Fire Officer Jerome Wins First Flight Chess

Richard Jerome receiving his first place trophy from Mrs. Lambert, a friend of the TTCF

Fireman Richard Jerome took top honours among players who participated in the First Flight Air Ambulance Company sponsored Chess Classic held on Saturday at St. Augustine Girl’s High School.  Jerome, a fireman by profession, played unbeaten in the Adult Novice section of the tournament capturing the top prize with a perfect score of 5 points from 5 games.

 The Adult Novice category is a new addition introduced by the Chess Foundation to its events. According to Edison Raphael, President of the Trinidad and Tobago Chess Foundation, parents who are themselves Chess players can now participate in Chess competitions together with their children, making it a family occasion rather than standing at the sidelines just to collect the kids at the end.  The Chess Foundation is also using this new Adult Novice enterprise as a way to reach people who play the game causally but do take part in competitions. It’s another way of meeting our objective of extending the range and popularity of Chess and its many benefits it offers to the community, says Raphael.

The feedback from the two Adult Novice competitions held over the last two months has been so encouraging that the Chess Foundation has now added both an Adult and a Junior Novice section for local players to the “Caribbean Chess Carnival” an international Chess competition, sponsored by the Ministry of Sports and Youth Affairs carded to take place at the Queen’s Park Oval from August 3rd to August 8th.

First to Third place winners in each section

Also in winners row over the weekend was Llevan Ramharrack of St. Mary’s College who won the Novice Junior section with 6.5 from 7 games. Luke Walker of Maria Regina Grade School took the top spot in the Under 1050 rated category with his school mate Jeremy Ammon edging out Safiya Lambert of Blackman’s Private on the tiebreak to win the Under 1300 rated section.

In the Under 1500 rated section, Fatima’s College student Matthew Wong Sang won with full points after 5 games, while in the Open section for players rated over 1500 points Christopher Raphael, returning to competition after two years following the completion of his Form 6 examinations, edged out Colin Knight to win with 4 out of 5 points. 

The next event will be the Caribbean Chess Carnival. Full details are available at the tournament website: www.caribbeanchesscarnival.com. 

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