Coming up Classic Championship 2026 21 Jul 2026 Did you know Prefers White (≥50 games as each colour): Siyuan Wu, 63% as White vs 42% as Black (22-point edge). Did you know Busiest year at the board: 2023 saw 1822 rated games played at WCC. Winner 2026 Winter WonderBlitz Kumaresan, Aditya Did you know Largest WCC tournament by field size: 2026 January Classic (39 entrants). Did you know The Returner, biggest gap between two WCC tournaments by an active regular: Mehmed Ceylan sat out 31 months between the Wollongong 2023 Spring Holiday Rapid and the 2026 April Holiday Rapid. Coming up Blitz Championship 2026 8 Sep 2026 Did you know WCC has hosted 6,654 rated tournament games on file. Did you know Biggest final-round flip: at the 2023 Top and Tail Rapid 2, Steve Ascic took a 1-point lead into the last round, lost to Vincent Qiang, and watched the title walk away. Winner 2026 June Swiss Soutter, Jake Did you know Busiest month at WCC: April, 898 rated games played across all years on file. Did you know Prefers Black (≥50 games as each colour): Jye Giddings, 61% as Black vs 41% as White (19-point edge). Coming up 960 Classic 2026 15 Sep 2026 Did you know Most decisive WCC tournament: 2025 January Holiday Rapid, 1% of games drawn (1 of 84). Did you know Highest ACF rating ever recorded at a WCC tournament: Jordan Morris at 2204, first at the 2024 Wollongong Blitz Championship. Winner Wollongong Rapid June Planiden, Chayne Did you know In Round 1 at WCC, the lower-rated player has won 13% of decisive games (87 of 649). Did you know Biggest tournament upset by seed: Edmund Esterbauer entered the 2022 Champs Warmup as the #10 seed and won outright. Coming up Classic Championship 2026 21 Jul 2026 Did you know Prefers White (≥50 games as each colour): Siyuan Wu, 63% as White vs 42% as Black (22-point edge). Did you know Busiest year at the board: 2023 saw 1822 rated games played at WCC. Winner 2026 Winter WonderBlitz Kumaresan, Aditya Did you know Largest WCC tournament by field size: 2026 January Classic (39 entrants). Did you know The Returner, biggest gap between two WCC tournaments by an active regular: Mehmed Ceylan sat out 31 months between the Wollongong 2023 Spring Holiday Rapid and the 2026 April Holiday Rapid. Coming up Blitz Championship 2026 8 Sep 2026 Did you know WCC has hosted 6,654 rated tournament games on file. Did you know Biggest final-round flip: at the 2023 Top and Tail Rapid 2, Steve Ascic took a 1-point lead into the last round, lost to Vincent Qiang, and watched the title walk away. Winner 2026 June Swiss Soutter, Jake Did you know Busiest month at WCC: April, 898 rated games played across all years on file. Did you know Prefers Black (≥50 games as each colour): Jye Giddings, 61% as Black vs 41% as White (19-point edge). Coming up 960 Classic 2026 15 Sep 2026 Did you know Most decisive WCC tournament: 2025 January Holiday Rapid, 1% of games drawn (1 of 84). Did you know Highest ACF rating ever recorded at a WCC tournament: Jordan Morris at 2204, first at the 2024 Wollongong Blitz Championship. Winner Wollongong Rapid June Planiden, Chayne Did you know In Round 1 at WCC, the lower-rated player has won 13% of decisive games (87 of 649). Did you know Biggest tournament upset by seed: Edmund Esterbauer entered the 2022 Champs Warmup as the #10 seed and won outright.

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Deep Thinkers

30 June 2024 · Illawarra

newsletter

Find out all about what the Wollongong Chess Club is up to.

Classic Tournament

Our Classic tournament concluded on Tuesday night. Congratulations to everyone who won a prize - especially to Ngoc Hai Nguyen and Jay Pham who shared first.

We would love to hear your feedback on the pairings that were done for this tournament. They were different to the standard tournaments we usually run.

Prizes

Open Category

1st= ($90): Ngoc Hai Nguyen, Minh Khue Pham (4.5/5)

3rd ($60): Martin Hill (4/5)

Rated 1300 - 1600

1st= ($70): Craig Curtin, Marco Quaranta (3/5)

Rated Under 1300

1st= ($70): Fernando Barasoain, Paul Parker (2.5/5)

This Coming Week - Our AGM

On Tuesday 2nd July we have our Annual General Meeting. We will be presenting a number of short reports as to how the club is going and voting in a new committee to take us through the next 12months. Please join us as we would love your input and to answer any questions you may have about the club. If you want more information or would like to help us through the next 12months please email our secretary, Martin Hill, by clicking below.

Chess960 Following the AGM

Following our AGM we will be having a number of games of Chess 960 or Fischer Random. For those of you who are unfamiliar with it - the back rank of chess pieces start in a random order. There are 960 possibilities with the following two rules:

The King is placed between the two rooks to still allow for castling. When you castle, the king and rook end of the squares they would be on after castling in a usual chess game. A short explanation of castling will be given before the first round.

If you want to know more, read up on chess960 online.

You can also play some practice games on chess.com or Lichess.

About Chess960

Wollongong Online

Our Monthly tournament is online tomorrow night!! Check it out. This starts promptly at 7pm. Don’t be late. When you are in the tournament lobby, make sure you click on the register button in the top right to be included in the first round. If you are late you will be given a half point bye for round 1. Even 2seconds late, we cannot include you as it is an automatic pairing system.

Wollongong Online Chess Club