harthousechess

August Programming at the Hart House Chess Club

Published on August 1, 2022August 24, 2022 by harthousechess

Hello Hart House Chess Club members!

Important updates from our club this month! All events listed here are FREE!

You can find us at the Hart House Reading Room Fridays from 4 pm to 11 pm. We also have online lessons weekly on Saturdays at 12 noon on Discord.
On our HHCC chess.com team page, we are running weekly Saturday events at 8 pm. Registration opens at 7 pm each Saturday. Each weekly winner gets a 1-month chess.com Diamond Membership.
Chess.com representatives will also be coming by in September if enough NEW members join our HHCC chess.com team page. Tell your friends to join!
Chess.com is running a Bullet and Bughouse Collegiate Chess League Championship. The Bullet Championship will be from August 6 to 13. Bughouse will be from August 20 to 28. You must be a student of UofT to register for this event. Registration for the Bullet closes August 5 at 10 pm PT.
Collegiate Chess League Fall Registration is now open. The league is run on chess.com and UofT had some success last year. You must be a student of UofT to register for this event.

If you would like to keep in touch with the latest events and activities of the club, you are encouraged to join our mailing list or our Discord server.

Victor,

HHCC Co-Communications Director 2022-2023

Chess players of all abilities attended a drop-in night organized by the Hart House Chess Club.

HHCC Summer Blitz

Published on June 17, 2022August 31, 2022 by harthousechess

The Hart House Chess Club returned for its first casual blitz tournament of the summer on June 17th, 2022. It was the first opportunity to meet the new Executive and catch up with old and new friends.

The HHCC Summer Blitz was the first in-person tournament at the HHCC since the 202- Reading Week Open in February 2020! The Club finally opened back its doors earlier in the month to its weekly Casual Play Friday events.

June 17, 2022 at 7PM

Registration: opens 4pm, ends 6:45 pm. (late registrants will get half point byes)

Time Control: 5/3, 6 rounds

Prizes for top 3, unrated, U2000, and top woman

Standings

Starting Rank	Name	Rating	Round 1	Round 2	Round 3	Round 4	Round 5	Round 6	Score	Prize
1	Christopher Knox	2350	1	1	1	1	0.5	1	5.5	1st – 2nd
2	Joseph Bellissimo	2276	1	1	1	1	0.5	1	5.5	1st – 2nd
3	Kit Ng	2200	1	1	1	0	0	0	3
4	Jim Zhao	2200	1	1	1	0	1	0	4
5	Wenzhi Dai	2156	1	1	0	0	1	0	3
6	Aria Payduri	1650	1	1	0	1	0	1	4	Top U2000
7	Eliot Tseng	1434	1	0	0	1	1	0	3
8	Adrian Shkumbov	1382	1	1	0	0	–	–	2
9	Isabelle Zhu	1302	1	0	1	0	0.5	1	3.5	Top Woman
10	Bowen Zhang	1250	1	0	0	1	1	1	4
11	Sean Sresnberg	1200	0	0.5	1	0	1	0	2.5
12	Maksym Woychyshyn	unr.	0	0	0	1	1	0	2
13	Chol Elijah Akol	unr.	1	0	1	1	0	1	4	Top Unrated
14	Illya Lywarev	unr.	1	0	1	0	0.5	1	3.5
15	Raeid Saqur	unr.	1	0	1	0	0	–	2
16	Evan Baltman	unr.	0	1	1	–	–	–	2
17	Aaron Hu	unr.	0	1	1	1	0	0	3
18	Vimal Simha	unr.	0	1	1	1	1	0	4	Top Unrated
19	Bradlev Northwcate	unr.	0	1	0	0	0	1 (BYE)	2
20	Andrey Jimier	unr.	0	1(BYE)	0	0	–	–	1
21	Sunghyoun Kim	unr.	0	0	1	0	1	1	3
22	Nick Jamkhou	unr.	F	–	–	–	–	–	F
23	Kirill Logoveev	unr.	0	0.5	0	1	0	0	1.5
24	Tony Lau	unr.	0	1	0	1	0	0	2
25	Nabeel Jafri	unr.	1	0	0	0	–	–	1
26	Daniel Stveiemann	unr.	1	0	0.5	–	–	–	1.5
27	Daniel Wang	unr.	0	0	0.5	1	0	1	2.5
28	Norman Fu	unr.	0	0	0	1	0	1	2
29	Jack Byembadorj	unr.	0.5	0	0	0	0	0	0.5
30	Nathaniel Yong	1281	1	1	1	0	1	1	5	Third
31	Daniel Zhao	unr.	1	0	F1	0.5	0	0	2.5
32	Artashes	unr.	0	0	0	0	1 (BYE)	–	1
33	Ben Hahn	1800	BYE (.5)	1	0	1	1	1	4.5
34	Jonathan Yu	2100	BYE (.5)	1	1	1	1	0	4.5
35	Victor Zheng	–	–	–	–	0.5	–	–	0.5
36	Edward Chang	–	–	–	–	–	b1	–	1

Congrats to all the winners! See you at our next tournament!

June & July Activities at the HHCC

Published on June 9, 2022August 31, 2022 by harthousechess

Thanks for supporting the club in the first few weeks back in person. We will be hosting a few activities in the coming months. All HHCC activities are currently free since we are not charging membership fees at the moment.

Our first in-house blitz tournament of the year will be next Friday, June 17 at 7 PM ET in the Hart House Reading Room. Register on-site before 6:45 PM. Prizes are HHCC T-shirts. See the poster below.

Sahan Karunaratne will be leading beginner lessons starting Saturday, June 11th at 12 noon on Discord. He is a former HHCC Exec and has numerous years of experience teaching chess. See the poster below for more info. Beginners and intermediates are encouraged to join!

HHCC will be running weekly chess.com blitz arenas with monthly chess.com diamond memberships available. The exact date and time will be communicated through Discord.

Finally, weekly hangouts continue Fridays in the Hart House Reading Room throughout June, starting at 5pm ET and running until 11 pm ET.

Hart House Chess Club Returns!

Published on May 20, 2022May 26, 2022 by harthousechess

Today, Friday, May 20th, 2022, marked the return of the Hart House Chess Club to the chess scene in Toronto. For over 2 years, UofT chess enthusiasts and the general HHCC community were left without a staple in the chess community. The strong showing from 40+ UofT students, chess enthusiasts, and community members showed that the HHCC was still alive and well.

Paul Keres simul at Hart House on May 7th, 1975. He scored 25 wins, 3 draws and 2 losses.

The Toronto chess community, of all ages, showed up to the meetup (May 20th, 2022)

The storied halls of the Hart House, which had once seen the likes of Boris Spassky, Bobby Fischer, Paul Keres, and many more, were once again alive with the sounds of clocks banging and pieces dropping. Although masks were mandatory, as per UofT guidelines, you could tell that everyone was excited and happy to see the club return. New friends were made and connections rekindled. It felt like a return to normalcy.

As we slowly return from COVID-19, we hope you join us in our weekly hangouts happening Fridays 5 pm – 11 pm in the Hart House Reading Room. For those not local (or who can’t join us for our Friday hangouts), we hope to see you again in-person at our upcoming events and tournaments.

HHCC returned today to great fanfare. (May 20th, 2022)

Written by Victor Zheng, HHCC Communications Director

Return to In-Person Update

Published on May 15, 2022 by harthousechess

The Hart House Chess Club will be returning in-person Fridays in the Hart House Reading Room from 5 pm – 9 pm starting May 20th. We have finally confirmed with Hart House that we are allowed to use the space!

Please remember that in-person activities follow University of Toronto COVID-19 policies. Right now, masks are required if distancing is not possible. Please also follow any directions from the HHCC Executive Board who will be supervising the in-person activities.

Stay tuned for in-person lectures, tournaments, and more in the coming months! Lichess and Discord HHCC presences will remain active for the time being as students and the HHCC community gradually returns back in-person.

Stay safe, and we hope to see you back in-person,

HHCC Executive Board 2022-2023

Support Hart House Chess Club

Published on May 3, 2022April 26, 2025 by harthousechess

For over 125 years, Hart House Chess Club has been the University of Toronto’s leader in the game of chess. Students, alumni, and community members alike all benefit from the rich ambiance, the chess lessons, and the great tournaments happening at the centre of U of T. Your support will ensure that Hart House Chess Club can continue to offer vital opportunities for students to learn the Royal Game and put their chess skills into practice, developing their capacities and sharing new student-life experiences.

Call for Support:

During its history, Hart House Chess Club has benefited crucially from the number of its members who have chosen to maintain their association and support of the Club beyond their time as students. This has helped the Club to maintain continuity not only of its existence but also of its character. Anyone who has played at the Club will attest to the liveliness of its atmosphere and the enthusiasm of its members. The stream of students who have come through its doors over the years consists of the whole range of players, from complete beginners to ones with international titles.

As the Chess Club moves into 130+ year of existence as U of T’s official Chess Club, its initiatives keep increasing, hitting record numbers of club members as well as internal and external events. More and more students get to enjoy the invaluable benefits of the game in a friendly and welcoming atmosphere. However, these rich activities have also resulted in increased costs, costs that we need your support to sustain.

Thanks to donors like you, many generations of UofT students have understood the value of having a space outside of academia where they can explore and engage in a diverse number of co-curricular chess-related activities, which ultimately provide extraordinary lessons of their own. No matter how small, any donation can help us continue to make progress, accommodating an ever-increasing number of students.

Make a Donation:

Every year, donations like yours help ensure the participation of our Varsity Chess Team in numerous events throughout the year and the continuation of our efforts towards making the Chess Club at U of T even better. Your financial support towards achieving these goals would be greatly appreciated.

If you wish to make a donation to the Chess Club:

You may do so online through the Hart House portal. Once you finalize the process you will get a confirmation and you will be issued a tax receipt.
You may also write Hart House Chess Club a cheque, made payable to Hart House, in which case you will also get a tax receipt.

Public recognition will be offered to all those people who decide to support but donors may also choose to retain their anonymity.

We hope that, with your precious support, the work done at Hart House Chess Club will gain momentum and help build an even better future for generations of students to come.

Please note, you can also choose to support the Club through our online Merchandise page.

Ahmed Khalf — Co-Communications

Published on May 3, 2022May 4, 2022 by harthousechess

Ahmed is a second-year undergraduate student at the University of Toronto pursuing a specialist in computer science. Motivated to beat his best friend, he started earnestly playing chess in high school. Aside from chess, Ahmed has various other hobbies, such as swimming and ice skating.

As a Communications Director for the Hart House Chess Club, he hopes to promote chess across campus and create a welcoming environment for all players. Being a new player himself, he expects to use his background to improve the experience of novice club members. Regardless of whether HHCC operates in-person or online, he hopes to make the best of it.

Tanner McNamara – Secretary & President

Published on May 3, 2022February 5, 2023 by harthousechess

Tanner is beginning his fourth year studying behavioural neuroscience at the Scarborough campus in the Psychology PhD program. He is focused on finding out what happens when we let rats drink alcohol, but he still finds time to enjoy chess. Tanner has played chess since the age of seven, after learning from his dad. Following mild success growing up in Maryland as a three-time state champion (Pre-Teen, Middle School, and High School), he went off to study at Carleton College. There he became President of the Chess Club and took a team to the Pan-American Intercollegiate Championship for the first time in school history in 2014. Despite earning awards for Biggest Team Upset and Top Small School, as well as an individual prize for Top Alternate, that team lost badly to a team from the University of Toronto.

Four years later, Tanner moved up north and switched sides, and now has represented the UofT at PanAms twice, as well as in other competitions, memorably at the World Prestigious University Invitational held in Tianjin, China in 2019. He is excited now to be starting his fourth consecutive term on the Executive Board serving as Secretary. He is happy to give back to the Club that has treated him so well and to continue working with the game that has brought him so much joy over the years.

Crystal Cao — Treasurer

Published on May 3, 2022September 1, 2022 by harthousechess

Crystal is a third-year PhD student at the Institute of Biomedical Engineering studying the mechanism of cancer drug resistance. Before coming to U of T for an undergrad degree in Engineering Science, Crystal played competitively during middle school and high school (provincial and national tournaments). She also served as the VP of her school chess club and organized school-wide chess competitions and tournaments with neighbouring schools. Crystal has been a Hart House Chess Club member since undergrad time and now is excited to serve as Treasurer to support the club!

Having had the great opportunities to enjoy all the fun in-person activities and tournaments hosted by HHCC, she hopes to help bring back in-person opportunities post COVID-19. This is the second consecutive term Crystal will be serving as the Treasurer of the club.

Victor Zheng — Co-Communications

Published on May 3, 2022February 5, 2023 by harthousechess

Victor is a second-year undergraduate student at U of T pursuing a specialist in Computer Science. Currently, he is one of the Communications Directors for the Hart House Chess Club and is thrilled to be a part of the club’s amazing history.

At a young age, Victor began chess with his 2 older brothers. He went on to play regularly in chess tournaments in his hometown of Vancouver, and frequently played at chess tournaments in BC. He has volunteered, coached, and played in numerous chess tournaments and has experience working with students. His biggest chess achievement was beating FM Shawn Rodrigue-Lemieux at the Canadian Chess Challenge in St. John’s in 2018. Believing in expanding the reach of chess to students regardless of their background, Victor started a chess club at his high school in 2019. Victor believes that chess can be taught to anyone, and strives to promote an open and hospitable environment for everyone at the HHCC.

Being in the footsteps of giants of the club has only further driven him to share his love for chess with the HHCC community. He recognizes the incredible legacy and the unbelievable impact that the HHCC has made on chess in Canada and looks forward to bringing the chess club and the Canadian chess community to even greater heights.

As the Co-Communications Director, he is responsible for the Club’s Discord, Twitch, YouTube, and Facebook pages. He is also responsible for maintaining and update the Club’s website. He is also the Club’s main tournament director and is the lead organizer of the Club’s many weekly events. He serves as the Chief Organizer for the Club’s Holidays Open and Reading Week events.