Latter-day Saint Chess Friends Newsletter #3
Welcome to the third newsletter! Our admin team thought that with all the new members and new activity in the club, we could help describe what happens here and what will happen in the future.
We compete in chess leagues, and vote chess matches. We also arrange 'friendly' matches to help ensure everyone who wants to play can do so. Signing up for matches is entirely optional, of course. If you do sign up, please check your game at least every three days so that your games don't time out.
Team Matches
In Team Matches, the players on the teams are ranked in order of rating against each other. Some players may not get a board if we have less players registered than our opponents. Some matches are limited by your daily chess rating, for example "< 1400" or U1400 means the match is limited to players with a daily-chess rating of less than 1400. Click on the match name, and if your rating is such that you are eligible to join the match, a "Join" button will appear. Chess.com handles all this automatically.
There are three 'friendly' team matches currently in registration:
The Good Knight starts June 18 8pm
Hello Hong Kong starts June 22
28 matches still in play with half of them over 80% done. We are in the lead in 19 of them and 3 tied. Way to go team. Finish strong. Surfsnook has done a great job of finding matches for us and usually they are exotic places. If you have an interest in playing a club, drop a comment and we will see what we can do.
Chess Leagues
Vote Chess Snow Dragon League
We are placed in the new Snow Dragon League. Play started the beginning of this year. Our club is smaller than the other teams in the league so we will view this year as a learning experience. We did recently pick up our first win. Matches are at https://www.chess.com/votechess/game/137804 and https://www.chess.com/votechess/game/144300. The next match round will come in July.
Vote Chess
Vote Chess is a team game. Each move takes 3 days. You discuss the each move with other members for the first 2 days, and after there's been consideration of all the proposed moves, normally during the last 24 hours, the Vote Chess Captain will post the agreed move (or a few alternative moves if no clear advantage was shown).
We have 4 vote chess matches in progress right now. We’ve won half of our game and expect more to follow. One was the Evan’s Gambit and we took the attack to them and broke through with checkmate. Expect to see more Vote Chess matches in the future. They are good for those trying to learn to play better. We encourage beginners but strongly encourage questions and joining in the discussions.
You can join Vote Chess games at any time. Click here to join or check on each game. Games can be found here https://www.chess.com/club/votechess/latter-day-saint-chess-friends.
Chess Improvement
When the virus shutdown, I experimented with working with a couple of our lower ranked players to improve their game. If there is interest in this, join the vote chess games or post a comment.
Recruitment Update
We added 29 members since last update and currently have 136. A warm welcome to all of you!
Please help by inviting fellow Saints on chess.com or those you play over-the-board or in local chess clubs to join. Just ask them to come to https://www.chess.com/club/latter-day-saint-chess-friends.
Top Match Players List
Top Match Players list can be found here: https://www.chess.com/club/leaderboard/latter-day-saint-chess-friends. Bishopskewer is in the lead but let’s push him for the top spot. How to do it? Play in more matches and win. 1 point per win and a half point for a draw. Or go for top win percentage. FirstAidFundraising is the new leader with 81.3% (10 game minimum).
Team Statistics
We have 28 matches in progress, but overall we have won 55% of our matches, which is up 6 points. Our ranking among all Clubs on chess.com has improved to #1035 of 50,653 which is 98%, up 285 spots. Vote Chess made a bit jump to #1,332 of 47,920 which is 97.2%, up 1,012 spots. Expect us to keep moving up the charts.
