The 2004 Junior Championships returned to East Grand Rapids Middle School, the site of the 2001 and 2002 events. The 387 participants in 9 sections were just shy of the final tally of about 400 from last year. For the first time, we used advance registration only which greatly aided in getting the event started on time. In fact, I spent most of Saturday worried that something would go wrong, rather than fixing all of the little problems that usually present themselves. We were altered to our disaster at around noon when the trophies arrived, with all of the wrong plates. But, all of the trophies were present and round one did start on time for the Saturday sections, so it wasn’t really much of a disaster. In any case, it was wonderful to have the event in a facility that was perfectly equipped to handle all of the people. Lest anyone forget the force behind East Grand Rapids chess, let me remind you all what a wonderful event organizer Dan Brown is. In addition to Dan’s efforts in coordinating the site for us, we must thank his parent volunteers, Belinda Wright who helped at the results table on Saturday, and the EGR Wrestling club who ran the concession stand and helped maintain the site throughout the weekend. Thank-you also to the MCA board members who stopped by, both to watch and to help. MCA secretary, Kathy Moroney, in addition to being a supportive parent, helped out at the results table on Saturday and Sunday, as did Tim McGrew, Michigan Chess Games Editor, who was also being a supportive parent on Sunday. The tournament event staff was composed of me, Jeff Aldrich, Keith Councell, Eric Choate, and Martin Moore, just like the 2003 Junior.

Michigan Junior (K-12)

For the first time in recent memory, the Junior had an amazingly small turn-out. Only 35 competitors joined the event. Perhaps the insurgence of participants in the Young Junior will restore the numbers of high school players in the future. The largest groups of students were from Mendon, in their first year of competition, and Kearsley, who drove over from Flint. However, the playing room for the Junior was beautifully set-up in the library on the second floor of EGR middle school, overlooking the lake. It was a quiet, serene room, with natural lighting that was really nice, except in the evening during round three. One of the three co-champions from 2003 returned to the 2004 event. Aaron Kahn, now a ninth grader, was top-seed in the event. Aaron’s rating was 300 points higher than his nearest competitor. Two upsets occurred in the first round. Brad Beagle had a very nice game, defeating Doug Fick on board four and Jeevak Somaratna defeated Nick Cox on table eight. Aaron Kahn defeated Ashlee Payne on board one, Gary Pratt defeated Kurt Benson on board two, John Gattinger won on board three over Eron Ali, and Scott Thach was victorious over Nick Perlongo on board five.

Aaron Kahn again won in round two, this time over David Whatling. Gary Pratt lost to Ashley Carter as she carefully reduced the position to give herself an advantage. John Gattinger defeated Michael Collins on board three, and Scott Thach defeated Stacey Moore on board four. Adam Ford, now in fourth grade, has returned to competitive chess after nearly a yearlong hiatus. He was one of three students below ninth grade competing in the tournament. Adam lost to Tim Moroney on board five. Jon Budzenski, a seventh grader, was upset by Chris Fraley on board six. Chris has been playing almost constantly lately, probably a big help in his recent, dramatic, improvement.

Round three pairings were carefully constructed to avoid a match-up between siblings Ashley Carter and John Gattinger. Aaron Kahn thus played Derek Wilder on board one and was victorious. John Gattinger defeated Roland Samuel on board two. Ashley Carter scored her second upset of the event, this time over Scott Thach. Tim Moroney defeated Jeevak Somaratna on board four and Gary Pratt returned to form, defeating Chris Fraley on board five. Tim Johnson scored an upset over Doug Fick on table six and Jon Budzenski drew with Ashlee Payne on table seven.

The round four pairings for the event were also carefully constructed. The four perfect scores entering round four were perfectly poised to create a single, undefeated champion. Ashley Carter won her first game in the Young Junior Reserve before coming upstairs to play her match on board one with Aaron Kahn. Aaron ultimately won the game. On board two, John Gattinger played a gut-wrenching game with Tim Moroney that went until the last possible second. Thus, round five had the makings of a game that could be played on board one, or at All the King’s Men at Universal Mall.... Gary Pratt drew with Roland Samuel on board three and Chris Fraley scored his second upset of the event, this time over Scott Thach, on table four. Nick Cox defeated David Whatling on table five.

With increasing numbers of younger students participating in the Junior, we awarded under ninth grade trophies this year. However, the overall event was much smaller, so we only had three such players. One of them won an overall award, so we only awarded two grade trophies. Both Adam Ford and Jon Budzenski finished with 2.5-points winning first and second place under ninth grade, respectively. However, we have no photograph as Adam had left to go home and Jon was busy winning the Young Junior tournament.

Amongst ninth graders, Kurt Benson finished in third place with 2 points; Nick Perlongo from Dearborn scored 2.5-points to finish second and Joe Sansone from Byron scored three points to finish first. Both Nick and Joe have just begun playing chess recently so it was very nice to see them make the trip to EGR for the event.

Jeevak Somaratna from Ann Arbor, has just arrived from Sri Lanka. He finished in third place amongst tenth graders in his first tournament. Michael Collins from Detroit finished in second place amongst tenth graders with 2.5-points. Winning the tenth grade prize was Derek Wilder from Detroit Finney. Derek scored three points.

All of the students winning eleventh grade awards scored three points. Chris Fraley finished in third, Ashlee Payne finished in second, and Flint Kearsley first board, Scott Thach, finished in first.

Roland Samuel from Detroit Southeastern scored three points to finish in third place for twelveth grade. Gary Pratt and Stacey Moore both scored 3.5-points to finish in first and second places, respectively, amongst twelveth graders. Roland and Stacey helped us out this year as floor TDs at the Junior High and Elementary Team tournaments, respectively.

Four points were necessary for players to break into the top five trophy winners. Tim Johnson scored a quiet four points, losing only to Derek Wilder, but with three upsets throughout the course of the tournament, including one over Nick Cox in round five. John Gattinger easily won in round five over Derek Wilder after his dramatic round four game with Tim Moroney.

Eighth-grader, Ashley Carter finished in third place after a very impressive tournament. She had two upsets on Saturday before losing to Aaron Kahn in round 4 defeating Chris Fraley in round five. Ashley will be representing Michigan at the Polgar Invitational tournament for Girls, held during the U.S. Open in Florida. This is the first year of the Polgar event, and participants are not required to be high school students. Also, the Michigan Chess Association has not yet established selection criteria for the tournament, but chose Ashley Carter as the 2004 representative by virtue of her victory in the 2003 Michigan Women’s Championship and her performance at this event.

Aaron Kahn and Tim Moroney played a very careful game in the last round that resulted in a draw. Although, I would have loved to have seen a single, undefeated Champion, I can’t fault either Aaron or Tim for their boring last round result because they both had superb tournaments with 4 quality wins. Also, as Aaron and Tim are both freshmen, we can have another 3 years of exciting chess. So, our 2004 Junior Champions are Aaron Kahn and Tim Moroney. They will each receive $225 from the Michigan Chess Scholarship fund when they attend college. The Michigan Chess Scholarship is supported by the Sponsors sections at the Junior, the Michigan Chess Association, and the booksellers who donate to it. This year, All the King’s Men and Lindsay Chess supplies made donations after selling at the Elementary and Junior High team events, and the Junior. Sal Chehayab also made a modest donation for selling at the High School team. As Aaron is in High School this year, he is allowed to represent Michigan at the Arnold Denker Invitational tournament of High School Champions. The event is held during the U.S. Open each summer and this year will be held in Florida.

Young Junior (K-8) Championship

Seventy-five players competed in this section, demolishing last year’s record by 21 players. A handful of these players had competed in the K-3 and K-5 Championships on Saturday, and two players were also competing in the Junior Championship. Also amazing was that 73 of the 76 competitors had ratings. Top seed in the event was again Peter Nelson, just like last year. However, he held a modest lead on the field as Jon Budzenski had gained over 400 points from last year’s event, and Neal Anderson had also improved. In addition to these three students, another four 1400 players had joined the fray. In the interests of generating a single champion, we used accelerated pairings in the Young Junior sections. Thus, the games were intense and competitive for all 5 rounds. At least one game lasted for the full time control each round, and each round was progressively later. However, despite the late check-ins, and the long rounds, each subsequent round proceeded in a timely manner.

As there are many younger students participating in the event, we awarded grade prizes for students that were under sixth grade. All three of the trophies winners for the under sixth grade prize scored 3.5-points. Bethel McGrew finished in third place. Bethel is a fifth grader from the Kalamazoo. She lost only to co-champion, Neal Anderson, and drew in round five with Brent Kowalski. Second-grader, Atulya Shetty, was second amongst the under sixth grade winners. He drew in round three and lost in round four, before winning in round five to complete his 3.5-point performance. Robert Taliaferro II lost in round round to Jonathan Evans and won the intervening games before drawing in round five with Ibrahim Haugabook. These talented players were very impressive in their performances against the older players.

Finishing second and third amongst sixth graders were Dalton Barksdale and Lanxin Liu. Dalton is a student at Detroit Bates. Both had parallel round results as Lanxin lost in round round to Peter Nelson and Dalton lost in round round to Atulya Shetty. Each then won the next three rounds before drawing in round five. Finishing in first place for sixth grade with four points was Ben White. Ben is an impressive player from Lansing Montessori Children’s House. He lost only to Peter Nelson in round three.

Two seventh graders with 3.5-points also won grade prizes. Finishing in second and third place in seventh grade, were Reginald Hammond and Deandre Hudson, respectively. Reginald is a student at Detroit Barbour and Deandre attends Detroit A.L. Holmes. Reginald drew in round one, won his next three games, and lost in the final round to Justin Brereton. Deandre lost in round two to Jonathan Evans and drew with Dalton Barksdale in round three. Justin Brereton finished in first place in seventh grade. Justin lost to Peter Nelson in round four. He is now a student at Okemos Kinawa.

Brent Kowalski, from Grand Haven, finished in third place for eighth grade with 3.5-points. He lost to Justin Brereton in round one and won his next three games before drawing with Bethel McGrew in round five. The first and second place eighth graders both had four points. Kurtis Droge-Germain is a student at East Lansing MacDonald and Ryan Rokita is from Saginaw. Kurtis lost only to Jon Budzenski in the last round and Ryan lost to Christopher Sweatland in round two.

With so many players, despite all of our efforts with the pairings, two perfect scores were virtually inevitable. No players finished with 4.5-points. In fifth place, James Canty III completed an impressive performance, losing only to Neal Anderson in round round. James also did very well in the Children’s Sponsors section on Saturday as did his father on both Saturday and Sunday. James is a sixth grader at Detroit Bates. Similarly to James, Jonathan Evans also had his only loss of the tournament in round four. Jonathan lost to Jon Budzenski. Jonathan is also a sixth grader and attends Detroit Robeson. In a repeat of his performance from last year, Peter Nelson finished in third place. Peter, now in eighth grade, attends Lansing Pattengill. Also in a repeat of last year, Peter lost to Neal Anderson in the final round.

The 2004 Young Junior Co-Champions are Jon Budzenski and Neal Anderson. Neal retained his title from last year. Jon improved on his second place performance from last year. Both of the boys are in seventh grade so they’ll probably be back for more trophies next year. Jon simultaneously competed in the Junior tournament which didn’t affect his performance in the Young Junior, but perhaps hindered his results in the Junior. Neal now attends Haslett MS, Jon is a student at Spring Lake Intermdiate School. Jon defeated Max Wilson, Matthew Hale, Jamonte Brown, Jonathan Evans, and Kurtis Droge-Germain en route to his first place performance. Neal defeated Clinton Boyd, Connor McGuckin, Bethel McGrew, James Canty, and Peter Nelson. Congratulations to these students.

Young Junior (K-8 U800) Reserve

Competing on both Saturday and Sunday is becoming a trend at the Michigan Junior Championships. The 55 players who chose to enter this section were one off from the 56 that competed last year. In fact, younger students did very well in this section with three of the eight trophy winners being in fifth grade or below. The first of these younger students was eighth place finisher, Prasantha Amarasinghe. Prasantha is a fourth grader from Ann Arbor Logan. His father also had a very successful Saturday, as he won the Children’s Sponsors section. Prasantha finished with four points, losing in round one and winning his final four games. R.J. Perry is from the Memphis chess program. He finished in seventh place, with four points. R.J. lost only in round four. Krishna Chokkaram is a teammate of Prasantha’s at Ann Arbor Logan. Krishna played second board for Logan and won a bronze medal at the state team tournament. Krishna finished in sixth place after losing only in round three. Fifth place finisher Husam Alghanem attends the Valley School in Flint. He lost to R.J. Perry in round one, but regrouped to score victories in his final four games. Danielle Moroney isn’t often seen competing in tournaments these days. On Saturday, she watched her brother Tim play in the Junior, but as he finished before she did on Sunday, he was able to see her score four points to finish in fourth place. Danielle lost only to third place finisher Daniel Brown. Daniel Brown was the Children’s Reserve Champion from Saturday. Daniel finished in third place, losing only in the final round to Edward Howard. Two top-tier finishes in two days? We suspect that Daniel is pretty talented. Second place was won by Fares Alghanem. Fares’ record was only blemished by a draw with Amber Williams in round two. Fares finished with 4.5-points, and like his brother attends the Valley School in Flint. The Young Junior Reserve section was won by Edward Howard. Edward is a student of Roy Almasy’s at the resurgent Armstrong Middle School in Flint. Edward had the only perfect score in the section. He defeated Steven Muckleroy, Erik Hascall, Sagor Bhuiyan, Antquinn Frank, and Daniel Brown en route to his victory. Congratulations to Young Junior Reserve Champion, Edward Howard.

Children’s (K-5) Championship

With 52 players, the Children’s Championship section had a modest increase over last year’s participation. Forty-three of the 54 players had ratings, attesting to the skill-level and abilities of the competitors in the Children’s sections. Top-seeded Atulya Shetty this year led Ann Arbor King team to the Co-Championship of the K-5 Elementary Team. Teammates Helen Chu, Andrew Elenbogen, and Conner McGuckin, were the second, fourth, and nineth seeds at the tournament. Also competing in the event were players from the other K-5 Elementary Team Co-Champion, Okemos Central. First board, Chris Rockwell, was seeded eleventh, and fourth board Even Hertafeld was seeded fourtyth, as his rating has not yet caught up after his perfect score at the team tournament. Chris and Evan comprised two members of an army of players from Bruce Roth’s Okemos program that exceeded fifty participants over 2 days.

Fourth grade prizewinners included Issac Zylstra and Nishant Jain, both with 3.5-points. Issac finished in third place for fourth grade, losing in round one and drawing in round four. Issac is from the west side of the state and Nishant plays for Okemos Cornell. Nishant finished in second place for fourth grade, drawing in round two with Connor McGuckin, and losing in round four to Andrew Elenbogen. First place winner in fourth grade was Eric Larson. Eric plays for Ann Arbor Wines and lost only in round two before regrouping to finish with four points.

Third place amongst fifth graders was Connor McGuckin. Connor drew with Nishant Jain in round two and won in rounds three and four before losing to teammate, Helen Chu in the final round. Connor scored 3.5-points. Four-pointers Alex Baker and Alexander Kopitz finished first and second amongst fifth graders. Alex Baker plays for Okemos Cornell. Alex Baker lost only in round three and Alexander Kopitz lost only in round two.

Finishing in fifth place, overall was Alan Li. Alan also plays for Okemos Cornell. Alan won in rounds one and two before losing to Atulya Shetty in round three. Alan then was victorious in rounds four and five to finish with four points. Helen Chu scored four points to finish in fourth place. Both Helen and Alan are fourth graders. Helen won in rounds one, two, and three before losing to Chris Rockwell in round four. She was then victorious over teammate Connor McGuckin in round five. Robert Hughes is another star from Detroit’s Robeson Academy. This fifth grader scored four points to finish in third place. Robert lost only to Atulya Shetty in round four. Chris Rockwell, a fifth grader from Okemos Central, finished in second place with four points. Chris lost only to Atulya in the final round and scored a victory over Helen Chu en route to his trophy. Atulya Shetty started out on board one and didn’t leave his spot for the whole day. Atulya was victorious over Prasantha Amarasinghe, Jimmy Mitchell, Alan Li, Robert Hughes, and Chris Rockwell to claim his second title in two years. Last year, Atulya won the Young Children’s Championship as a first grader and this year, he won the 2004 Children’s Championship as a second-grader. He also did very well at the Nationals in Pittsburgh, finishing 11th in the K-3 section. Congratulations to the 2004 Children’s Champion.

Children’s (K-5 U700) Reserve

Seven players finished the five-round event with four or more points. These players all received trophies for their efforts. Meera Desai from Ann Arbor Go Like the Wind finished in seventh place with four points. She won her first three games before losing to second place finisher, David Wallace in round four. Meera then won her round five game to guarantee herself a trophy. John Champion scored four points to finish in sixth place. John attends Detroit Bates. He lost in the first round to De’Laun Lofton and won his next four games to complete a four-point performance. Fifth place winner, Sh’Raven Wells won her first three games before losing in round four to Troy Spell. Sh’Raven was one of several players from Detroit Robeson who were very successful in this section. In all, there were fourteen participants from Robeson and they all played both days. Robeson coach, Robert Taliaferro I, was also successful, winning a class prize in the Sponsors section. Christopher Fox, of Ypsilanti Erickson, finished in fourth place. He won his first two games before losing to second place finisher David Wallace in round three. Christopher then resumed his trophy hunt and was successful in winning his final two matches. Third place finisher, Jack Spitzer competed in his first tournament and had a very impressive performance. Jack won his first three games, lost to the eventual champion in round four, and won in round five to finish with four points. David Wallace, finishing in second place, has already been mentioned a few times as the reason that other four-pointers had only four points. David won his first four games over very tough competition before faltering against the champion in the last round. David Wallace attends Robeson, as does the Children’s Reserve Champion, Daniel Brown. Daniel is a fifth grader, and not to be confused with the event host, also Daniel Brown. Daniel Brown scored a perfect 5 points, defeating Sunjay Josyula, Evan Piotrowski, Troy Spell, Jack Spitzer, and David Wallace. Congratulations to 2004 Children’s Reserve Champion, Daniel Brown.

Young Children’s (K-3) Championship

Although 54 players were twelve fewer than the 66 that were present last year, the tournament field appeared to be incredibly strong. Over half of the players were rated, and the top 3 seeds were all over 1000. There were also seven Kindergartners competing in the section, along with one pre-school player. Notably absent was second-grader, Atulya Shetty, who was playing in the K-5 Championship section.

As I mentioned, we had the largest number of Kindergartners ever to compete in the event. Often, I am not able to award all three Kindergarten grade prizes, so I encouraged all of the players to compete in the Championship section. This year, not only did the young players compete against older students for their prizes, but also they finished with impressive scores. All three of the trophy winners in the Kindergarten group were unrated. William Miklavcic earned third place amongst the Kindergarten students by winning games, in rounds two and four to finish with two points. Scoring 2.5-points to finish in second place was Charlie Fauman. Charlie is a student at Ann Arbor Summer’s Knoll. He scored points in rounds two and four before drawing in round five. Finishing first among Kindergarten students with three points was Safal Bora. Safal got off to an excellent start, winning in rounds one and two over two 700-rated players before drawing with a 900-player and losing to top-seeded player, Chang Che. Safal completed his three-point performance by drawing with improving first-grader, Joseph Tang.

Joseph Tang took a half-point bye in the first round, before winning in rounds two and four and drawing with Safal Bora to finish with three points, and in first place amongst first graders. Winning seconnd and thirrd place amongst first graders were Daniel Yuan and Bryce Wilson. Bryce plays for Okemos Central, and Daniel for Ann Arbor Thurston. Both Daniel and Bryce scored two points.

Second-graders however, dominated the event. Four of the top five awards were won by second-graders. Amongst the grade prizewinners, Jacob Seeterlin and Hunter Sagaskie finished in seconnd and third places in second grade with three points each. Jacob is a student at Okemos Wardcliff, and Hunter attends Memphis. Finishing in first place in second grade was Andrew Ying. Andrew has only been playing in tournaments since January, so this was a very impressive result for him. He lost only to Michael Carter in the last round to finish with four points.

Amongst the third graders, more points were necessary to break into the trophy ranks. Finishing in third amongst third graders with 3.5-points was Noah White. Noah’s older brother Ben is a force to be reckoned with at Lansing Montessori Children’s House and Noah seems to be drawn of similar cloth as played first board for the Montessori primary team this year. Noah drew with Safal Bora before losing in the last round to Jacob Fauman. The other trophy winners for third grade were second place Waleed Yassine and first place Chang Che. Both Waleed and Chang scored four points. Waleed played first board for the Okemos Hiawatha Primary Team this year. He lost only to Safal Bora. Chang played first board for the 2004 Primary Team Co-Champion Ann Arbor King. Chang lost only to Michael Carter.

Finishing in fifth place overall was the Okemos Hiawatha second board, Jeffrey Hoshal. Jeffrey was one of four-second graders to finish in the top five. He lost only to Jacob Fauman in round one, and scored victories in his next four rounds to earn himself a trophy. Fourth place was won by second-grader, Zachary Wilkins from Ann Arbor Emerson. Zach played second board for the Elementary Team K-6(!) Champions from Emerson. He had a very smooth tournament, winning in the first three rounds before losing the Michael Carter in round four, a match-up that you will probably see for many years to come. Zach won his final game to finish with four points. Another second-grader finished in third place, Leonard Crosby from Detroit Bates. Last year, Leonard tied for first place in the Children’s Reserve section. Leonard won his first two games before losing to Jacob Fauman in round three. Leonard then rebounded, and won his final two games to finish with four points.

Now you may have noticed that most of the losses amongst the trophy winners were to one of two players, either Jacob Fauman, or Michael Carter. These two students finished with perfect scores to earn the title of 2004 Young Children’s Champion. Jacob, a third grader at Ann Arbor Summer’s Knoll (and the older brother of Kindergarten trophy winner Charlie Fauman), defeated Jeffrey Hoshal, Dane Rosseter, Leonard Crosby, Abhinau Reddy, and Noah White to complete his perfect score. Jacob also achieved a perfect score playing first board from Summer’s Knoll at the Primary Team tournament. Michael Carter is a second grader at Monroe Custer. He played first board for the Custer team in the K-5 tournament where he scored 4.5/5. Michael defeated Nathan Janick, Joey Spring, Chang Che, Zachary Wilkins, and Andrew Ying en route to his perfect score. Congratulations to the 2004 Michigan Young Children’s Co-Champions.

You also may have noticed that the stronger players in the event have similarly strong siblings. Michael Carter took his first place trophy upstairs to the Junior room to show Ashley and John where the standards were for 2004. Last year, all 3 of them earned grade prizes.

Young Children’s (K-3 U500) Reserve

Top five places were awarded in the Young Children’s (K-3 U500) Reserve section. This field of 31 players was largely unrated and just playing in their first or second tournament. Jacob Lourim from the Roeper school finished with 3.5-points and in fifth place. He won his first two games before losing to eventual third place finisher, Heidi Hoess. Jacob next defeated fellow 3.5-point finisher Samir Desai before drawing in round five. In fourth place was one of three players to finish with four points. Shawn Gilbert, Jr. lost only in round two, to eventual third place finisher, Heidi Hoess. Having scored in round one, Shawn won his final three games to finish with four points. Heidi Hoess won her first three games, including victories over fourth and fifth place finishers, Shawn Gilbert, Jr., and Jacob Lourim, respectively. Heidi is a member of the Otsego St. Margaret’s club. In round four, eventual second place finisher, Domenic Digiovine prevented Heidi from attaining a perfect score, but she bounced back and won her fifth round game. Second place finisher, Domenic Digiovine is a member of the very new Ann Arbor Logan club. Domenic won his first four rounds before losing to the champion in round five. And, the 2004 Young Children’s Reserve Champion was Demetrius Brown. Demetrius is a member of the very large, very skilled, and very active Bates club in Detroit. Demetrius won all five of his games to finish in first place with a perfect score. We can expect some exciting things from all of these players in the future.