The first of four legs of The Chess Academy Asia Pacific Championship U16 took place this past Saturday (Nov 28) with an outstanding participation of 220 players from 6 different countries. The tournament was held in the Lichess platform using the Team Arena with masnou pairings.  

The Chess Academy’s Grand Master Coach Andres G. met the players in Zoom, and greeted all the players from Hong Kong and other counties. Then he gave a quick Game Analysis of the famous chess player – Alexander G Sellman. The analysis session was very interactive and inspiring, and all the players actively participated on all the possibilities of moves in the chat.

After the Analysis session, the Asia Pacific battle began! The arena was intense and impressive – 930 games were played within two hours with a total of 49,504 moves played!

The first leg was a huge success with a very respectable number of players representing our very own Hong Kong team The Chess Academy (TCA), with some being the best in their age category. During the 2 hours of  tournament play, TCA maintained the number one spot throughout without much trouble, with Brainbox Chess Academy coming in second place and Looi Chess Club in third, both clubs representing Malaysia. Other teams/countries participating were Тавда from Russia, Champion Chess Academy and ChessNut Academy from India, PowerChess Asia from Singapore and Alpha Chess Club from Japan.

Team and individual results – https://lichess.org/tournament/kpzt1E4M

TCA was led by chesseditor (Neel Iyer) scoring 21 points of the 174 total points for the team. Rounding the top 10 were also 5 TCA members, JamesKwong (Wing Ki Kwong), Niilo1 (Niilo Nissinen), KainosWong (Kainos Wong) and Samuel101 (Chi Fung Chan). Special congratulations to Kainos for being the youngest at only 8 years old and placing 9th!

The Chess Academy’s Grand Master Coach Andres highlighted his favorite game from the tournament below.

Featured Game – chesseditor (1817) vs ethanwong09 (1901) 1-0

Black has played 16. ..Bc5, how does White react? 17. Bxh7!, a nice sacrifice known as the Greek Gift. The Black King is lured out of the castling position and left exposed. Play continued, 17. ..Kxh7, 18. Ng5+ Kg6, 19. Qd3+ f5 20. exf6+ Kxf6 21. Ne4+, and White went on to win in a couple more moves. Nice execution by chesseditor (Neel Iyer)!

Link to game – https://lichess.org/AlQPZPIi

The Chess Academy Asia Pacific Championship U16 was created to allow our students to have opportunities to enjoy the game in a more global arena.  We are very proud and greatly encouraged by the wonderful turnout and successful tournament.

The second leg of The Chess Academy Asia Pacific Championship is scheduled for Saturday December 5th from 6-8pm. For any questions or inquiries please contact us at info@activekidshk.com