US Chess Brings Historic Events Online to Chess.com
The United States Chess Federation will hold some of its longest-running and most prestigious scholastic tournaments online this year, starting this weekend on Chess.com.
Like many "over the board" tournaments, the U.S. Open (historically held in August) was canceled this year following required COVID-19 pandemic safety protocols. For scholastic players, not holding US Chess's flagship tournament would, unfortunately, mean the major scholastic events that normally take place in conjunction with the Open were in danger of being canceled. Canceling these historical tournaments all together would likely mean denying many young people their opportunity to fulfill lifelong scholastic chess goals.
However, thanks to the hard work of many US Chess delegates, and in partnership with Chess.com, all five of the Premiere Invitationals will take place, in addition to a brand new event, appropriately named after one of the most influential people in scholastic chess history.
The weekend of elite U.S. scholastic chess will start on Friday, July 24 at 4 p.m. Pacific / 7 p.m. Eastern / 01:00 (Saturday) Central Europe with the FM Sunil Weeramantry National Blitz Tournament of State Champions. The event is open to all competitors of the Invitationals and will feature commentary by GM Robert Hess and WGM Kateryna Nemcova.
Hikaru Nakamura and his stepfather, Sunil Weeramantry
Sunil Weeramantry is the Co-Chairman of US Chess's Scholastic Council and a chess coach with a legendary reputation. Weeramantry is the founder and Executive Director of the National Scholastic Chess Foundation but is perhaps most known for leading Hunter College elementary to numerous national scholastic titles over several decades as well as training his stepson and future five-time U.S. Champion, Hikaru Nakamura.
Starting each day at 8 a.m. Pacific / 11 a.m. Eastern / 17:00 Central Europe, both Saturday and Sunday will see the GM Arnold Denker Tournament of High School State Champions, as well as the WIM Ruth Haring Tournament of Girls State Champions and the National Tournament of Senior State Champions, get underway.
Also running throughout both weekends will be the National Tournament of Senior State Champions. The full guide of the events taking place can be found here, with the rules that govern the invitationals being found here. Long days will display some of the top talents in the United States competing for thousands of dollars in scholarship prizes.
None other than Nakamura himself will provide commentary on the two most elite-events for American high school chess players. He'll be joined by IM Danny Rensch on his Twitch channel Twitch.tv/gmhikaru on July 26. Coverage will also take place on July 25th by GM Robert Hess and WGM Jen Shahade on Twitch.tv/gmhess.
The following weekend of August 1-2 will similarly feature top American players of an even younger variety: The Dewain Barber National Tournament of Middle School State Champions as well as the John D. Rockefeller III National Tournament of Elementary School State Champions will take place, yet again with commentary by some of the most well-known streamers in the online chess community.
The full schedule is above. Tune into Chess.com/TV for every broadcast.
