This is my last “Message from the TCA President” since, as I previously wrote, I am not seeking reelection.  It has been an honor and privilege to serve as the TCA President for the past four years, and I thank all of you for your support of our players, tournament directors, organizers, and to those of us who were appointed to lead this great organization.  As you know, the TCA Elections are underway, and I encourage all TCA members of voting age to exercise their right to vote.  Regardless of who gets elected, I am confident that you will continue to support them and, most importantly, our players.

Five outstanding chess players represented us at the US Chess National Invitational events, July 27-30, in Norfolk, Virginia!  Once again, these five players were Scott Elliott (Irwin National Tournament of Senior State Champions), Sharvesh Deviprasath (Denker National Tournament of State High School Champions), Ellery Zhang (Haring National Tournament of Girls State Champions), Eric Liu (Barber National Tournament of Middle School Champions), and Oscar Zhang (Rockefeller National Tournament of State Elementary Schools Champions).  Sharvesh finished in a tie for first place and is the Co-Champion of the Denker!  In the Barber, Eric finished in second place, while Ellery finished tied for 7th place in the Haring.  In the Irwin, Scott finished tied for 12th place, while Oscar finished tied for 14th place in Rockefeller.  These fantastic individual performances resulted in a first-place tie (second on tiebreaks) for Texas among the 53 teams. Congratulations to our Texas representatives!

In the recently conducted 4th Annual Creativity Contest, Texas chess players and organizers were the winners in three categories.  Caleb Brown of Innovative Chess Solutions was a winner in the Online & Social Media Subcategory, Best Website U500 Users; Kwunnie Ng (Montgomery) in the Visual Arts Subcategory for Best Photo (Chess Bunny), and young Evelyn Leal of Region VIII in the Visual Arts Category, Best Art Subcategory for her drawing of The Last Board.  Congratulations to them.  Lastly, winning the 2024 US Chess Annual Awards were two Texans: Sr TD/FA/IO Luis Salinas was posthumously awarded the US Chess Outstanding Career Achievement Award, and Jim Hollingsworth was awarded the US Chess Meritorious Service Award.

As always, there is much more included in this issue of TK, so please read on!  Thanks again for your support for this organization and, most importantly, for our chess players!

With best regards,

Franc