Pioneer School Top Team
( More like tie-break madness ! )
by James Stripes
A trio of players dominated the upper elementary and middle school section at the March Madness youth chess tournament. The event was held at Saint George's School on March 12. The trio of players were teammates or they might have been paired against one another before the final round. Varun Ambalavanan, Connor Gosselin-Harris, and Aniketh Parlapalli each accounted for one of the losses of every player who scored 3.0 in their section.
In the final round, Aniketh faced Varun, while Connor played the top player with one less point than the trio, another teammate. Varun won and finished first on tie-breaks over Connor, both finishing with perfect 5.0 scores. Connor earned a trophy for second place. Aniketh was the top fourth grader. Toby Kast, dispatched by Connor in the final round, finished as the top 3.0 and took home the trophy for top fifth grader. The top sixth grader, Mia Sponseller, also finished with 3.0 as did four others who went home without trophies.
Also receiving trophies in that section were Jack Curry (2.0) for biggest upset and Tysean Oliver (2.0) for first in seventh grade.
In the K-3 section, Arnav Wadikar and Ethan Shan drew their final round game after both beating all other opponents. They finished with 4.5 each. Arnav was first on tie-breaks. Ethan took home the second place trophy. Two others were close behind with 4.0. Rohan Dhillon won the trophy for first in third grade, while Evelyn Arquette, behind Rohan on tie-breaks, took home a chess book.
Others winning trophies in K-3 were Ben Barrett (3.0), first in second grade; Elizabeth Arquette (3.0), first in first grade; Alex Marsh (2.5), first in kindergarten; and Amelie Hilton (2.0) for biggest upset.
The top three players by rating and the only high school player elected to play a quad--a four player all-play-all--with a longer time control. Garrett Casey won all three games and took home two chess books for his efforts. Alex Herron was second, losing only to Garrett, and took home a chess book for second place.
Pioneer School's 17.0 top four combined score topped Saint George's School (14.5), The Oaks (11.0), and Roosevelt (8.5) for the team trophy.
Anand Wadikar was again perfect in the parents competition. His score added to son Arnav's edged out the Gosselin-Harris family by half a point for the family prize. Having won a chess set in a prior tournament, they took home a book.
