Posted in Asia, China, Turkey, World Championships on Dec 24th, 2010 2 Comments »
GM Hou YifanWomen’s World Champion Since becoming one of the youngest Grandmasters in history (14 years, 6 months), the chess community knew that good things were to come for the diminutive girl from China. GM Hou Yifan, 16, would compete for the Women’s World Championship in 2008 losing to GM Alexandra Kosteniuk in the finals, [...]
Posted in Asia, China, World Championships on Dec 18th, 2010 15 Comments »
2010 Women World Chess ChampionshipFINALS (Hou Yifan vs. Ruan Lufei) Player ELO Nation Flag Player ELO Nation Flag Hou 2591 CHN Ruan 2480 CHN Preview: The stage is set and at the end of this final match, the glory will be China’s once again. However, who will win the Women’s World Championship Chess match? If [...]
Posted in China, India, Turkey, World Championships on Dec 15th, 2010 13 Comments »
2010 Women World Chess ChampionshipRound #5 Pairings # Player ELO Nation Flag Player ELO Nation Flag 1 Ruan 2480 CHN Zhao 2474 CHN 2 Koneru 2600 IND Hou 2591 CHN Preview: As if on cue, China has made a statement on the world stage once again. They will boast three of the last four players [...]
Posted in Turkey, World Championships on Dec 12th, 2010 2 Comments »
2010 Women World Chess ChampionshipRound #4 Pairings # Player ELO Nation Flag Player ELO Nation Flag 1 Harika 2525 IND Ruan 2480 CHN 2 Zhao 2474 CHN Skripchenko 2460 FRA 3 Koneru 2600 IND Ju 2524 CHN 4 Hou 2591 CHN Lahno 2522 UKR Preview: Looking at the quarterfinals, you have Koneru Humpy and Hou [...]
Posted in Turkey, World Championships on Dec 10th, 2010 2 Comments »
2010 Women World Chess ChampionshipRound #3 Pairings # Player ELO Nation Flag Player ELO Nation Flag 1 Kosteniuk 2507 RUS Ruan 2480 CHN 2 Muzychuk,M 2462 UKR Harika 2525 IND 3 Dembo 2454 GRE Zhao 2474 CHN 4 Skripchenko 2460 FRA Cmilyte 2514 LTU 5 Koneru 2600 IND Zatonskih 2478 USA 6 Muzychuk,A 2462 SLO [...]
Posted in Turkey, World Championships on Dec 4th, 2010 7 Comments »
Round #1 – Game #1 Saturday, 4 December 2010 Top Seeds maul Challengers GM Koneru Humpy got off to a promising start.Photo by wwcxc2010.tsf.org.tr. In the first round of a two-game match, upsets are likely to occur. However, in the Women’s World Chess Championship, there were no major upsets and the top seeds rolled to [...]
Posted in Turkey, World Championships on Dec 4th, 2010 22 Comments »
Today starts the Women’s World Championship with most of the top players in the world. Of course, Judit Polgar has eschewed playing in the gender-based tournament, but as the gap closes, there may be more entrants into the upper echelon of chess. Two possibilities are from the Asian continent in India’s Humpy Koneru and China’s [...]
Posted in Scholastic on Mar 11th, 2010 12 Comments »
Susan Polgar with Diamond Abdus-Shakoor. Photo courtesy of Susan Polgar. Diamond Abdus-Shakoor played in the Susan Polgar All-Girls Chess Challenge last year and won her group with a perfect 7-0 score. With this came a digital clock and a laptop computer! Diamond recently competed in the Polgar tournament and had another triumphant outing. The 9-year [...]
Posted in Opinion/Editorials, USA on Feb 19th, 2010 14 Comments »
Baraka Shabazz’s demure pose is a testament to her confidence and poise. This photo was featured in Chicago Metro News, December 4, 1982 as part of Tony Brown Journal segment. Baraka Shabazz (pronounced ba-roka sha-boz) is a famous name is Black chess lore and a name that exudes power. Her arrival on the scene was [...]
Posted in Media Stories, Scholastic, Videos on Dec 22nd, 2009 2 Comments »
The famed GM Susan Polgar, the eldest of the famed Polgar Sisters was the subject of an interesting documentary on how the three sisters received specialized training to become strong chess players. Much of the documentary was set in New York and Hungary and Polgar described her evolutionary process as a player. Polgar now runs [...]
Posted in Media Stories on Oct 14th, 2009 2 Comments »
There was an interesting argument made in a recent Wall Street Journal article titled, “Abolish Women’s Chess Titles”. This is a long-held argument that women’s titles encourage mediocrity since the standards are much lower than for overall titles. Chinese star GM Hou Yifan Photo by Fred Lucas. For example, to earn the Grandmaster title, a [...]
Posted in Scholastic, USA on Mar 25th, 2009 13 Comments »
Since of the age of 12, Medina Parrilla has been a scholastic sensation and has a case full of trophies and accolades to prove it. Pages of The Chess Drum are replete with stories of her exploits. Now on the verge of graduating high school, she is embarking on perhaps the pivotal point in her [...]
Posted in Scholastic on Feb 17th, 2009 38 Comments »
Ohio’s Diamond Abdus-Shakoor scored a stunning 7-0 result at the Susan Polgar National Open and earns an automatic invitation to the Polgar National Invitational for Girls in July. She will be the representative for the state of Ohio. Diamond also won three trophies, a laptop computer and a digital clock. Her father Abdul told The [...]
Posted in Scholastic, USA on Feb 7th, 2009 4 Comments »
Posted in Asia, China on Feb 6th, 2009 1 Comment »
There was an interesting article on ChessBase with a profile and interview of Hou Yifan, the Chinese Grandmaster who will soon turn 15 years old. The article showed the young star at various stages of her career and described her evolution as a player. GM Hou Yifan Photo by GM John Nunn. Yifan is not [...]
Posted in Scholastic on Jan 27th, 2009 11 Comments »
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Contact: Mary K. Meagher, OCCH January 25, 2009 614-224-8446 CPO Second Grade Student Places First in National Title Chess Championship Diamond Abdus-Shakoor Columbus-Ohio—In a sport that rarely sees young African American females excel, one local young girl is making a name for herself. Diamond Abdus-Shakoor, a second grade student at Deshler Elementary [...]
Posted in Opinion/Editorials on Dec 29th, 2008 16 Comments »
There is an article in the Scientific American titled, “Men’s Superiority in Chess Explained.” While the title of this post bears a question mark, the article’s title did not. The article claims to explain the rationale of why men dominate chess. They basically say that since there are more men playing then they have a [...]
Posted in Asia, China, Europe, Russia, Tournaments on Sep 12th, 2008 9 Comments »
China’s Hou Yifan and Russia’s Alexandra Kosteniuk will face off in the Championship Finals. Photo by FIDE.com. For the past two weeks, the Women’s World Chess Championship has seen inspired play amongst the 64 participants. Now that field has been whittled down to two after Hou Yifan’s dramatic tiebreak win over top-seed Koneru Humpy. Alexandra [...]
Posted in Scholastic, USA on Jul 30th, 2008 3 Comments »
The up-and-coming Brianna Conley is appearing once again as the Ohio representative at the Susan Polgar Invitational. The Polgar tournament is the counterpart to the Denker Invitational featuring all the state champions from around the country… including Alaska and Hawaii. This year the tournament is taking place at Texas Tech, the university where GM Polgar [...]
Posted in Tournaments on Jun 25th, 2008 No Comments »
EAGLE Chess Academy will host the Touch of Elegance Chess Tournament on Saturday, July 5, 2008. This royal event will take place at the Upper Marlboro Library, 14730 Main St., Upper Marlboro, MD 20772 from 10:00am-5:00pm. It is a tournament for females only. EAGLE Chess Academy is a 501(c)(3) non-profit, established to promote and teach [...]
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