FIDE Rated Juniors from NorCal

Coach Ted, Vignesh, NM Cameron, NM Daniel and IM Enrico at House of Chess.

The Bay Area has witnessed an explosion of highly talented chess juniors.  Within the past two years, so many of these kids, 9 to 13 years old, began playing in the Open or Master sections at adult tournaments.  Imagine a room half-full of preteen opponents, all rated above 2000!  Indeed, a decade ago we saw no more than a half dozen experts or masters under 18.  Today that number stands at 24!!

Any improving player rated above 2000 becomes a prime candidate to earn an international (FIDE) rating. There are two common routes to a published rating: participate in the top section of major adult tournaments or attend the annual World Youth Championships.  They must play at least 9 FIDE rated opponents, usually over two or three events.  Only games against internationally rated players count.  On the May FIDE rating list, I found 23 local juniors, up from 15 just eight months ago.  There's no stopping this trend now!

FM Tanuj, always smiling. (Shorman)

CalChess Top 20 FIDE Rated Juniors

1. IM Naroditsky, Daniel    2479
2. NM Liou, Yian    2312
3. NM Sevian, Samuel    2247
4. NM Liu, Daniel    2105
5. Chow, Colin    2072
6. NM Wheeler, Cameron    2066
7. Apte, Neel    2066
8. Tong, Benjamin    2064
9. Shin, Kyle    2046
10. Viswanadha, Kesav    2031
11. Klotz-Burwell, Hunter    2025
12. Liou, Arthur    2024
13. Zhu, Jack    2023
14. Iyengar, Udit    2005
15. FM Vasudeva, Tanuj    1984
16. Panchanatham, Vignesh    1964
17. Richter, Paul    1960
18. Beilin, Allan    1953
19. Banik, Siddharth    1930
20. Wang, Michael    1857

Remarks:  1. Please contact me if I missed anyone.  2. FIDE ratings tend to be 50 to 100 points lower than the corresponding USCF ratings.  3. Those who participated at World Youth start even further underrated, because their ratings are based on young opponents, who are themselves underrated.  4. Both House of Chess March Qualifier and Larry Evans Memorial in Reno made the list.

Top rated in the World at 11!  (Shelton)

Congratulations to those who earned an international rating since last September: Colin, Neel, Benjamin, Hunter, Tanuj, Paul and Siddharth!  Daniel and Cameron made strong gains to go along with their brand new USCF Master titles.  While chasing IM norms in Los Angeles and Fremont, Yian Liou recently broke 2300 and will be designated a FIDE Master as soon as the paperwork gets processed.

And finally, here is a shout-out to Samuel Sevian for being rated #1 under 12 in the entire World!  Wow!!  It reminds me of a quote by Viswanathan Anand about future World Champions: "Nowadays, if you're not a Grandmaster at 14, you can forget it."  No pressure Samuel!