Nikhil Rajesh wins Under 18 Title

Heath Brown wins Under 12 Title

Nikhil Rajesh of Dubbo has won the NSW Country Junior (Under 18) title with a clean score of 5 out of 5 in the finals. Vincent Qiang of Gwynneville came second with a score of 3.5, half a point ahead of the 2015 Under 12 winner, Matthew Clarke of Charlestown.

Heath Brown of Belmont won the Under 12 Division convincingly, with a clean score of 10 out of  10. Second, with 7 points, was Abbey Wardrope of Tuggerawong, followed by Kieran Langstaff of Wollongong with 6 points.

For full results click on "Results" in the menu at left.

For the third year in a row a school from NSW has won the Secondary Girls Division of the Australian Schools Teams Championships, which took place in Melbourne on 5-6 December. In a close finish Abbotsleigh claimed the title by the slender margin of half a point. Abbotsleigh previously won in 2013 and St George Girls High School won in 2014.

In the Primary Open Division Ironbark Ridge Public School came second to Mount View Primary School of Victoria, while Lindfield Public School came fourth in the Primary Girls and North Sydney Boys High finished sixth in the Secondary Open.

Full details should be available soon via the Australian Junior Chess League website (australianjuniorchess.org.au/astc/).

This year's series of Primary Schools One-Day Tournaments has concluded with the NSW Finals, in which 57 schools took part. The series of 31 tournaments (plus finals) attracted a total of 1046 teams from 247 schools (89 more teams and 25 more schools than last year). Ironbark Ridge Public School won the finals, a point ahead of Baulkham Hills North Public School with Lindfield Public School another point away in third place. This completed a good weekend for Ironbark Ridge, as the previous day the school had won the final of the NSW Primary Schools Competition (see below).

For detailed results click on "Schools" (at left) and then on "Results" under the heading "Primary Schools One-Day Tournaments".

The state-wide Primary Schools Competition (for teams of four players), which commenced in second term, has concluded. Over the last few months the 35 zone winners participated in region finals and the 10 region winners then took part in the inter-region finals to determine the country and metropolitan champions, which then played each other in the NSW final. In the Metropolitan final Ironbark Ridge Public School defeated Sydney Grammar Edgecliff in a rematch after their first match was tied with equal tie-break scores. In the Country Districts final New Lambton South Public School won for the second year in a row by defeating Deniliquin Christian School. New Lambton South then played the Metropolitan champions, Ironbark Ridge for the NSW Primary Schools title and in this match Ironbark Ridge was victorious. Congratulations to Ironbark Ridge and also to all the other finalists for their achievement in reaching the finals. For full details click on "Schools" in the menu at left, then on the Primary Schools Competition's "Draw & Results" and then on "Finals".

Ironbark Ridge Public School  will represent NSW in the Primary Open Division of the Australian Schools Teams Championships to be held in Melbourne on 5-6 December. Lindfield Public School won a selection playoff to represent NSW in the Primary Girls Division.

Hunter High School of the Performing Arts has won this year's Country Secondary Schools Competition for the second year in a row, but with a much larger margin of 4 points (compared with half a point last year). The minor placings were the same as last year – Macquarie Anglican Grammar School (from Dubbo) second and Smiths Hill High School (Wollongong) third.

For full details click on "Schools" in the left-hand column and then look under the heading "Country Secondary Schools Competition".

The playoff between Michael Pogrebinsky and Max Mikkelsen for the City of Sydney Under 15 title has concluded. A two-game playoff match was tied 1-1, and a second match was then held, which Michael won 1.5-0.5.

For details click on "Results" in menu at left.

Kevin Willathgamuwa wins Sydney Spring One-Day Tournament
Linus Cooper and Luke Marsh win Sydney Spring Two-Day Tournament
Nikhil Rajesh wins Orange Spring Under 18 Tournament and Ivan Santos wins Orange Spring Under 12 Tournament
Titus Maddern wins Western Riverina Spring Tournament

Eleven-year-old Kevin Willathgamuwa has won the Sydney Spring One-Day Tournament with a clean score, a full point ahead of 12-year-old Luke Marsh.

The Sydney Spring Two-Day Tournament ended in a tie between Linus Cooper and Luke Marsh, both of whom scored 8 out of 10.

The Orange Spring Tournaments attracted a total of 58 players. Nikhil Rajesh repeated his victory of last spring by winning the the Under 18, and Ivan Santos won the Under 12.

Fourteen-year-old Titus Maddern has won the Western Riverina Spring Tournament, replicating his brother Gil's victory in the same tournament a year ago.

Full details may be found by clicking on "Results" in the menu at left.

Fourteen-year-old Rishi Dutta has won the City of Sydney Junior (Under 18) title, half a point ahead of Paul Russell. Rishi scored 5 out of 6, losing only to Raymond Li, who finished third.

The Under 15 Championship resulted in a tie between Michael Pogrebinsky and Max Mikkelsen. They will play off for the title.

Kevin Shen has won the Under 12 title with a score of 8.5 out of 11, half a point ahead of Yifu Wu, Heath Brown and Ryan Lane, who shared second place.

The three divisions attracted 88 players, eleven more than last year.

For full scores click on "Results" in the left-hand column.

The NSW Girls (Under 18) Championship has been won by Fiona Shen with a clean score of 6/6, a point ahead of Australian Girls champion Kristine Quek.

The Under 12 tournament was won by the Australian Girls Under 10 champion, Jennifer Zhang, who scored 12/13, finishing a point ahead of Eva Ge.

For full scores click on "Results" in the left-hand column.

NSWJCL President Brett Marsh was this week interviewed on Radio 2RRR by Lia Crawley. To hear the 7-minute interview click on INTERVIEW.

The 2015 Metropolitan Secondary Schools Teams  Competition, which commenced at the beginning of second term, has concluded. The winners of the three grades were as follows:

Senior Grade (Years 11-12): Knox Grammar School
Intermediate Grade (Years 9-10):  North Sydney Boys High School
Junior Grade (Years 7-8): Baulkham Hills High School

The competition attracted 280 teams from 77 schools. These were divided into four regions and then into divisions of approximately 8 teams. Division winners qualified for knock-out region finals, the winners of which progressed to the competition (inter-region) finals in each grade. For full details click on "Schools" in the menu at left.

As the competition is in three separate school-year-based grades and does not produce an overall secondary schools winner (with players from any secondary year) a separate selection playoff was held to determine the Secondary Open and Secondary Girls teams to represent NSW in the Australian Schools Teams Competition to be held in Melbourne in December:

Secondary Open:   North Sydney Boys High School
Secondary Girls:   Abbotsleigh

James Ruse Agricultural High School has won this year's Secondary Schools One-Day Tournament and retained the Terrey Shaw Shield, which it has held since 2012. James Ruse dropped only half a point and finished three points ahead of Killara High, with Newington College another three and a half points behind in third place.

The Junior Division (for teams of players in years 7 to 9) was also won by James Ruse.

Forty-nine teams participated, representing 27 schools – five more teams and five more schools than last year. A feature of this year's tournament was the participation of several country schools – from Lismore, Coffs Harbour, Dubbo and Wollongong..

For full scores click on "Schools" in the menu in the left-hand column.

Sean Gu wins Under 18 title

Michael Gong wins Under 12 title

Sixteen-year-old Sean Gu has won the 2015 NSW Junior Championship. He conceded two draws to finish on 8/9, a full point ahead of William Tao. A further point behind were Peter Boylan and Luke Marsh.

Michael Gong was untroubled to win the Under 12 division. He scored 9.5/10 and finished two points ahead of Daniel Melamed and Caleb Kim.

Full details may be found by clicking on "Results" in the menu at left.

Linus Cooper Sydney Winter One-Day Tournament

Joshua Behar wins Sydney Winter Two-Day Tournament

Daniel Stevenson wins Orange Winter One-Day Tournament

Linus Cooper, winner of the Sydney Summer Two-Day Tournament and co-winner of the Autumn One-Day Tournament, has won the Sydney Winter One-Day Tournament, half a point ahead of Lance Cheney.

City of Sydney Under 15 champion Joshua Behar was untroubled to win the Sydney Winter Two-Day Tournament by a handsome margin of one and a half points. His previous victories have included the Autumn Two-Day Tournaments of last year and this year and he has also been the co-winner of several other tournaments.

A newcomer to our Orange tournaments, Daniel Stevenson, has won the Orange Winter Tournament with a clean score of 8 out of 8.

Full details may be found by clicking on "Results" in the menu at left.

Joshua Behar, Matthew Clarke, Linus Cooper and Gordon Yang tie for Sydney Autumn One-Day Tournament

Joshua Behar wins Sydney Autumn Two-Day Tournament

Nikhil Rajesh wins Orange Autumn One-Day Tournament

Titus Maddern wins Western Riverina Autumn One-Day Tournament
Vincent Qiang wins Wollongong Autumn One-Day Tournament

Four players, Joshua Behar, Matthew Clarke, Linus Cooper and Gordon Yang tied for first place in the 159-player Sydney Autumn One-Day Tournament. Two of these, Matthew and Gordon are only 12 years old.

Joshua Behar improved on his Autumn One-Day joint win by claiming sole victory in the Two-Day Tournament, which attracted 148 players. He scored 9/10, a full point ahead of Raymond Li and Matthew Clarke.

Nikhil Rajesh won the 57-player Orange Autumn Tournament with a clean score, 1.5 points ahead of his nearest rival.

Titus Maddern also achieved a 1.5-point margin in winning the 47-player Western Riverina Autumn Tournament in Griffith.

The Wollongong Autumn Tournament was won by Vincent Qiang, who finished half a point ahead of Hugo Black.

Full details may be found by clicking on "Results" in the menu at left.

Start preparing now for our Winter holiday events. As well a plenty of practice, your preparation should include getting into good physical condition! To find out why see

www.abc.net.au/news/2015-03-08/chess-a-battle-of-bodies-as-much-as-minds/6163804

Our main schools competitions began on Friday and, coincidentally, four press articles have just appeared drawing attention to the benefits of teaching chess in schools.

• More than a game, more than a sport. Chess might hold the answer to many of our problems. By Peter Martin, Economics Editor of The Age.

• National curriculum: Economist John Adams calls for chess to be taught in schools. By Anna Henderson, political reporter for the ABC.

• Chess can help kids 'think outside the box'. By Misa Han, Australian Financial Review.

• Push to include chess in national curriculum. By Angela Thompson, Illawarra Mercury.

The Australian Junior Championships in Canberra started well for NSW with Jennifer Zhang winning the Girls Under 10 title with a clean score of 9/9. Well done, Jennifer!

The Championships concluded well too with Kristine Quek's win of the Australian Girls Under 18 title.

Another outstanding result for NSW was Matthew Clarke's equal first in the Under 12 tournament; however, he missed out on the Australian Under 12 Open title after losing a close playoff, 2-3.

In the Australian Junior Problem Solving Championships Linus Cooper won the Under 16 Open title.

To see the full results click on "Australian Junior Championships" in the menu at top right.

A close and exciting finish in the Sydney Summer Three-Day Tournament produced a three-way tie between Jongmin Lim, Linus Cooper and Joe Chua on 7 points out of 9. Half a point behind them were four other players.

Linus Cooper and Joe Chua also featured in a three-way tie for first in the Sydney Summer One-Day Tournament, this time with Edmund Yu from Newcastle. They scored 7.5 out of 9. Again there were four players half a point behind them.

Titus Maddern has won the Western Riverina Summer Tournament in Griffith with a clean score, 10 out of 10, one point ahead of his brother Gil.

After his equal firsts in the first two Sydney Summer tournaments, Linus Cooper did even better in the Summer Two-Day Tournament by finishing first on his own. He finished a full point ahead of Jongmin Lim, who had shared in the three-way Three-Day tie.

Peter Dixon repeated his victory of last summer by winning the Orange Summer Tournament with a clean score, 8 out of 8, again by a 2-point margin.

For detailed results click on "Results" in the left-hand menu.