"Mount Zion boy a chess prodigy"

Aydin Turgut, a third-grader from Mount Zion, Ill., has made a name for himself nationally as one of the best chess players in his age group. | AP Photo/Herald & Review, Lisa Morrison

It is really dangerous to make predictions...but we've got several players in the Midwest who are capable of reaching the very highest levels in chess.

Aydin Turgut is one of them.

Supernationals 2013

Once every four years, all of USCF's scholastic national individual & team championships (high school, junior high, elementary) are held simultaneously in Nashville: this was the weekend for "Supernationals."

Results are in, says Chess Life Online.  And Illinois students did more than OK.

Congratulations to two National Champions from Illinois!!

Aydin Turgut of Decatur took the K-3 Championship with a perfect 7-0.

David Peng won the K-6 Championship with an undefeated 6½-½ score.

I was renewing library books at Harold Washington yesterday when I ran into Phillip Turner, father of Whitney Young's Philip Parker-Turner, who was kind enough to send the below picture of the Whitney Young team (here collecting hardware at the MVP tournament).  Whitney Young did more than OK, finishing in a tie for 5th-7th with 18 points, only 2½ points behind the winners.  Sam Schmakel tied for 2nd in the individual championship (7th on tiebreaks) with a 6-1 score, losing only to tournament winner Atulya Shetti of Michigan.

595 at 2013 Illinois K-8 Championships

Bloomington-Normal Area Scholastic did their typically wonderful job hosting the 2013 K-8 Championships, held March 9-10 at the Bone Student Center on the Illinois State University campus.

It's tax season, so the congratulations are much briefer than they should be.

Individual results:

• Vincent Do of Thurgood Marshall in Rockford took the Junior High section with a 7-0 score.
• Edward Zhang of Hoffman Estates took the Elementary (grades 4-5) section with 6½-½.
• Aydin Turgut (1852!) of Decatur took the Upper Primary section with 6½-½.
• Aaron Gan of Sprague Half Day in Lincolnshire and David Zimmerman of Monroe Elementary in Hinsdale tied for first in the Lower Primary 6½-½.

Team results:

• Elementary: Grove Elementary, Normal
• Upper Primary, Avery Coonley School, Downers Grove (on tiebreaks over Benjamin Elementary of Bloomington)
• Lower Primary: Monroe Elementary, Hindsale
• Junior High: Thurgood Marshall, Rockford

Hmm, Chicagolanders, the Downstate kids more than held their own...

Illinois Blitz Championships

Saturday's Illinois Blitz Championship was unusually strong, as it was held in conjunction with the U.S. Amateur Team North in Schaumburg.  Let's hope this tradition continues!  Hungarian Grandmaster Denés Boros, a student at Webster University in St. Louis, won the Illinois Blitz Championship with an impressive 9-1 score.

NM Gopal Menon and NM Sam Schmakel tied for second with 8-2; as Illinois residents, they share the 2013 blitz title.

Israeli GM Anatoly Bykhovsky and our own GM Dmitry Gurevich tied for fourth with 7½ points; FM Eric Rosen, FM Albert Chow, NM Erik Santarius of Wisconsin, NM Pete Karagianis, George Li (still 12 years old?), and Aakaash Meduri tied for sixth with 7-3.

Notable results: Gopal shut out Brazilian GM Andre Diamant 2-0.  (But that's not really notable to those of us who have played Gopal.)  And eight-year-old Aydin Turgut shut out IM Angelo Young 2-0 in the first round!  Not sure whether I was jaded or gullible: the A. Turgut-Young result was a forfeit.  (Thanks to Gopal Menon.)

Full crosstables at chessweekend.com.

Slips happen (and TJWO results)

IM Angelo Young - Michael Auger (I think!)
Oak Brook 2013
Black to move

Here (more or less) is the position of the weekend. I say "more or less" because I've reconstructed the above position (from the game between two of the tournament leaders in Round 4 of Tim Just's Winter Open) from memory, so a couple Black pieces might be incorrectly placed.  But all the pieces on the first four ranks are in their proper spots.

Immediately before the diagrammed position, Angelo (who is down the Exchange and a pawn, and who only has minutes left on his clock) played 1.Nf3-g1.  With forty minutes plus increment left on his clock, Michael (who would almost certainly earn his long-overdue National Master title with a victory in this game) now unhurriedly plays 1...e4. 

Can you spot White's subtle reply, which turned a totally lost position into a quick win?  And which blunder in chess history was this most like?  Of the examples on in the Wikipedia article on blunders in chess, I'd compare it to Petrosian's famous blunder against Bronstein.


Most players would be kicking themselves, but after the tournament, Michael was good-naturedly demonstrating 1...e4?? 2.Nxe2 to a roomful of players, laughing and marveling at his blind spot.  The ability to be critical of your play without being too critical of yourself makes chess much more enjoyable!

***

Oh yes, the prizewinners: the full list is here.  I'll call out the most notable performances.  Congratulations to Angelo Young, Angel Angelov, and the angelic Tommy Ulrich, all with 4½-½ scores in the Open Section.  And special congratulations to eight-year-old Aydin Turgut, who took first Under 2000 with a 3½-1½ score!!

Gee Leong and Nathan Beauchamp took home the big money of the weekend by splitting the Reserve Section title; Giorgi Vanderway (1080) won the Under 1400 prize.

In the Scholastic sections, Robert Barr (slightly underrated at 291!) won the Under 1200 section, and Trevor Tompkins won the Under 700 section.  See the full list of trophy winners here!

Round 8 of World Youth Chess Championship underway

Eric Rosen is playing on Board 1 against GM Samvel Ter-Sahakyan of Armenia.  Follow the action here!

Update 9:00 p.m. by Frederick Rhine Alas, Eric lost, leaving him with 5.5/8 (+4 =3 -1) with one round left. I haven't done the math, but according to Jon Burgess on Facebook he can still get an IM norm if he wins or draws tomorrow. Go Eric!! Update 2:05 p.m., courtesy Matt Pullin, who doesn't think it looks good. I agree.Update 12:20 p.m.  I've been unable to get moves for some time.  Here's the last I saw (obscure opening, still theory):

Here are the round 7 standings: Eric moves into a tie for first if he wins. Awonder Liang of Wisconsin leads the World Under-8 by a full point, while Aydin Turgut has a plus score in the same event!

Games from National K-1 Champion Aydin Turgut

Dr. Turgut's notes went up instead of mine.  Fixed!  Yours truly sent the wrong file.  But in the meantime, you can Enjoy the fine games of this handsome young man!

4 Illinois students qualify for World Youth Championships

Story here!

Congratulations to Illinois students Aydin Turgut (K-1 National Champion), Susanna Ulrich (Girls 8 & Under), David Peng (Boys 8 & Under), and of course Eric Rosen (K-12 National Champion).

I hope Brazil survives the onslaught of 8-year-old Awonder Liang of Wisconsin, the US's top-rated (currently rated 2005 on the June 2011 rating list).