Emma on The Good Morning Columbus Show

March 6, 2015

Emma Cheng, interviewed by NBC NEWS, regarding her upcoming bout with Arnold Schwarzenegger.

UPDATE

The Dispatch Gets it Right

My hats off to Lori Kurtzman from the Dispatch who got the story right, from beginning to end. Her insights, concern for accuracy, and ease to talk with, was a marvel to me. Thank you so much for telling this story correctly. Here is her story:

Pre-fight - http://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/local/2015/03/06/arnold-chess.html

Post fight - http://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/local/2015/03/08/8-year-old-is-no-pawn.html

Both Ethan and Emma represented CCL very well, showing great composure dealing with all of the news media and cameras back stage. Since Emma was the initial, and the local player, much of the focus was on her. However Ethan performed equally as well, both in his chess and in his behavior. Thank you both, for confirming that CCL is a program with class.

This was not really a fair chess match as although Arnold may be a good chess player among his peers, he does not really compete with us. Here are the first few moves of the game where Arnold, playing white against Emma, was down by a pawn and bishop after only 7 moves!

CCL Welcomes 2 New Coaches

February 20, 2015

With great pride we are welcoming two very accomplished chess coaches to the CCL family. Not only do I think a great deal of them, Jelena things so much of Zoran that she married his twin brother IM Goran Arsovic. People who know this author might think that this is one of those mean Balan jokes, but no this is for real! Please welcome IM Zoran Arsovic and his sister-in-law WFM Jelena Arsovic to the CCL family. What a thrill it is to have the two of them join our program. Zoran has all 3 of his GM norms and just needs to raise his rating to get the title. But much more important than that, he has extensive history of quality experience as a chess coach. Jelena is going to be working in our Pre-CCL program. Having a female coach in our Pre-CCL program should really help us to develop our girl’s program to even greater heights than we have taken it already. And it is my understanding that these are two very honest individuals with a high degree of personal integrity. Our search for additional coaches has taken awhile, as we needed to be absolutely sure that it will not lower the high bar that we have set for CCL. More information on these new coaches in the CCL family can be see on the coaches page.

Chris Shen becomes a National Master

February 9, 2015

Congratulations to Chris Shen who became the 4th CCL member to become a USCF National Master. He is preceded by John Hughes, Walker Griggs, and Maggie Feng. The next in line is Luke Xie, who only needs another 18 rating points to earn this honor. Chris will be on a team with Walker, Maggie, and Luke in next month's MOTCF tournament.

In this past weekend, Chris played in the FIDE rated Baltimore Open and achieved the U.S. National Master title. During this tournament, Chris defeated one FM (USCF rating 2345, FIDE rating 2150), one IM (USCF rating 2364, FIDE rating 2308), then, he drew IM Tegshsuren Enkhbat (USCF rating 2479, FIDE rating 2419). After scoring 2.5 out of 3, his live USCF rating went above 2200 and he decided to drop out the tournament in order to secure his first chess master title. His post tournament rating now is 2215, and he may be the youngest chess master in Ohio history at the age of 10 years and 9 months. Chris was putting in a sustained effort, playing in 9 open tournaments from the east coast to the Midwest in the past three and one half months. His hard work paid off and his rating increased by 159 points, only staying between 2100 and 2200 for 3 months.

The Baltimore Open is a perennial, traditional chess tournament which runs in early February of each year and is now FIDE rated. The time control follows the FIDE rule of 40/90, SD 30, with 30 seconds increment. This year, 80 players participated. Other CCL players who participated were Emily Hu and Meghana Bhanuprasad.

Spotlight on Coach Goran

February 6, 2015

You should all know that we have an amazing coaching staff at CCL I always spotlight the students and never the coaches. I am now going to let you know a little bit more about the coaches, from time to time. The spotlight is now on IM Goran Vojinovic. With 2 of his 3 Grand Master norms, Goran is about as high a level IM that you can become. What makes this really amazing is that Goran has dedicated his life to coaching. For Goran it has always been coaching first and playing a distant 2nd. Those of you that have him as a coach know how passionate his coaching is. In this blog, I will highlight references from some of his more successful students:

Testimonials

Grand Master Milos Perunovic - Fide Rating 2633

I have played many tournaments with Goran Vojinovic and my chess instructions with him was amazing. During our chess work, Goran was thorough and always trying to find new ideas and new plans. He is never satisfied with the present, always looking for something new, which of course requires lots of energy and knowledge.

In addition to all the things he taught me, Goran is a great motivator! He encouraged and gave me self-confidence many times before a game.

Goran is an excellent trainer and a real friend to everyone who wants to play and learn chess.

Editor note - Milos qualified for the 2015 World Cup!

Grand Master Borki Predojevic - Fide Rating 2633

I began working with Goran in 1999 while I was preparing for the Junior World Championship in Oropesa del Mar, Spain and shared a 6-12 place up to twelve years. I had previously won the European Championship.

My experience in working with Goran as my instructor is positive. His work quality and access to his students made a long lasting and positive impression on me and my family.

He has the ability to openly and professionally work with his students (which is most important in working with young players.) As proof of this, many of his students have earned international titles and have become members of national teams.

As a player, Goran is known to have a solid and rigid style of playing. He has a great positional understanding and that is permanent chess knowledge that he shares with his students.

Grand Master Boban Bogosavljevic - Fide Rating 2525

I met Goran in 2000 at an Open tournament at Vrsac, Serbia. Soon after, we agreed to start working together. From 2001 to 2003 was the most important period for my career.

Working with Goran gave better play and results for me. Our Junior National Team had great results in Belford in 2005, and Goran had a great influence in our success.

He told me once, "Boban, you will be a grand master if you follow my instructions. Also, you must be willful." His prediction was right and I am thankful to him. I want to add that Goran is one of our best trainers for sure besides his great experience (as a player and trainer) he has the right approach, which is most important in a trainer's work.

As an example of my words, you may see it by results of his daughter, Jovana. At seventeen years old, became the youngest Woman Grand Master in our region.

CCL Performs well at the 2015 Cardinal Open

January 26, 2015

The Open section at the Cardinal Open was very strong with a number of visiting Grandmasters. Walker Griggs kept his good form of late, coming in tied for 3rd and bringing his rating up to 2357. Strong performance by young CCL players, Luke Xie and Chris Shen, have brought them close to becoming Chess Masters with ratings of 2182 and 2162 respectively.

In the U-2100 section, Abhi Ramaswamy came in clear 1st place, netting him a very nice $806. Chess is such an odd game, a week earlier Abhi had one of his worst tournaments in a while and this week he had one of his best tournaments in a while. It just shows that in chess you can turn on a dime, as long as you can keep the proper mental attitude. Don’t carry your loses forward to your next contest, accept it as part of the game and come back for the next game fresh and ready to focus. Om Borkar had a very strong event, coming in tied for 2nd place.

In the U-1800 section, Matthew Yuan continued his hot streak of late by coming in clear 2nd place with 4.5 points. Finishing a ½ point behind Matthew for a tie for 3rd place were Shourjya Ghosh and Elton Cao.

In the U-1500 section, Udbhav (aka Oliver) Raghukanth stomped out all resistance with a clear 1st place finish, giving him a bunch of $$$. Udbhav joined CCL a few months ago and brought his rating up almost 500 points in that time. And this is not a fluke, he is for real. He has the combination of talent and hard work, that as we know nothing is more dangerous. Coming in a tie for 2nd, a ½ point back, was Sanjay Medicherla. This could be the breakout tournament that Sanjay needed to start a new climb.