On March 9, Luca participated in a chess tournament between schools in the province of Torino "Trofeo Scacchi Scuola" (TSS). He was one of the top six students selected from his school to participate in the tournament. He of course was more than happy to skip an entire day of school for the event! He left at 8am and got back at 5:30pm.
He was bused to the PalaRuffini in Torino for a day of chess competition along with 174 other elementary students, plus middle school and high school students. In combination with the other elementary school in Caselle, the players were divided into teams of four with a total of 44 teams (for the boys). Luca was selected as team captain for the Caselle B Team. With great responsibility comes great expectations, because the Captain is also the top ranked player of the team, meaning they go up against the hardest competition.
Luca did very well and won 4/6 games. He said he won the first game and then lost the two following. His school coach said to him "did I bring you here to lose or win?" Luca rebutted that he was doing his best, but clearly the fire was relit and he won his final three games after lunch. There were no timers so it was a play to "Check Mate/Draw" scenario for each of the six rounds.
We are so proud of Luca! It was an honor for him to be selected for this opportunity and we are so glad he took his losses well and just had fun. He has come a long way in just 1 year of chess playing.
The final rankings are as follows:
Team Caselle B
10 of 44
Ranking Board 1 (Top seed of each team)
10 of 44
Overall Individual Ranking
42 of 174
For posterity sake, I am posting a photo of an article in Italian about the tournament.
2 comments:
Great job, Luca! We are as proud of your good attitude about your losses (very hard to do!) as we are about your great wins! We love you!
Love, Munga and Gramma
Good work, Luca! Keep it up!
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