Countdown to SuperNationals

(This map illustrates the size of the Opryland complex--a mega hotel with over 2800 rooms. The lobby is at the lower left while the convention center is at the upper right.)

The wait is finally over! Over three dozen Northern California players will fly to Tennessee tomorrow in anticipation of one of the largest chess tournaments in world history! The entry list has 5191 participants on the eve of the festival at the Gaylord Opryland. The opening ceremony is on Friday at 11:00am CDT and the first round starts two hours later.

The CalChess delegation consists of 44 players plus accompanying parents and coaches. A majority of the participants represent one of two large school teams: Saratoga High School (8) and Mission San Jose Elementary (16). Below is a listing of the top local players in each section. Click on the links to my website for files showing players in rating order as well as by team.

K-12 Champ (357 players)

• #56 Evan Sandberg 2009
• #61 Jeff Young 1996 -- Saratoga
• #107 Arthur Liou 1859
• #107 Charles Sun 1859 -- Saratoga
• #113 Brian Wai 1849 -- Saratoga
• #124 Aaron Garg 1820 -- Saratoga
  

K-12 U1600 (310 players)

• #17 Alex Lun 1536 -- Saratoga
• #18 Sankash Shankar 1532 -- Saratoga
• #19 Avinash Kumar 1531 -- Saratoga

K-8 Champ (233 players)

• #52 Aamir Azhar 1695

K-6 Champ (215 players)

• #17 Jerome Sun 1864 -- MSJE
• #21 James Kwok 1816 -- MSJE
• #25 Hemang Jangle 1737 -- MSJE
• #63 Armaan Kalyanpur 1541 -- MSJE
  

K-5 Champ (306 players)

• #4 Kyle Shin 1905 -- reigning National 5th Grade Champion (see photo at right)
  

K-3 Champ (238 players)

• #5 Vignesh Panchantham 1654
• #10 Cameron Wheeler 1589

K-1 Champ (299 players)

• #10 Rayan Taghizadeh 1003

Saratoga High School fields teams in both the K-12 Championship and K-12 U1600. The elite team is ranked #7 by the average rating of the top 4 boards, but the competition is extremely fierce. There will be quite a few very good teams, including three rated above 2100! While the U1600 team has only three players, they all are rated in the top 10% of the section and can fight for both individual honors and a respectable team trophy.

Mission San Jose Elementary has three teams in the K-6 Champ, K-5 Champ and K-3 Champ. The K-6 Champ team is ranked #1 by average rating of the top 4 boards. Before anyone counts their chickens before they hatch, I would caution that the usually underrated New York programs and one strong team from Virginia will offer serious competition. The younger kids from MSJE are not quite as highly ranked, but still the K-3 Champ team is seeded #8 in their section.

Wish us all good luck! Please check the Fpawn Blog throughout the weekend for daily updates, usually at night after the kids have gone to bed. I will post occasional news from my cell phone onto my Twitter feed. Of course, the USCF website will have stories each day. Finally, check the official SuperNationals website for news, pairings and results.