In 2006 I was a keen 17 year old chess player that managed to win the 2006 U18 NSW Country Championship title. This was probably my greatest achievement in junior chess and I was stoked to win the event.
Chess players from country NSW (Not Sydney) played in qualifying tournaments in their own regions and then met in Sydney to battle it out in a round robin. I had managed to qualify and journeyed down to Sydney to play. The event was held in a house that had a lovely library. There were 6 players and 5 rounds to complete in the day.
I had the third highest rating and it was going to be a tough one to win.
In round 1 I played against Michal Tokarz. Michal was a great chess mate at tournaments and we played a bunch of practice games together at various events. He was a strong player and playing against him was always fun.
In this game Michal controls the game from the get go and the final position on my scoresheet shows he is winning. I can’t remember what happened. Maybe he lost to the clock or we may have been low on time (and that is why we stopped recording moves on the scoresheet). In any case somehow I managed to win from a losing position.
In round 2 I played against Ramon Aich. I manage to get to an endgame with a passed pawn and that was enough to win. I could only recreate up to move 32 as when I was young I didn’t specify which rook was moving, making it very tricky to navigate a scoresheet where both rooks are on the board for each player.
In round 3 I managed to score an early win against the Sicilian Najdorf. My opponent played well and after 13… Qxa8 the position is equal, but a rook blunder lets white in and it goes from equal to +8 in just three moves.
In round 4 I played Garry Mann. I was black against a Smith Morra Gambit and won the game. I couldn’t recreate the game though as there were too many errors on the scoresheet.
The fifth and final round was a big one! I had the white pieces against David Behne-Smith who had beaten me on many occasions and was the top rated chess player in my area. Both of us were on 4 points and so it was winner takes all.
Well that is on overview of how I won the 2006 U18 NSW Country Championships. Here are the final results.
