Chess Articles, CRS London Academy, UK Chess News
Chess Rising Stars

To help prepare our students to compete beyond Chess Rising Stars, we are delighted to announce our first Online Grand Prix.

You can find our free Grand Prix tournaments on our lichess team page this term. Chess Rising Stars students, parents and friends are all welcome to take part.

Each tournament will have 5 rounds of 10+5 and points will be tallied across the 6 Grand Prix events. We have chosen this time control to mimic the playing conditions in the Junior Four Nations Chess League Online (J4NCLO).

Prizes will be awarded based on the number of entries and will be confirmed at a later date. Your top 5 scores from the 6 Grand Prix events will count towards this.

The online chess tournaments will take place on the following Sundays at 4 pm (GMT) in the Spring Term 2024:

28th Jan = Warm-Up

4th Feb = Grand Prix 1

11th Feb = GP 2

25th Feb = GP 3

3rd Mar = GP 4

10th Mar = GP 5

17th Mar = GP 6

To ensure the integrity of the Chess Rising Stars Online Grand Prix tournaments are maintained, we will use the lichess cheat detection system alongside the observation and judgement of our experienced coaching team.

The Chess Rising Stars London Academy team hope to see many of you there.

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CRS London Academy
Aug 17, 2023

CRS London Academy to announce its participation in the Junior 4 Nations Chess League

Chess Rising Stars London Academy are thrilled to announce its participation in Season 8 of the Junior 4 Nations Chess League Online with not one, but three talented teams!

The 4NCL is a prestigious team chess event in the UK with £10,000 in cash prizes.

As J4NCLO veterans, we secured the Division 3 title in Season 7 and were Division 4 champions in both Seasons 5 and 6.

Discover how our top students have consistently achieved impressive results at local, county, and national levels, and watch your child’s chess skills soar to new heights with exemplary team spirit and competitive camaraderie.

J4NCLO serves as an ideal gateway to tournament chess, and our experienced students have successfully progressed to compete over the board. All competing juniors are required to become members of the English Chess Federation.

We can provide an introduction to the world of team chess competitions for your child.

Contact us to find out more about this enriching experience.

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CRS London Academy, UK Chess News
Oct 18, 2023

Our Rising Star Sheng Lu Wins UK Chess Challenge Terafinal

It is our pleasure to present the UK Chess Challenge U10 Girls Terafinal 2023 Champion, Sheng Lu.

Sheng first joined Chess Rising Stars back in the Summer of 2021 and, through her sustained effort both on and off the board, has made excellent progress. To support her chess development, she has been an active member of our Elite Club Online and received private lessons with us. Notably, Sheng was one of three Chess Rising Stars students to secure a spot in the U10 Terafinal.

Terafinalists and their families in the grounds of Blenheim Palace

The tournament followed a challenging 12-player Round Robin format with 8 boys and 4 girls vying for the titles. Sheng achieved 3.5 points, including a perfect score of 3/3 against the other girls in her section. Sheng’s final round win against her closest rival secured the U10 Girls Champion title.

Chess Rising Stars coaches WFM Maria Manelidou and Chris Russell were in attendance at the Terafinal to provide pre-game preparation and encouragement. We were keen to support our students at this prestigious event. They all competed fiercely and exceeded our expectations!

Chess Rising Stars students and coaches at the Terafinal

Sheng’s journey to the Terafinal reflects her extensive tournament experience, which spans across England, Germany, and the USA. She secured her place as the Top Girl in both the Online Megafinal and Gigafinal and carried this winning momentum into the Terafinal.

At Chess Rising Stars, we are committed to promoting and empowering girls in chess. As part of our ongoing efforts, we will launch a Girls’ Online Chess Club in November 2023. For further details, please refer to our website here.

We are looking forward to finding out what’s next for Sheng!

Sheng before her 7th round game

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UK Chess News
Jun 08, 2024

SW England v Wales – 26th May 2024

Match Report by Noah Bevis

I was really excited to be playing Board 1 for the SW England team in the fixture against Wales. It was my first fixture since being selected to join the England U11 team and it was brilliant to travel to Bristol with Aden, who is also a Chess Rising Star and my best chess friend.

Chris Strong, who is the team captain, met us when we arrived and showed us to our team waiting room where we were given our England t-shirts. I played a few friendly games against Aden and other members of the team to warm up. The atmosphere was quite exciting.

Each player played two standard-play games (60+10). I played Wales’s Boards 1 and 2, and Aden played their Boards 3 and 4 (as he was on Board 3) and our Board 2 played their Boards 1 and 2.

My first game, which was against their Board 1, was very rough as I made a losing mistake around move 20, but thankfully he could not punish my error. After that, it was very smooth for a while. Eventually, he got into time trouble in a complex position and ended up blundering a fork! He realised his mistake immediately and I smoothly converted the winning position that arose after that. Then there was a break between rounds for lunch and we took a whole team photo which was really fun!

I played some more friendlies before going in to Round 2. In this round, I played their Board 2. It was pretty even throughout because we both played very accurately. Like before, this opponent got into big time pressure in a key rook endgame. In the endgame he lacked technique and tried to rush to a draw. He made some poor choices in pivotal moments (admittedly, rook endgames are very hard!) which led to a resignation and that meant 2/2!

The final score overall was 10.5 England – 9.5 Wales in the U11s. Altogether, the day was a big success!

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