Chess is Big News!

Fifteen schools and more than 130 kids participated in Super 14 Interschool Chess around the Waikato region this week. From Taupo in the South to Whakatane in the east, and further north to Huntly and Ngatea all had a wonderful time. This comment, from one of the schools that participated at Ngatea was typical:

“What a wonderful tournament yesterday.  The children came back buzzing about the day.  We will definitely be attending again!  It is great to have a tournament for students to play this great game.”

The week started at Taupo, where Tokoroa High School edged out the hosts by just one point, to take the gold medals in the Secondary competition. Taupo Intermediate and Waipahihi were the qualifiers for the national finals in the other divisions.

On to Huntly where Helensville Primary, who had already qualified for the National finals, took a punt on making the long road trip to try to qualify an extra player. They blitzed the field for their third zone win, ensuring they will have a team of 7 at Pigeon Mountain on October 18. In the battle for the other qualifying spot behind Helensville only half a point separated three teams: Huntly College, Kimihia School and St Andrew’s School. In the end Kimihia prevailed on tie-break. Where the scores of the top 4 players in two teams are the same, the tie-breaker is the score of the fifth-highest scorer for each team. Unfortunately for Huntly College they had entered a team of only 4!

The event at Ngatea saw the host school Hauraki Plains College take the Secondary competition, with Stanley Avenue School grabbing both the Intermediate and Primary qualifying spots.

Finally we went to Whakatane where the Sonny Bill Williams of Super 14 Interschool chess was unearthed. Fernanda Sirvian, a foreign exchange student from Brazil, swept the field with 7/7 and led her school to a qualifying spot over hosts Trident High School. Perhaps this will start a trend of schools recruiting internationally for the 2011 edition of Super 14 Interschool Chess!

All the results are at our results page here.