We wanted to take a moment to recognize and thank David Shifren for his effort in getting a chess tournament together this past weekend on Saturday, October 14th at the Islamic Center of Pittsburgh. Around 20 people were in attendance, with some of ChessGuides’ own students and Jon Naser participating in the tournament. Additionally, there was a simul against Director Tom Martinak who played several people at the same time!
David has been an important member of the chess community in Pittsburgh for several years now. Back in 2016, he began giving lessons at the Hazelwood Library, quickly becoming the Pittsburgh Police Chess Club – an initiative to increase community engagement between local police officers and citizens, especially kids. Similar to ChessGuides, he wants to teach kids not only the love of the game, but of the many benefits it provides in strategic and long-term thinking. Being a near life-long player himself, he understands how important such benefits are, and several other areas of the city quickly picked up similar programs after seeing the success of his.
Our students did well, finding victories against multiple adult players and scoring 2 / 3 possible points!
Jon went undefeated in his Quad, scoring 3 / 3!
Results for the tournament in detail: https://www.uschess.org/msa/XtblMain.php?202310148792-13368788
(Below) Chess being played in Pittsburgh’s Market Square
Congratulations to everyone who participated; We hope you had a great time and thanks especially to David for everything you’ve done organizing this and other chess-related activities over the past few years!
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