News

The National Elementary Chess Championship occurred May 8-10th at the Gaylord Opryland Hotel and Convention Center.  Over 2200 students from across the United States competed in multiple divisions over the three-day weekend.  Alabama sent 59 students to compete in this tournament, and 41 were members of the Madison City Chess League.

Each student played seven rounds over three days.  Each game can last up to 4 hours because of the longer time controls at national tournaments.  Therefore, a number of these games lasted past our kids’ normal bedtimes.  The final day and the last two rounds of the championship occurred on Mother’s Day, and there were many mothers present supporting their kids throughout the day.

Team Awards

Rainbow Elementary’s team of Geon Park (2nd grade), Constance Wang (4th grade), Maanasi Limaye (5th grade) and Mercedes Zich (5th grade) won 1st place in the K-6 U1000 category in the National Elementary Chess Championship this weekend.  Geon also received 11th place with 6 out of 7 possible points, and Mercedes won 19th individually.  Constance Wang tied for 25th place with 5 points.  This was the first elementary national championship in Alabama history.

In the K6 Championship section, Rainbow’s team of Boone Ramsey, Jonah Tuttle, Jenson Wilhelm, Will Bao and Hayden Billmann placed 8th.  Boone led the team with 4 points and received 3rd place in his class of players rated under 1100.  The K6 Championship section was the toughest section of the entire tournament.  This was the first time Rainbow was able to field a team in this section, and the 8th place finish was outstanding.
 
Also placing at Nationals were the team of Victor Lundy, Sam Fellows, Ethan Kueck, Edward Calinsky and Leah Lessmann who won 15th place team in the K-5 U900 section.  Victor received an individual award of 8th place and Sam Fellows was awarded 10th place in that section.  Victor and Sam both achieved 6 out of 7 points.
 
Rainbow’s team of Zachary Calinsky, Karsten Wallace, Ben Lessmann, Corinne Wilhelm, and Simon Fellows placed 17th in the K-3 U800 section.  Zachary Calinsky led his team with 5 points and tied for 35th place.

Individual Awards

Numerous MCCL students received individual awards at the National Elementary Chess Championship.  

K-6 U1000
Aubteen Pour-Biazar (West Madison) – 9th place with 6 points.
Geon Park (Rainbow) – 11th place with 6 points
Mercedes Zich (Rainbow) – 19th place with 5 points
Constance Wang (Rainbow) – tied for 25th place with 5 points

K-5 U900
Victor Lundy (Rainbow) – 8th place with 6 points
Sam Fellows (Rainbow) – 11th place with 6 points

K-3 U800
Zachary Calinsky (Rainbow) – tied for 35th place with 5 points
Rishi Sethuraj (Mill Creek) – tied for 35th place with 5 points

K-3 Unrated
Pulak Agarwalla (Julian Harris Elementary - Decatur) – 7th  place with 5 points

Also competing at Nationals for Rainbow were:  Cameron Edwards, Audrey Holschen, Caroline Wang, Alex Edwards, Wesley Gaddy, Madeline Edwards, Catrina Holschen, and Mallory Morgan.

Competing for Columbia Elementary were:  Neha and Puja Chopade, Pranaav Satheesh, and Timothy Zhu.

Students competing from other Madison City Schools were:  Joshua Lin (Madison), Vallabh Busetty (Heritage), Madhushalini Balaji (Heritage), Om Badhe (Mill Creek), Pranav Somu (Mill Creek).

MCCL students competing from outside Madison were:  Mohak Agarwalla (Leon Sheffield), and Joel Friedman (Huntsville, home school).  Mohak competed in K-5 Championship and won a 2nd place prize for students in his class of rating (1200-1299).  Joel won a 3rd place class prize (1100-1199) for Blitz.

Coaches

Coaches supporting and preparing the MCCL students and teams were:  Ranae Bartlett, Bill Nash, Noel Newquist, Don Maddox, Paul Mulqueen, Will Stevenson, FM Bradley Denton, and DMS student Michael Guthrie.