Chess with Errol

Former world champion Garry Kasparov once said, “Chess clearly shows us the power of why.

One of the prerogatives of age to a discerning eye is you understand people better.

Chess players worldwide, some one billion of them, are ecstatic that face-to-face chess has returned.

There is a peculiar independence and strength in Guyana’s junior chess players that is becoming evident as one replays and studies the games of the National Junior Championship.

It is true that chess is considered an elitist game and only the great schools of a nation teach and play it.

“Only the best will represent Guyana at the Chess Olympiad in July,” says Loris Nathoo, a director of the Guyana Chess Federation (GCF).

The International Chess Federation (FIDE) approved a bid from Chennai, India, on March 15, to host this year’s Chess Olympiad.

Today, we celebrate the magnificent return of face-to-face chess in pictures with the hosting of the Gaico Grand Prix Tournament at the National Stadium, Providence.

Following a three-year hiatus, the increasingly popular Grand Prix face-to-face chess tournaments are back.

Three years after the last behind-the-board classical chess game was contested in 2019, the Guyana Chess Federation (GCF) is ready to re-commence this traditional activity with the Gaico Grand Prix Chess Tournament which begins on Saturday, March 19 at the National Stadium, Providence.

In the first quarter of 2022, developments within the Guyana Chess Federation (GCF) seem to be flourishing.

JuLo’s Enterprises, a stationery and ice cream shop in Grove, East Bank Demerara, last weekend donated two FIDE- approved tournament-sized chess sets and one FIDE-approved DGT chess clock to the St Ignatius Secondary School in Lethem, Region Nine.

The Guyana Chess Federation (GCF) is seeking stronger ties with the international chess community to assist in its ongoing programme of development.

Wendell Meusa, an international Candidate Master, obliterated Guyana’s accomplished blitz players in a clean sweep at the STR Wood Inc online five-minute tournament this past weekend.

Justino DaSilva, a promising Guyanese chess player, scored a total of five points in a five-minute online blitz tournament between Guyana and Suriname recently.

Guyana’s finest chess players, including a list of imaginative juniors, will compete in the 2022 National Blitz Online Chess Championship on Saturday February 5 from 2 pm.

Alexander Zhang and Kristin Xavier played unbeaten to emerge winners in the DeSinco Rapid Online U-12 National Chess Championships last weekend.

Over 100 students aged seven to 15 years old are benefitting from a compre-hensive online program-me, conducted by the Guyana Chess Federation (GCF), to learn and study the game of chess.

So, let us wage a global struggle against illiteracy, poverty and terrorism and let us pick up our books and pens.

In the world of elite chess and with the introduction of computers, it is becoming difficult to pick winners in tournaments.