 3rd to Sept 5th for Hawaii chess players: There were 42 USCF players of which 24 were CXR players and more then half were HICL scholastic players.
Congrats to Hawaii Open State Champions, Cornelius Rubsamen and Chet Gionson Hawaii's new co-champions both with 4.0 scores three wins, two draws and no losses. (1600 USCF and below) winner Soliven Lansangan with a 4.5 score one draw and no losses, won this section tournament. For prize info and new state champion photos of the see HCF web site www.hawaiichess.org. To review some of the games played go to HCIL 2005 games

Hawaii Chess Federation was finally able to submit the USCF tournaments in an amazing one day turn around for USCF to process these two tournaments. Several other recent tournaments that were held up due to software bugs, were worked out by USCF's new rating system and were processed Sept 5 via the new USCF TD / Affiliate account system! Yeah!!

CXR members also had their games processed overnight, even though there were only 24 CXR players in the 42 players event. So please check your new USCF www.uschess.org and CXR www.chess-express.com ratings for those that have been wondering what their new rating were especially for the "Unrated new members".

For the most current U.S. Chess Federation ratings results and wallcharts and (CXR) Chess Express ratings and 40 plus stats see the following link for additional details: http://www.windwardchess.org/clubstandings/ratinslinks.html

If anyone who played in the Hawaii state championships, has any chess notated games from this event that you would like to share, please email at frank713@windwardchess.org.

HCF will be posting the new Interscholastic schedule soon, so keep practicing and remember winning is 99 percent tactics!

Reminder the first Interscholastic Chess Tournament is at Le Jardin Academy on Sept 24 see www.windwardchess.org/forms/2005LJACC_CXR_Tourlessphotos.doc

Mahalo to STD Larry Reifurth for submitting the ratings report to the USCF for the quick processing and helping us get CXR ratings process quickly as well!

Paco