A number of surprise winners as well as a few household names retained their titles at the first-ever Online National Age Group Chess Championships which ended on July 4 with nearly 200 players from no fewer than 50 schools across Jamaica competing.

The titles up for grabs were the National Under-8, Under-10, Under-12, Under-14, Under-16 and Under-18 for both boys and girls. The Under-8 section was merged and saw for the first time in the history of the event that a girl won the absolute title.

Young Emilia-Rose Leake of Creative Kids Learning Academy finished with a perfect score on the first day and repeated it on the final day to achieve the title of National Under-8 Chess Champion for both absolute and female. Second and third place went to Raheem Gayle on five points and Austin Xiang on four points. The female section saw second going to Esther Mullings on four points and third to Dayna-Simone Swasey on three points.

Ronak Shergil won the Under-10 Absolute section with 4.5 points, ahead of Tahir Tavares on 3.5 points and Liam Logan on three points. Victoria Salazar blazed to victory in the Under-10 female section with four points, with second and third going to Meghalaya Haughton-Pathaw and Victoria Aung on three points each.

The Under-12 Absolute section was a tense affair with top seed Najae Powell tying for first with Corbin Harvey, both on four points. Najae went on to win the blitz play-off for the title of Under-12 Champion. In third position was last year’s Under-12 Champion Jaheim Smart.

The Under-12 Female section saw the return of Woman Candidate Master (WCM) Zaina O’Connor who amassed an unbeatable 4.5 points, followed closely in second place by Kaia Gayle on 3.5 points and Niara McLeod on three points.

Jaden Shaw of Wolmer’s Boys’ School continued his recent impressive results to win the Under-14 Absolute section on 4.5 points. Rohit Mahtani was second on 3.5 points and J-Loy Chin third with three points.

Gabriella Watson was the only other perfect score result, scoring six points on the first day and five points in the finals to secure the Under-14 female title. Ruthan Collins ended with three points and Suraiya Matandara-Clarke got 2.5 points to finish third.

Another truly remarkable result was that of Campion College’s Raehanna Brown. She walked away with the Under-16 Absolute and female titles as both sections were merged. Scoring an unbeatable four points on the final day cemented her as the third female ever in Jamaica, to win an absolute title in the championships. Damari Bryce finished with three points to haul second place, while the top-rated Daren McKennis ended with 2.5 points.

Raehanna was also crowned Under-16 female champion ahead of Amy Stephenson on three points and Kaity Gayle on two points

The absolute Under-18 section was hard fought between Shamir Martin of Glenmuir High and Lontae Walker. Both tied on four points and had to go to a play-off. Shamir won the play-off to become the Under-18 Champion. Kamari Stephens was third on three points.

The Jamaica Chess Federation event was sponsored by Grace Vienna Sausages and took place online for the first time ever. Member of the organising team Warren Elliott was happy. “It is amazing that we could continue this prestigious chess championship online given the various restrictions caused by COVID-19. The numbers make this event the largest online event in Jamaica and we are certainly happy to see so many of our youth engaging in this intellectual sport.”

When asked what’s next for these youngsters, he explained that they will now be the online national representatives and the most immediate tournament is the World Cadets and Youth Championships organised by the world governing body of chess (FIDE). It will also be played online in August 2021.