KJCA AGM on October 13th

KJCA is pleased to invite and welcome all to its Annual General Meeting which will be held on the 13^th of October 2013, during training day 1 at Amherst School. We are a volunteer organisation and we need your help to function.

The KJCA provides first class regular competitions and training days across Kent which are the envy of all other counties throughout the UK. It also has a long and proud history of success at its county team events, winning many national titles across all junior age groups. Many Kent players go on to achieve great individual success at National events such as the British Chess Championships held every summer and also through representing England at International  tournaments such as the Worlds and the Europeans (see our Roll of Honour page: http://www.kjca.org/site/page?view=honour).

The KJCA is run through the dedication of a few parents just like you. We not only need to hear your voice in order to update and improve our services, but we also need more volunteers to help run the organisation and to help continue the KJCA success for many more years to come. If you are able to give some of your time, even if it is just for a few hours at the various KJCA events, please let us know. You do not necessarily need to know anything about chess.

You can help and we need your help! Come along to the AGM to find out more. All are welcome.

Regards,

KJCA

Chess Kid Membership - Price reduced

Price for the Chess Kid membership has been reduced to £8 and £4 for any siblings. This will give you GOLD membership of www.chesskid.com until mid July 2014. Click here to register.

GP 1 Rathfern Primary School

The first GP of the 2013/14 season was held on Sunday 15th September at Rathfern Primary School with 69 participants competing across five sections.

This being a London Qualifier event, we were pleased to welcome some top players from neighbouring counties and there were many excellent games and some close fought battles being played at all levels. The top two for each section were:

U8: 1st Navieinaah Haridas (6 / 6), 2nd Mason Graves-Brown (5 / 6),

U10: 1st Ximan Mao (6 / 6), 2nd Elizabeth Johnson (4.5 / 6),

U12: 1st Anantha Anilkumar (6 / 6), 2nd Francesco Bernardini, Anshu Ramaiya and Amardip Ahluwalia (4.5 /6),

U14: 1st Joelle Hakim (5 / 5), 2nd Riya Parikh (3 / 5),

U18: 1st Raunak Rao (4 / 5), 2nd equal Michael Green and Jessica Wen (3.5 / 5).

Full cross tables can be found on: http://www.kjca.org/result/60

Current leaders of the GP tables after the first event are as follows:

U9: Robert Akeya-Price

U11: Freddie Hand and Kiran Shiatis

U14: Joelle Hakim

U18: Raunak Rao

Primary School: Dulwich Prep London

Secondary School: Sevenoaks

Full GP tables can be found on: http://www.kjca.org/site/page?view=GPTables.

Many thanks to Rathfern Primary for accommodating us and also a big thank you to all the parents who helped before and on the day.

Please note: Our second GP which also doubles up as a London qualfier event, will be held on the 10th of November at Sevenoaks Senior School. As usual you can enter online and we hope to see many of you there.

KJCA

Congratulations to our U18 and U14 teams

A huge well done to both our U18 and U14 teams for coming a superb 2nd and 3rd at the National Youth Chess Championships on Sunday 22nd September 2013, the best performing county across both sections.

Under 18s maintain unbroken 6 year record at 2013 National Youth Chess Association Championship

On Sunday September 22^nd 2013, our 8 player Under 18 team travelled up to Northampton on an unseasonably mild day to defend our Under 18 title from 2012. With the usual high standard of county teams, it was always going to be a tough call to perform at the same level as recent years.

After round 1, we did admirably well with a score of 5/8 and were second to a very strong Berkshire team. However, matches became progressively more challenging as the rounds progressed; we scored 4.5/8 in round 2 and 3/8 in round 3. With a final score of 12.5/24, we awaited our fate with some degree of trepidation knowing that other counties were not far behind. However, our closest competitors after round 2 experienced equally challenging final rounds and we finished second out of the 7 competing counties, another great Kent performance.

Since new impetus was put into secondary school age county teams in 2008, Kent has performed remarkably well, finishing in either first or second place; 2008 2^nd, 2009 2^nd, 2010 2^nd, 2011 2^nd, 2012 1^st, 2013 2^nd.

We hope that this track record continues for many years to come.

Well done to the following players (in Board Order) who did us proud yet again to bring an excellent start to the 2013/14 season: Rohan Shiatis, Rohan Bansal, Raunak Rao, Alexei Davis, Gautham Reddiar, Jessica Wen, Michael Green, James Maguire

Tony (U18 team manager)

U14s Finish Third NYCA 2013 National Youth Chess Association Championship

Our young U14 team finished a brilliant third in the NYCA Championship. Most of our players were U12 and performed extremely well to score 10.5 out of 12 in the first round and second behind a very strong Sussex team.

Round 2 proved tough as we faced many older and more experienced players from other counties and slipped to third position just half a point behind South Wales. Unfortunately we could not improve our position in the last round despite a valiant effort from all of our players.

Kiran Shiatis finished with a perfect score of 3/3 was the nominated for best player award. Alejandro Ito-Armendia also had the perfect score of 3 out of 3. Jacob Watson won the prize for the best U14 reserve.

Of note, we were the only team to take points off the winners Sussex.

Well done to all the players. The team in board order: Jackson Wen, Anantha Anilkumar, Francesco Bernardini, Freddie Hand, Emily Green, Kiran Shiatis, Karthik Velayudham, Ronit Nair, Mikey Watson, Alejandro Ito-Armendia, Niakwei Carty Bing-Peppoe, Ximan Mao, Nikhil Chidipothu and Jacob Watson.

Anil (U14 Team Manager)

Kent Junior Newsround Update no. 8 (by Jacob Watson)

Several Kent Juniors played in the Silver Plate and Scholarship tournaments on 7^th of September 2013.

Forming part of the UK Chess Challenge, players in the Silver Plate had to qualify by getting more than 3.5 points at the Gigafinal.  The Scholarship is open to all other players who participated in the Giga or Mega finals.  For more information see: www.ukchesschallenge.com

Congratulations go to:

Mikey Watson, who got 1^st place in U9 boys section, scoring an outstanding 6/6.

Navieinaah Haridas, who secured 1^st place in the U7 girls with a score of 3/6. 

Thomas Hooper who scored 3.5/6 in the U11 section, enough to gain a rosette.

Michael Green who was second in the U15s with 3.5 / 6.

Also to Jacob Watson, who played in the Scholarship tournament, and came 2^nd  in the U14 section, scoring 3/4 .

Well done to all the Kent players who took part:-  Freddie Nunn, Alexander Thompson, Kartik Velyudham and Ni Akwei Carty Bing-Peppoe.

To see the results and crosstabs go to:    http://ukchessacademy.com/?page_id=577