Congratulations to our latest and 20th CCL graduate, Xavier Paganini.

• Xavier became our landmark 20th graduate from CCL.  This happened a few weeks ago but is just being posted now as we were not posting CCL accomplishments in July, in honor of Goran.
• Xavier also set a new record by becoming the quickest CCL graduate.  He did this by gaining around 200 ratings points in under 3 month!
• Congrats to this future superstar of CCL.
• See a strong recent annotated game of Xavier’s by CLICKING HERE.
• This Who’s Who chess list has been growing with great talent which is clearly characterized by a high value on perseverance, hard work, and passion.What is a CCL graduate?  It is an honorary degree that we give to any CCL player who has worked their way through the ranks while in CCL and has made a USCF experts rating (>= 2000).   This group is becoming a who’s who of the top young talent around. It entitles them to lifetime membership in CCL, based on good behavior, without the requirement of taking lessons (although most still do).  They are allowed to receive email spam from me for the rest of their lives!!
• Who will be next?

CCL graduates are (in order of obtainment):

• John Hughes
• Walker Griggs
• Maggie Feng
• Rahul Ramaswamy
• Annorjan Naguleswaran
• Luke Xie
• Chris Shen
• Noah Keating-Adams
• Sam Massick
• Anagh Kulkarni
• Vikram Srivastava
• Aristo Liu
• Abhi Ramaswamy
• Jason Wang
• Ricky Wang
• Vincent Baker
• Forest Chen
• Neo Zhu
• Alex Kolay
• Xavier Paganini

IM Goran Vojinovic

March 1, 1963 – July 1, 2016

Please come to our memorial page by clicking here.

If you know Goran, leave a memory of him on that page.

The upcoming memorial events are open to the world.

One of the biggest accomplishments that many chess players hope to achieve is to become a USCF Chess Master. Recently one more CCL member climbed to the top of this huge mountain, which takes an exceptional amount of hard work and commitment. CCL is very proud of:

 Aristo Liu

Aristo will be starting 8th grade in the fall.  CCL now has 8 CCL players earn their USCF Masters with many more knocking at the door. All of this players were active members of CCL from the early parts of their chess development through getting the title.  This amazing group also includes: Walker Griggs, John Hughes, Maggie Feng, Chis Shen, Luke Xie, Noah Keating-Adams, and Annorjan Naguleswaran.

Congratulations to CCL coaches, Grandmaster Ivan Ivanisevic and Grandmaster Milos Perunovic, for just having had their book The Taimanov Bible published. This book is the current authoritative word on the Taimanov/Paulsen variation of the Sicilian.

To celebrate this occasion, we are having a limited time sale on chess lessons from these esteemed grandmaster experts on the Taimanov. Learn how to play this system from the world’s top authorities, or simply use this sale to work with them on any chess topic. This is a CCL exclusive that you will not be able to find anywhere else in the world!!

… Sale is over ….

Jason finished 6-1 at the 2016 National Elementary School Championship to finish in a tie for 2nd place.  He did this despite only being in 4th grade and taking a 1/2 point bye in round 5.  With two more years of eligibility ahead of him, it looks like he has an excellent chance of eventually winning this prestigious National title.  Chris Shen also had a strong showing, finishing with 5.5 points and tying for 8th place.  Next year the National Elementary, Junior High, and High School Championships will all be held at the same time and same place (Nashville, Tenn.) and it is called The Super Nationals.  Put it on your calendar now, May 12- 14, 2017.  All of the CCL competitors are listed below:

K-6 = Jason Wang – tied for 2^nd with 6/7, Chris Shen – tied for 8^th with 5.5, Amanda Huang 3.0, Matthew Liu – 2.5

K-6 U-1000 = Rohan Kumar 5.0

K-5 = Lainie Massick – 4.5, Evan Wu – 3.5, Triyakshari Venkataraja 3.0, Justin Song 2.0

K-5 U-900 = Rahul Kumar 4.0

K-3 = Rohan Padhye 4.0, Vishnu Mangipudi 3.0

K-1 = Grant Mu 5.0, Eli Dropic 4.0, Lingaadyakssh Venkataraja 4.0