North American Youth Chess Championship

Historic Morristown

From the Pan-American Youth Chess Championship in Costa Rica on July 1-7, after spending a few additional days there, we fly directly to the North American Youth Chess Championship in Morristown, NJ on July 12-16.

Naomi (14) plays in the Girls Under 18 category, and gets 4.5 points in 9 rounds, taking 7th place.  That's a good result considering she plays 4 years up.

Morristown is a historic place.  For two critical winters of the American Revolution, 1777 and 1779-80, General George Washington chose this area as the Continental Army's winter encampment. Because of its strategic location, the area continually served as the military capital throughout the war. During the 1779-1780 Jockey Hollow encampment, over 10,000 soldiers endured the war's most severe winter.

See the photo albums:

2017-07-12 Morristown - Fort Nonsense, Brookside Diner, Opening Ceremony

2017-07-13 Morristown - Round 2, Washington HQ, Ford House

2017-07-14 Morristown - Round 4, Arboretum

2017-07-15 Morristown - Speedwell Park, Patriots Path

2017-07-16 Morristown - churches, McCullough Hall, Acorn Hall, George Washington statue, road to NYC

All-Girls National Chess Championship in Chicago

Chicago, Chicago, Chicago!

All-Girls National Chess Championship 2016

The annual All-Girls US Chess Championship in Chicago is a venerable tradition for us.  Naomi has played there four times (!): in 2012 -- Under 8 -- second place, in 2013 -- Under 10 -- first place, then in 2015 -- Under 12 -- first place again, and now in 2016 we threw her to the lions -- Under 18 -- which expectedly was a great learning experience for her ;-) with 3.5 points out of 6 and 10th place Under 18.  Still, not bad for our 12 year old youngling, among much older toughs.

This time we stayed at the ridiculously expensive Hyatt Regency McCormick Place hotel, because it was the playing venue, so Naomi was able to walk to the playing hall and back to the room by herself.  In 2015 we missed the tournament booking window for the Hyatt, and stayed at the more reasonably priced Chinatown Hotel, which is 8 minutes Lyft ride from the McCormick Place venue.  The Chinatown location was gastronomically great, but tied us up to Naomi's chess game timing.

StrandBeest

What enticed us to Chicago was in part the desire to see StrandBeest (just click on that link!) by the artist Theo Jansen.  The Chicago Cultural Center had this StrandBeest exhibition, and we just couldn't live with the thought of missing it!

• Photo album: 2016-04-23 Chicago Cultural Center, StrandBeest, Cloud, Adler Planetarium

Garfield Park Conservatory

• Photo album: 2016-04-24 Chicago Garfield Park Conservatory, Grant Park, flight home

In Chicago, we use Lyft all the time - from the airport, between our hotel and attractions, and it works out great. 

Just for the ride back to the airport Naomi asked us pleeease to ride the exotic Chicago metro.  Diagnosis: Public Transit Deficiency Syndrome (PTDS).  Prescription: One Ride Per Year (ORPY). Prognosis: Full Recovery.

With the champion

All-Girls National Chess Championships in previous years

2015

Blog post: Under 12 -- first place again + photo album:

• 2015-04-17..19 Chicago All-Girls Chess Championship.

2013

Blog post: Under 10 -- first place first time + photo albums:

• 2013_04_27 Chicago All-Girls Day 2 Arts Institut
• 2013_04_28 Chicago All-Girls Day 3 City, Awards, Kasparov

2012

Blog post: Under 8 -- second place (go to "2012 Flashback" section) + photo albums (this is when we fell in love with Chicago):

• 2012_04_20 Chicago Architecture Boat Tour, All Girls Chess Day 1, Magnificent Mile
• 2012_04_21 Chicago All Girls Chess, Millenium and Grant Parks, the Loop
• 2012_04_22 Chicago Rounds 5 and 6, Navy Pier, Awards, Sears Tower
• 2012_04_23 Chicago Cloud Gate Art Institute

2010

In April 2010 Naomi was 6 years old and played for the first time in the All-Girls National Chess Championship, which took place in Columbus, OH.  She took 9th place out of 45 in the Under 8 years section. 

It was so long ago that there was no Chess Travel blog back then yet!  So, no blog post to recall, just photo albums:

• 2010_04_16 Columbus chess tournament
• 2010_04_17 Columbus state House Short North Convention Center
• 2010_04_18 Columbus Art Museum Awards Pool Lobby
• 2010_04_19 Columbus COSI Airport

6 years ago

Future Plans

1. Naomi has been invited to the 6th Schein - Friedman chess camp, in collaboration with the US Chess School, to be held at the world famous St. Louis chess club and scholastic center in June.  This invitation-only camp is offered to some of the most promising young chess players in the country. Sweet!
   
2. Both Ethan (Open Under 18) and Naomi (Girls Under 14) will travel to the 2016 Pan American Youth Chess Championship in Montevideo, Uruguay. Yay!