{"id":501,"date":"2013-01-26T19:30:27","date_gmt":"2013-01-26T09:30:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.doubleroo.com.au\/blog\/?p=501"},"modified":"2013-01-26T19:30:27","modified_gmt":"2013-01-26T09:30:27","slug":"australia-day-weekender","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.doubleroo.com.au\/blog\/2013\/01\/australia-day-weekender\/","title":{"rendered":"Australia Day Weekender"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Chess Weekend<\/span><\/strong><\/div>\n
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The Doubleroo Australia Day Weekender was conceived just a few weeks ago in a phone conversation with CAQ president Mark Stokes. I wanted to bend Mark’s ear about having a nine round, one round a week on\u00a0Friday’s\u00a0tournament. What about the Australian day he asked?<\/div>\n

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Sponsors<\/strong><\/span><\/div>\n
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While Mark was in Sydney playing the Australian Open he secured the sponsorship of two generous gentlemen, George Lester (also a participant) and Sydney chess enthusiast Elliot Renzies, who donated $100 each towards the tournament. Hearing this, David Esmonde, former president of the Gold Coast chess association decided to throw in $100 as well. Thanks to them we will nearly break even \ud83d\ude42<\/div>\n
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Kickoff<\/span><\/strong><\/div>\n

Our tournament kicked off with twenty keen players taking advantage of the rainy day<\/p>\n

One\u00a0particularly nice surprise was the\u00a0appearance\u00a0of\u00a0\u00a0several players who had not moved a pawn in anger for a long time like former leading junior, Jakob Edwards, Ross Jempson and Don Hamilton.<\/p>\n

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The highlight of the day was when a man in his late twenties, Matt Watson, told me that I had been his Chess teacher at St Kevin’s College more than a decade ago.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
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Matt Watson<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

We also managed to attract the strongest Queensland chess-player, International master Moulthun Ly. He had a relatively short first round against Craig Stewart who bemoaned having lost in a similar method just recently.<\/p>\n

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