Fischer Random Championship

On March 3rd, 2023, 20 players joined the Hart House Chess Club for its 2023 Fischer Random Championship. With lightning striking and snow falling, a phenomenon very rarely seen, travelling to Hart House was treacherous and only a handful travelled from outside the University to the event. The event consisted of 6 single rounds of chess with a built in “study time” to prepare for each position. This was unlike any other event in Canada and we hoped to showcase the interesting games that arise from this incredible chess variant. Conveniently, this year’s Fischer Random Championship occurred on March, 3rd, 2023, 6 days before the birthday of Bobby Fischer himself on March 9th, 1943.

Fischer Random Chess or Chess 960 is a variant of chess, which employs the same board and pieces as standard chess, but the starting position of the pieces on the players’ home ranks is randomized. Certain restrictions apply on the randomization, preserving the dynamic nature of the game by retaining bishops of opposite colors for each player and the right to castle for both sides. The result is 960 unique possible starting positions.

In this tournament, the same starting position was used for all games of the same round of the tournament, but for every new round of the tournament, there was be a new starting position.

This year’s event started with top-seed IM Advait Patel missing because of the weather. Thus, WIM Yunshan Li and IM Nicholas Vettese entered as the top seeds. The resulting 6 rounds proved competitive, with IM Nicholas Vettese and Matthew Shih both tying for first at 5/6. However, in the ensuing playoff, IM Nicholas Vettese defeated Matthew 2-0 for first place overall. Jim Zhao took home clear third.

Young prodigy from South Korea, unrated Isaak Huh, finished tied third with WIM Yunshan Li and Yixiao Wang, who both tied for top-woman. Isaak was the only player able to take off a win against Nicholas throughout the entire event.

Top U1600 was won by Joshua Bakradze and Michael Ashcroft.

There was another strong showing by UofT’s unrated players, as almost 50% of the field was yet again unrated.

Thank you for attending this year’s event and we hope to see you out here at Hart House again!

Original event post below:

FORMAT AND EVENT DETAILS

WHEN: Friday, March 3rd, 7pm – 10pm.
WHERE: Hart House (7 Hart House Cir, Toronto) – East Common Room
WHAT: 6-round, single-section, single-round blitz event (Swiss) using a 5 minute + 2 second increment time control.
RATED: Unrated
ENTRY FEE: FREE for members, and $15 for non-members. Free for FMs at least 1 week before (email entry). In-person and online registration available.
PRIZE FUND: Guaranteed $300 – $100 for first, $75 second, $50 third, $25 top-woman, $25 top-unrated, $25 top-U1600.
SPECIAL PRIZES: All participants will be entered into a door prize for a HHCC t-shirt and toque.
MAXIMUM CAPACITY: 68 players
ORGANIZER: Hart House Chess Club
NOTE: chess sets and boards provided

Positions will be released via random assignment from one of the 959 different positions (we will not use the original position) at the start of each round. Players will be given 3 minutes of “study time” before the round.