Monday, October 1, 2007

Check Mate!

My kid beat me at chess yesterday. First time ever. He was so excited, and I am so proud of him. He beat me fair and square. I did not let him win. It was a very clean check mate. I'm going to have to work harder to stay competitive with my 8 year old.

He had his first tournament on Saturday, September 29th. He didn't win anything individually, but his team took first and second place. I've mentioned the Chess Club here before. These kids are really amazing. Provided my son can keep up with his schoolwork and behavior in class, his next tournament will be October 20th. He's bound to just keep getting better. And I've already noticed a change in his level of motivation at school.

Feel free to visit IdaFreemanChess.com, shop in the store. It helps the team.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

How is the chess coming along?

My mother never let me win either. I don't think I won my first game with her until I was about 14 though, maybe 15. I was also quite a poor loser too. That was almost 30 years ago. I still have all the chess books that I collected.

More chess news, please. I'd love to see how the young ones are doing nowadays.

I had learned defensive type strategies which kept me from winning a lot of games. King's Indian defense, Caro Kahn(? - can't remember spelling now) and I forget the pattern I learned when playing white.

My first rated tournament, I won $50. I was happy! During a speed chess tournament, I tied for first place overall among players who were 5-700 points higher than me at the time. It is the only trophy I ever won.

Unknown said...

Unfortunately, due to poor behavior in his classroom, kiddo got himself suspended from the team.
The team is doing very well though. They are state champions once again. They have been embarrassing the high school players.
We've been playing a little with Isaac, but admittedly not as much as we should. He's trying to get back on the team though. He challenges them to games on a regular basis.
Thank you for asking. I'll have to write a full update.