Zara La Fleur re­mained un­de­feat­ed as the St Au­gus­tine Girls’ High School stu­dent soared to glo­ry at the Na­tion­al Youth and Na­tion­al Ju­nior Chess Cham­pi­onships which took place on Jan­u­ary 14 at Cas­ca­dia Ho­tel in St Ann's, Port-of-Spain.

Some 60 play­ers across the coun­try com­pet­ed in sev­en age di­vi­sions in the ju­nior (Un­der-20) com­pe­ti­tion host­ed by the T&T Chess As­so­ci­a­tion (TTCA).

La Fleur com­pet­ed in the Open Sec­tion as op­posed to the Fe­male cat­e­go­ry of the Un­der-20s and fin­ished un­beat­en with a score of 6/7 (5 wins and 2 draws).

TTCA pres­i­dent, Son­ja John­son, was hap­py with the lev­el of par­tic­i­pa­tion.

She said, “Chess con­tin­ues to thrive in T&T. It is al­so en­cour­ag­ing to see play­ers from as young as 6 years of age par­tic­i­pat­ing in these events. On be­half of the TTCA, I ex­tend a heart­felt thank you to all play­ers, par­ents, coach­es, me­dia per­son­nel and all oth­er stake­hold­ers who have joined in con­tin­u­ing to de­vel­op the sport of chess in T&T!”

Pre­ced­ing this event, the TTCA host­ed the Na­tion­al Youth Cham­pi­onships (U-8 – U18) for 2024 from De­cem­ber 9-12, 2023 which saw 105 play­ers par­tic­i­pate.

The TTCA, in a re­lease, ex­pressed its ap­pre­ci­a­tion for the of­fi­cials who op­er­at­ed at its events in­clud­ing tour­na­ment di­rec­tor, TTCA sec­re­tary and mem­ber of the FIDE Amer­i­ca Board, NA Sandy Razark, Chief Ar­biter for the Youth Cham­pi­onship, FA Rod­er­ick Noel, who was sup­port­ed by the two Deputy Chiefs, TTCA third vice pres­i­dent, FA Sadiqah Razark and FM Ryan Harp­er. Razark and Harp­er served as the Chief and Deputy Chief Ar­biter for the Na­tion­al Ju­nior Cham­pi­onships, re­spec­tive­ly.

John­son was praised for host­ing the prize-giv­ing cer­e­mo­ny, while Kee­lan Hunte, TTCA Trea­sur­er, was thanked for his tech­ni­cal sup­port and all per­sons who served as ar­biters over the pe­ri­od in­clud­ing FM Quinn Cabralis, NA Za­akir Razark, Akeera Sayyid, and TTCA first vice pres­i­dent CM Frank Sears.

Na­tion­al chess cham­pi­ons

U-8

Fe­male: Vaish­navi Ram­per­sad, Mon­trose Gov­ern­ment Pri­ma­ry School

Open: Ty Humphrey, Home-schooled

U-10

Fe­male: Bre­an­na Joseph, Mon­trose Gov­ern­ment Pri­ma­ry School

Open: Jay­don Bowyer, St. Mon­i­ca’s Prepara­to­ry School

U-12

Fe­male: Alexan­dra Ku­mar, Scar­bor­ough RC Pri­ma­ry School

Open: Nicholas McLetchie, Lam­beau An­gli­can Pri­ma­ry School

U-14

Fe­male: Saman­tha Dol­ly, St. Au­gus­tine Girls’ High School

Open: Luke Gillette, Fa­ti­ma Col­lege

U-16

Fe­male: Arad­hana Ram­nar­ine-Singh, Na­pari­ma Girls’ High School

Open: Kael Samuel Bis­nath, Pre­sen­ta­tion Col­lege Ch­agua­nas

U-18

Fe­male: Zara La Fleur- St. Au­gus­tine Girls’ High School

Open: Brad Munroe-Brown

U-20

Fe­male: Arad­hana Ram­nar­ine-Singh, Na­pari­ma Girls’ High School

Open: Zara La Fleur-St. Au­gus­tine Girls’ High School