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Chess Tournament

Office @ Heaton —

Written by Edward, Jasiah and Justin, Room 19

On Friday the 17th of May, Heaton hosted the Canterbury regional chess tournament. The entire hall was filled with students from different schools who all loved chess. Heaton had 3 teams, with 4 people on each team. There were 4 extra students as well. In total, Heaton had 16 students competing. There were many people from different primary, intermediate and high schools participating. Some of the other schools were Casebrook, Chisnallwood and home school students.

There were chess matches every 30 minutes and each student got to compete 7 times for points. The hall was silent at the beginning of the matches and there were buttons clicking everywhere. Towards the end of the matches, you could hear a lot of “check” and “checkmates.” At the end of the game, we shook hands and said congratulations or good game. When we were waiting for our next game, we could eat food, play games and take a break.

There were 7 rounds in total. We also got to play friendly matches for no points. There were 4 different certificates. There was merit, credit, excellence and the top teams earned a medal. Points were based on a whole team’s performance.

One of Heaton’s teams earned a silver medal, one got a credit and all other people earned merits. You could also earn badges for other specific things. For example, the “picket fence” means you won all your games, and the “Usain Bolt” badge was for beating people in under 30 seconds. If you got checkmate with a pawn or a knight, you also earned a badge.

Chess club is a fun place where you can meet a lot of different people who play chess. Heaton is lucky to have great teachers who hold chess club. Thank you to the parents and teachers who put it together. Also, thank you to Ms Christie and Ms Boyle for running the chess club, because without them none of this would have happened.