The Chess Club is a club about playing chess competitively or just for fun. They meet up on Tuesdays and Thursdays in the Den from 3:30 to 5:00. Tuesdays are typically dedicated to simply playing chess while Thursdays have more chess-related activities, like observing games and learning tactics. The supervisors, Aaron Hong, Seth Chiles, and Jackson Earl, help teach and run the club. It doesn’t matter if you’re a beginner when you join, the Chess Club welcomes any player level. The newer members of the chess club have stated that the club helps teach you the skills you need and how to play chess well.

“It’s helped me improve a lot. I’ve just learned a lot about chess since I’ve started going,” said Gideon Blair. Diego Marguccio also stated that it’s helped him get much better since he came to the club as a beginner.

The chess club competed in state on February 10th and February 11th this year. The competition lasted all day, on both days, and had 7 rounds, 4 on Friday, and 3 on Saturday. It was a team tournament, so 8 Champaign Central Chess Club members competed against other high school teams. The members who competed were Beren Ozer, David Yong, Geri Paray, Marshall Bigler, Michael Lee, Ryan Slifer, Marguccio, and Blair. The Chess Club ranked 71st out of 129 teams. 

“We went in and played the best that we could, and I think our team learned a lot from the experience competing with schools all over the state,” Hong said.

Coming up in April, there will be another chess tournament. It’s set for April 1st, an invitational Swiss Tournament. This tournament is open to Centennial, Edison, Jefferson, and Franklin. It’s an individual competition instead of a team competition so the chess club members will each have a personal score. 

“I hope the tournament gets students excited about competitive chess,” Hong said. 

The Central Chess Club will be hosting this tournament and is hoping to promote more competitive chess and get players interested in it. The tournament is meant to help create interest in competitive chess within Unit 4 schools.