Somerset Chess Dominates Term Three Inter-School Tournament

Somerset Chess has won Division A, B and C, receiving medals and merit ribbons aplenty!

The exciting rebuild of Somerset College Chess continued to bear fruit this term as 80 of our Junior School returned to take on the "group of death" zone- Gold Coast Hinterland- containing 140 King's Christian College entries as well as other formidable school competition.

Our growing coaching program, lunch and after school clubs- as well as the return of Somerset coaching legend Doug Williams to help FM Dusan
head up our elite chess program- meant that we were more ready than ever with 20 teams entered in every division.

With an ever increasing buzz and excitement around chess at Somerset, it was exciting to see the hard work and dedication of our kids and coaches paying off!

CONGRATULATIONS TO THE FOLLOWING STUDENTS

**Division A 1st Place**

• William Zhao (Also equal 1st place individual)
• Theo Appel
• Arthur Chou
• Marcus Wong

**Division B 1st Place**

• Daniel Chen (also equal 1st place individual)
• Alan Zeng
• Jakub Pitura
• Thomas Chudzinski

**Division C 1st place**

• Angie He (also equal 1st place individual)
• Nathan Liu
• Ethan Zhang
• Jacob Kearney

The Year 2 up-and-comers took out Division D last term, went up and immediately won Division 

OTHER INDIVIDUAL HIGHLIGHTS

Sohan Pateel continues his meteoric rise, debuting in the top division with 5/7. Seeded 41st out of 53 participants, Sohan finished =6th.

Asha Kowalczuk fell painfully short of winning the whole tournament with his final game on Board 1 coming down to the wire. Asha was up a Queen in a tricky position, but was not able to prevent his opponent promoting a pawn with a crowd watching and his clock approaching zero. Also finishing =6th, Asha played absolutely amazing the whole day, with a tournament high and personal best +241 rating performance. I look forward to seeing him continue to grow as he joins the High School squads next year.

Prep Student Xavier Saunders, made his tournament debut with an incredible 3rd place bronze in Division E! Along with Hamish Logan, Harvey O'Brien and fellow Preppy first-timer Oscar Yu, also went home with Team Silver Medal. Amazing!

A big thank you to all our students, parents, coaches and Somerset staff who all contributed to an amazing day!

Check out this link for all the details.

And stay tuned for news around our Gold Coast Finals Team going for States!