Welcome to This Week at the Charlotte Chess Center, our weekly recap of the chess tournaments here at the CCC. In addition to the normal selection of weekly events, CCC hosted the Charlotte Spring Open, which is currently in progress at the Hilton Garden Inn (Southpark). A full recap of that tournament will be posted as a standalone piece here in the News/Blog section in the coming days.
This post will summarize the recurring events held at the CCC in the final week of March. To find a specific event, use the headings below.
Sunday Afternoon Classical (CCC North)
Sunday Afternoon Classical is a weekly event at the CCC North location in which members play one round of g60 +10 USCF-rated chess per week. A total of 28 players participated in the March 24 SAC, with the following players victorious:
Top: Alex Kaelin, Siddharth Senthil, Andrew Horton, and Frank Johnson
U1300: Mario Michaels, Alex Sedlock, Gavin Burton, Josh Alex, Carlene Pyne, Alexander Aceituno, Shivin Ashwin, Anjali Clapp, and Douglas Moran
Mario Michaels has had an excellent month, going 3.5/4 in the U1300 section. Meanwhile, with wins in each of the last two weeks, Alex Kaelin leads the top section with two points. Full standings can be viewed at this link.
Our final Sunday Afternoon Classical of the month will be held this weekend on March 31.
Sunday Action Quads (CCC Main/South)
Our Sunday Action Quads tournament takes place every week at the CCC Main/South location and is open to players in grades K-12. Participants are grouped into four-player quads and compete in three rounds of g20+10 USCF-rated chess. A total of 33 players participated in our March 24th event.
Our first-place finishers this week were:
Quad A: Sattwik Dutta (2.5 points)
Quad B: Srivatsa Gundumalla and Satvick Kumar (2.5 points)
Quad C: Reyansh Mayank (2 points)
Quad D: Yisen Dong (2 points)
Quad E: Gideon Beamon (3 points)
Quad F: Advai Nalla (3 points)
Quad G: Vaid Naidu and James Newton (2 points)
Quad H (five players): Walker Wieland and Euri Matthewson (3 points)
Congratulations to all quad winners! All perfect scorers in our scholastic quad events in grades K-8 are qualified for the NEW Tournament of Champions event, which is scheduled for May 4, 2024. Detailed results from March 24 can be viewed here.
The next Sunday Action Quads will take place at the CCC Main/South location this weekend on March 31.
Monday Action Quads (CCC North)
Monday Action Quads event is a weekly quads tournament held at the North location on Monday nights. All K-12 scholastic players are welcome to participate in the three-round g20+10 USCF-rated tournament. We had 21 players this week across five quads.
Congratulations to the following players who finished in first place:
Quad A: Zachary Baltazar (2.5 points)
Quad B: Shivin Ashwin (3 points)
Quad C: Vihaan Arvind and Pranav Pradeepkumer (2 points)
Quad D: Himavarsha Bhadri (3 points)
Quad E (six player "small swiss"): Jeyashri Jayamurugan (3 points)
Reminder that all 3-0 scorers in grades K-8 are qualified for our Tournament of Champions event! For detailed results, click here for the USCF crosstables.
The next Monday Action Quads event is scheduled for April 1.
Tuesday Night Action (CCC Main/South)
Every Tuesday evening, the CCC Main/South location hosts our Tuesday Night Action tournament. Following a lecture by Fide Master (and Charlotte Chess Center founder) Peter Giannatos, participants are paired into one USCF standard-rated game a week.
A total of 50 players participated this week. Our winners were:
Top: Andrew Wu, Patrick McCartney, Namish Kondabathini, and Lokruth Patil
U1750: Diya Balamurugan, Deepak Vellattu, Shlok Kaushik, Luke Johnson, Shreyas Karki, Srivatsa Gundumalla, and Satvick Kumar
U1300: Reyansh Mayank, Eldar Gabidoff, Nandhan Gummi, Akshith Chintalacheruvu, Namish Mayank, Douglas Samson, Jeevith Reddy, Eduardo Palmeira, Kelly Centrelli, Isaac Rubanenko, Joshua Rubanenko, Bryan Muraya, and Philip Benke
For the month, the top junior and top adult player in each section received a $25 USCF sales gift card. In the Top section, the number one junior was Andrew Wu (3.5/4) and the top adult was Shawn Bale (2/3, not playing the final week). The top junior and adult prizewinners in the U1600 were Diya Balamurugan and Deepak Vellattu respectively (both 3/4). In the U1300, Reyansh Mayank became the only player in any section of TNA to go a perfect 4/4 this month, winning his section's top junior prize, while Charles Cameron took the top adult prize with 3/4. Full standings can be viewed here.
Our first Tuesday Night Action of the new month will be held on April 2.
Wednesday Action Quads (CCC Main/South)
Our Wednesday Action Quads event is a weekly tournament held at the CCC's Main/South location every Wednesday, open to both adult and youth players. Our 3/27 WAQ tournament saw a total of 40 participants across ten quads.
Here are the top finishers from each group:
Quad A: Smayan Ammasani (2 points)
Quad B: Brian Peterson and Mario Pineda-Bermudez (2.5 points)
Quad C: Diksha Jaikumar (3 points)
Quad D: Zoey Moore (3 points)
Quad E: Murari Raghavan (2 points)
Quad F: Pranav Arun (3 points)
Quad G: Rishaank Channad (3 points)
Quad H: three-way tie between Isaac Rubanenko, Ritvik Kumar, and Brendan Daunt (2 points)
Quad I: Daniel Freeman (3 points)
Quad J: three-way tie between Aarush Agarwal, Daniel Rubanenko, and Chris Dimbu (2 points)
The full results of the March 27 WAQ can be viewed at this link. Our next Wednesday Action Quads is scheduled for April 3.
Friday Action Quads (CCC Main/South)
Friday Action Quads is a weekly g20+10 quads event at the CCC Main/South location, which is open to all K-12 players. This week's event attracted 32 total players across eight quads.
The following players took first place in their respective quads:
Quad A: Benjamin Raz (3 points)
Quad B: Moses Collins (2.5 points)
Quad C: Nandhan Gummi (2.5 points)
Quad D: Ritvik Kumar (3 points)
Quad E: Bryan Muraya (2.5 points)
Quad F: Gnanesh Jasti (3 points)
Quad G: three-way tie between Sakau Dhayabharan, Sohan Nelapati, and Tristan Zhang (2 points)
Quad H: Daniel Eni (3 points)
All players who score 3/3 at FAQ are qualified for the Tournament of Champions scheduled for May 4, 2024. Full results of the tournament can be viewed here.
The next Friday Action Quads will be held on April 5.
Submitted Games!
To conclude this week's slate of tournament recaps, I'd like to show a game sent in this month by Aaron Wilson. To submit a game for inclusion in these reports, head to our Chess Game Submission page and enter it in!
Aaron had the black pieces against Matthew Sedlock in this game, which took place a couple weeks ago in a Sunday Afternoon Classical. He employed a line of the Caro-Kann in which black uses piece activity to compensate for a somewhat inferior pawn structure (note: this author also has a lot of experience in the line in question!). However, it was white who generated a big attack, first breaking through in the center with d4-d5, then creating a deadly queen-bishop battery that decided the game.
I always like to commend members who submit losses. It's important to learn from our defeats! Thanks so much to Aaron for sending in this game, included here with his annotations:
For upcoming tournaments, bookmark our Events Schedule. The CCC hosts nearly 8 events a week at our facilities in North and South Charlotte, along with bi-monthly major events such as the upcoming 2024 Spring Open and ALTO tournaments.
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NM Dennis Norman
Chess Coach - Club Journalist
Charlotte Chess Center