The Shanghai Chess Academy's Winter Regional, their most elite tournament of the year, was recently held at Shanghai Center, with 38 international students aged 5 to 15 participating and competing for the championship.

To complete the rapid, Swiss-style tournament, each player is given seven rounds for at most 15 minutes per round. If they win a round, he or she will move to the next round to play against the winner from another match.

The player who loses a round still has a chance to play with other players who also lost their round. After seven rounds, players are ranked by the number of rounds that they have won. After five hours of competing, the very best players from each age group win the championship.

"There are students at the beginning level. There are also intermediate and advanced level students," said Rosita Janbakhsh, tournament director of Shanghai Chess Academy. 

Troy Cui from Shanghai American School was the overall champion. Cui is 11 years old, but has played chess for over five years. "Originally, it was my mom who wanted me to play chess, because she thinks that I am really quiet," said Cui, who added that he stopped playing when his family moved from Xiamen to Shanghai, but got back into the hobby after learning about the academy.

Your move

Shanghai Chess Academy was launched in 2015 and its coaches have been teaching chess to students from Shanghai's numerous international schools since 2012.

"We started at Yew Chung International School of Shanghai, and now we are teaching at nine other international schools in Shanghai," said Alan Clarke, president of Shanghai Chess Academy.

The chess classes are extracurricular, with children interested in the game staying after school to learn from their coaches for one hour every day. The academy also offers small group classes to children interested in further improving their skills at Shanghai Center and three other community centers in Pudong New Area, Hongqiao district and Jinqiao on weekends.

Currently, upwards of 200 children are learning chess at their own schools and around 50 are taking small group classes. "One of the key features and the main benefits of chess is the extraordinary concentration and attention that it helps you to develop. These two things can be applied to all of your studies," said Clarke.

Alan Clarke, president of Shanghai Chess Academy

 

International students in Shanghai compete in a chess tournament.

 

International students in Shanghai compete in a chess tournament.

Photos: Courtesy of Shanghai Chess Academy

 
Newspaper headline: Checkmate!