Overall, 2023 was a very positive year for the International Chess Academy! By far our school's biggest highlight was being able to restart our Dr. Ostfeld Memorial ICA Championships at Bergen County Academies after the pandemic. Other club highlights include seeing record attendances week after week at our Glen Rock events.
With constant, high tournament attendance comes progression from our students. And with opportunities to play at a high level becoming easier to find than ever, we are proud to see our students representing our school in such a positive manner! Several ICA players that have shown great progression this year include Kian Zarineh, Leon Shevelenko, Jack Holder, Goktug Bas, and Ido Alkin, but those names only scrape the surface.
Therefore, we had to raise the bar even higher for the final week of 2023; and raise the bar we did. With the quality of our Winter Camp and New Years Blitz improving each year, we have a lot to share in this report!
Morning chess lessons at our Winter Camp featured game analysis, tactics puzzles, memory and vision challenges, new strategic and positions ideas, and even some chess psychology. Campers worked hard, had fun, and improved their chess. The chess was interspersed with active games like Circle of Doom, dodgeball, soccer and freeze tag. And in the afternoon, campers tested out their new ideas in the afternoon tournament. The Friday tournament of course is bug house day – a great release after a week of chess study.
In Coach Sean's group at Glen Rock, the focus was on weighing different imbalances in a position and utilizing weak squares. Grisha led the class in the most correct answers, in addition to showing a memorized game he had retained from summer camp, winning the best-in-group prize. Nick also did a great job showcasing a classic Greco game.
Camp started at Teaneck on Christmas day this year with only four of the most dedicated campers attending. Rishabh and Michael Jin shared first place in the four-man tournament that day, but could get no further starting on Tuesday as Michael Lokhov, the highest rated camper (if we don't count Octavia's provisional rating) convincingly won first, or shared first every single day during which we had a classical tournament. The section two winners changed from day to day with Yair, and Rishabh earning first on various days. The section three winners on different days were Amy, George, and Dylan.
At Glen Rock, where camp started on Tuesday, the top section had a different winner each day! David, Geoffrey, and Grisha each won once, meaning each player received a prize. In another quad, Nika won her tournament with 2.5/3. Beforehand she said she was nervous to play, but she didn't look nervous when she was winning her section!
Throughout the week we also managed to go outside for dodgeball no matter what be it rain, or shine, or as Peppa Pig would say “muddy puddles.” Some of the campers complained about their shoes being ruined (expensive shoes no less) but as good chess players they had a choice to make about playing dodgeball in the mud, or not, and being true to the spirit of childhood they ultimately made the right decision.
At Teaneck, Max, and Yair had a fantastic duel in the dodgeball point standings all week, but despite a late charge by Yair on the last day it was Max who finished with forty-four points (Yair managed to get close with forty one) and took his prize home (or on vacation to Atlantic City!).
At Glen Rock, the sports highlight came on the final day of camp during the after hours extracurricular program. On that day, Coach Alan Salnikov came up with a fantastic idea to shake things up. He proposed playing “futbol” in the parking lot. This unexpected twist brought a wave of excitement, with both coaches and campers actively participating in the game, scoring goals back and forth. It turned out to be a delightful and memorable way to wrap up the year.
On Friday, we had our traditional blitz bughouse event which was won by the team of Maximus and Yair at Teaneck and by Max and Sophia at Glen Rock. The highlight of the tournament, undoubtedly, came when one of our most inexperienced players, Ariya, was placed on a team with the coaches. After entering the tournament at Round 3, she had Albert as a teammate, then Jonathan, then Alan. Despite the prestige of her teammates, Ariya won her individual match during Round 4 while Jonathan lost!
All in all, both Glen Rock and Teaneck had very successful camps! But before we move on, HERE is a short story about the playground adventures of Glen Rock, written by After a day off on Saturday, we returned to ICA on Sunday, New Years Eve, for our annual Blitz Tournament! The tournament was directed by Alessandro, Jonathan, and Prashant while Alan, Sean, and Arnav live-streamed the tournament. For those who either missed it or want to relive the events, below is the FULL VIDEO of the livestream.
In the Open Section, Gary Leschinsky comfortably won all seven games to seal first place! It seemed as if Yujeong Yeo would do the same after winning his first six games. All he needed was a draw against Ari Lukatsky in the final round to seal sole possession of first place. Unfortunately, Yujeong bottled it, and, with a Leon Shevelenko victory against Choco in the final round, first place was shared between Yujeong, Ari, and Leon!
The costume contest presented a chance for players to vote for each other via noise. This method worked perfectly for the unrated section, with Levi comfortably winning with his heavy metal costume. Unfortunately, this event turned more into a popularity contest at the U1600 level, with the Zarineh brothers receiving the most applause for inferior costumes! Therefore, I disqualified one, and allowed the other to stay, only to get voted out by the commentators. In the end, after the commentators could not decide between Isaac Newton and a flower, Alessandro gave the deciding vote to the flower (Grace Chen)!
But, undoubtedly, the best part of this tournament (and, possibly, the year), came at the conclusion of the tournament, when many players stayed to play matches of blitz and bughouse whilst Jessica Lee DJ'd for the players! Despite her obvious disappointment that nobody was dancing, it was clear how much everyone appreciated her efforts. As I told Nicolas and Yaakov, the atmosphere was electric.
Over the next week, I will upload videos onto YouTube featuring highlights from the blitz tournament, including the costume contest and DJ. But for now, Happy New Year to everyone, and we hope for an even better 2024!
But before I let everyone go, congratulations to David Milstein for winning 4th place at the Annual Eastern Open U1900 section with 6/8 points! His name could easily have featured in the report intro alongside the other improved players. But since it didn't, David will analyze his matches in the first ICA SHOW episode of the year! Below is the video, which will go live Sunday, January 7th, at 8pm.
Albert Abzalimov CHAT GPT.
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