As we start a new year, once again, the Texas Chess Association staff and I thank you for your outstanding support and love for the game of chess. As always, it is a team effort, and your contributions do not go unnoticed.
This, the first issue of Texas Knights this year, is packed with tournament reports, games, and pictures. Thanks to those who contributed to this, and in particular to our Editor, Jeff French. As I mentioned before, please mark your calendar for the 2024 tournaments, starting with the Regional Championships, which are being held during the early part of the year in most of the ten TCA regions. Following the Regional Championships, we will have the Texas Scholastic Chess Championships, both North and South. Players are not limited to one or the other, and they may play in both. The Texas Scholastic Chess Championships North are being organized by the Dallas Chess Club and will be held in Houston, on March 1 – 3. The South Championships are being organized by UTRGV and will be held in Brownsville, on March 16 – 17 (correction from the last issue, as the South Championship will start on Saturday, not Friday). We hope to see most of our scholastic chess players in either one of these or both! And as we mentioned before, since these events will be used to select our representatives for the US Chess National Invitational events (Denker, Barber, and Rockefeller), there will be online playoffs between the first-place winners of the North and South High School, Middle School, and Elementary School Championship sections. In addition, we will have an online playoff between the top female players of those three sections in both North and South events, and they will join the winners of the same sections from the 2023 Texas Girls Championships to determine the Texas representative to the Haring National Tournament of Girls State Champions. Of course, we cannot forget about the Irwin National Tournament of Senior Champions. The winner of the 2024 Senior Championship, which is being organized by the Arlington Chess Club, will be the Texas representative. As you may know, those national events are always held in conjunction with the U.S. Open, and in 2024, they will be held at the Sheraton Norfolk Waterside Hotel in Norfolk, Virginia, July 27 – 30. So, again, please make plans to attend the TCA events and visit our website as well as the TCA Facebook page for information.
We have had a lot of chess action recently, and this issue also covers, among other things, the Texas Team Championship, the Intercollegiate Team Championship, the SPICE Cup Open, a historical game from the 1986 Southwest Open, an informative book review by the 1989 U.S. Women’s Champion WIM Alexey Root, and much more, so read on!
For this issue, we were also going to include Part 2 of my article for tournament directors and organizers, but I am still working on it, and it will be included in the next issue of Texas Knights.
Thanks again for your support for this organization and, most importantly, for our chess players!
With best regards,
Franc
