Red Deer County Chess December Happenings

Hello all!

With the season of festivals nearly upon us, some may be wondering about the state of chess in our little group. (Alright, probably not, but I'll provide an update anyway.)

Since the mall will be open, and since Saturday doesn't actually fall on a holiday, I think we will continue meeting for chess at the food court as usual on December 23 and December 30. Come to do some last minute shopping, but don't forget to stop by for a game of chess from 2:00-5:00 pm. It sure would be nice to get back to even a fraction of the players we had at the mall last winter. I'm open to suggestions to how to improve/make the meetup more appealing for everyone. Don't be shy now.

Also, the last week of December traditionally holds the final competitive chess event of the year, the FIDE World Rapid and Blitz, to be held this year in Samarkand, Uzbekistan. I thought we could have a little rapid and blitz event of our own to celebrate the year in chess. So, I have scheduled the Boxing Day Rapid to begin at 8pm December 26, and the New Years Eve Eve Blitz to be held December 30. The rapid will be 15 min+3 sec increment, slightly faster than the official FIDE time control, and the blitz will be FIDE standard 3 min +2 sec. You should see these events appear on our club homepage and when you log in to live chess.

Chess.com doesn't allow you to actually register until 1 hour BEFORE the start time, so please remember to register between 7:00-8:00 pm on December 26 and December 30. Hopefully enough people will register to have the tournaments. Time commitment will be 1.5 hours or less for each event.

TLDR:

December 23 - OTB chess at the mall; 2-5pm

December 26 - Boxing Day Rapid; register 7-8pm online

December 30 - OTB chess at the mall; 2-5pm AND Blitz event; register 7-8pm online

Thanks and Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Joyous Festivus, Blessed Kwanzaa, Happy New Year, and blessings to all and sundry.