The Guyana Chess Federation hosted a School Chess Festival at the Texila American University on Saturday, March 2nd, 2024, at their prestigious Providence campus. The event was attended by former world chess champion and Indian Grandmaster Viswanathan ‘Vishy’ Anand where over 100 students from several invited schools, who are being taught chess in the classroom and have active chess clubs, were thrilled to meet the five-time title holder. These young chess players met, interacted, chatted, and had a photo opportunity with the Grandmaster, who was also happy to give his autograph to his fans.
Students played two rounds of chess during the two-hour-long event at the university campus. The School Chess Festival was held to promote the GCF Chess in School initiative, a core mission of the federation. At present, the GCF, under the Ministry of Education’s Priority Programme, has facilitated the teaching of chess in the classrooms of ten schools since the start of the program. The federation also hopes that the exposure will encourage more schools to come on board to add chess as an extra-curricular to their core curriculum.
The Grand Master, who is also Deputy President of FIDE (International Chess Federation) is on an official visit to Guyana for the opening of the inaugural CARICOM Chess Team Tournament, set for March 4-9 at the Ramada Princess Hotel. The event, which celebrates the 50th Anniversary of the founding of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM), will see chess players from across CARICOM member states and associate nations, fostering cultural exchange, sportsmanship, and intellectual excellence, while competing for the title over the week.
On Sunday the university of Guyana in association with the GCF organized a guest lecture at the George Walcott Lecture Theatre at the university’s Turkeyen Campus. GM Anand addressed the gathering of student chess players, parents and members of the public on what it takes to become a grandmaster.
Starting his chess journey at the age of six to becoming the first grandmaster of India at the age of 18 took dedication and commitment to perfecting his game. He has seen the transition of leaning chess the traditional way to its evolution with technology but the rules of the game remain the same.
He emphasized the importance of overcoming a loss as there is always a winner and a loser in chess or mistake and how skills learned in chess can translate to focus in real life, academics, performance and decision making. He made it clear to the students present and for future chess players that chess does not compete with academics, it competes with your free time, players have to be honest with how they prioritize their time if chess is really their passion.
The GM was presented with a token by the University of Guyana Chess society, a portrait of his chess journey from a young player to present. The piece was conceptualized by University of Guyana student artist.
The Guyana Chess Federation wishes a warm welcome to the various visiting federations and their team players in Guyana. We also wish to express gratitude to all of our sponsors for their support in organizing this tournament including The Ministry of Culture Youth & Sports, Texila American University, ENet and ExxonMobil.
Keep updated with tournament results via the GCF website at
https://guyanachess.gy/caricom2024/
