Sam Schmakel equal third at Denker

Our high school representative, Sam Schmakel of Whitney Young, also did Illinois proud.  The final crosstable is here, and Chess Life Online has a nice feature on the winners of the Denker and the Barber.

Sam has a perfect score in the early rounds of the U.S. Open (six-day schedule), and will be playing "behind the ropes" against GM Alexander Shabalov.  You should be able to follow the action at monroi.com: action begins at noon Pacific, 2 p.m. Chicago time.

Both Sam and Sean Vibbert of Indiana (who also had a great event) came out swinging in the following game from Round 5. As often happens in Golden Gloves, they neutralized each other without doing damage.

Greetings from Vancouver, Washington

Looking west from the I-5 bridge: Columbia River and Mt. Hood

The US Open might as well be in the Loop: I keep running into Dmitry Gurevich and Harold Winston.  Former ICA President Al Losoff (whose Sears Tower office used to be around the corner from mine, and who lived across the street from my brother-in-law before moving to Nevada) is working the event, as is Wayne Clark.

"I've played ...a6 and ...h6, I must be winning..."

Our Illinois representative, NM Sam Schmakel, won his first two games in the Denker Tournament of High School Champions, then lost to #2 seed SM Atulya Shetty of Michigan.  The game is featured on Chess Life Online.  (Denker standings are here.) 

Sixth-grader George Li has an even score in the Barber Tournament of K-8 Champions and is paired against a fellow expert: no easy pairings in either scholastic event!  Barber standings are here.  Thanks to both George and Sam for representing our state so well.

Oh yes, the US Open.  Here are the standings after round two.

I had an excellent adventure last night: almost got mated twenty different ways, fianchettoed my rook, and was offered a draw while I was an Exchange and pawn up.  It didn't take me more than a minute to accept....

Trevor Magness at the Denker

The Illinois representative is one of the early leaders at the Denker Tournament of High School Champions in Orlando.

In today's game, Trevor finds a nice shot in the hyper-theoretical Romanishin Variation of the Nimzoindian.