03-02-2006 chess
From Malaysia Encyclopedia
Gearing for national meet
By QUAH SENG SUN
WITH the schools’ mid-semester break coming next month, junior chess players are now gearing up to play in the national age-group chess championships.
This year, the Malaysian Chess Federation (MCF) shall be using the Olympic Council of Malaysia’s indoor sports arena in Kuala Lumpur as the venue of this event which takes place on March 16-17.
The venue is capable of accommodating 500 participants.
According to the MCF, this year’s event will again be played over six age groups: the under-8, under-10, under-12, under-14, under-16 and under-20. Each age group will feature separate events for boys and girls.
However, there is a new twist. While prizes will be awarded as normal, this will not be the end of the story for the winners.
The MCF intends to bring them together again at a later date to contest the national age-group finals over two weekends.
The top 10 boys and top six girls from each age-group will be invited to play in a full time control, round-robin event and the respective champions shall then be considered for selection to the ASEAN and Asian-level age-group tournaments.
I look at this as a very positive move by the MCF because for far too long, we have been over-reliant on players chosen on the basis of their results in a Swiss-styled tournament of limited rounds and at rapid chess time controls.
It is never ideal that our youngsters do not have enough exposure to international time controls.
Possibly, this was one of the reasons for our overall poor performance in the Singapore-Malaysia match last December.
While our junior players were largely brought up on playing rapid chess games, the Singapore juniors were weaned on real chess played with international time controls.
They appreciated the use of their time wisely whereas our players’ calculations and assessments were simply rather superficial.
Such is the chess culture in Malaysia where the rapid chess format is king.
Hopefully, this will change with the introduction of national age-group finals. While the full time control is not an immediate cure-all, at the very least, our chess administrators have recognised the problem and have taken positive steps to rectify it starting with our top juniors.
For more details on the national age-group championships, contact Gregory Lau (012-902 0123, e-mail: all4chess@hotmail.com) or Hamid Majid (e-mail: aham@pc.jaring.my, fax: 03-4024 4337).
Meanwhile, the MCF has also confirmed that this year’s men’s and women’s national closed chess championship will be played at The Chess Network, Wilayah Complex, Kuala Lumpur on March 11-15.
- Quah Seng Sun can be contacted at ssquah@gmail.com. Join Malaysia’s biggest chess mailing list by registering yourself at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/chess-malaysia.
Up next
The Chess Association of Selangor (CAS) will hold their 20th Royal Selangor junior tournaments this Sunday and on Feb 12.
This Sunday’s tournaments will be for the under-10 and under-14 age categories while on Feb 12, the under-12 and under-16 events will be played.
Venue is Sunway University College in Bandar Sunway.
There are 10 prizes in each category, comprising a mix of pewter ware, cash, chess books and chess sets, depending on the age category.
All winners will also receive certificates of achievement.
Entry fees for the under-10 and under-12 events are RM10 for CAS members and RM15 for non-members, and for the under-14 and under-16 events, they are RM15 for CAS members and RM20 for non-members.
Inquiries should be directed to S. Balen (012-354 7011) or Lim Tse Pin (012-298 4922).
Those interested in taking part should send their name and event category to selangorchess@gmail.com with a carbon copy to tsepin@gmail.com.
