2026 Illinois Youth Invitationals
This past weekend (April 24-26) the ICA held the Youth Invitationals. This is when 20 of the top-rated players for each section get invited to compete for a chance to represent our state at the national level. Players were invited based on ratings to play in one of the following sections:
- Denker – High School 9th to 12th grade
- Haring – Girls K to 12th grade
- Barber – 6th to 8th grade
- Rockefeller – Kindergarten to 5th grade
- Ashley – Kindergarten to 3rd grade
Denker
Thanks to an exciting blitz playoff triumph, Anshul Shetty was named the 2026 Illinois Denker qualifier. The Waubonsie Valley sophomore forced a playoff against Lane Tech senior Dario Pjevic after both finished with 4.0’s in the five-round event.
Shetty won the first game of the playoff and successfully played for a draw in the rematch. Anshul does not consider himself to be a strong blitz player – but suggested this was a strength of his opponent, and he felt fortunate to come away victorious.
A three-way tie for third place included Stevenson sophomore Debarghya Das, Stephenson junior Hemanth Samayamantri and Rohan Menon, all with 3.5. Pjevic collected second place honors while Debarghya, who handed Shetty his lone loss in the third round, earned the third place trophy.
Anshul Shetty - 1st place Dario Pjevic - 2nd place
Haring
In the Haring Invitational for girls, top-rated Women’s Candidate Master Elizabeth Xia, compiled four wins before drawing in the final round against Gaofei Wang. Xia finished with 4.5, a full-point ahead of a four-pack of 3.5’s including Shivani Manimaran, Valerie Yan, Victoria Chen and Wang. On tiebreaks, Manimaran, an Oswego East sophomore, and Yan collected second and third place hardware.
Elizabeth Xia - 1st place
Barber
In the middle school Barber competition, Artemii Khanbutaev compiled a pattern similar to Xia’s, winning his first four games before drawing in the last round. Khanbutaev’s 4.5 score was a full-point better than a four-pack including strong players such as Aidan Baker, Justin Lee, Jacob Tran and Sachit Rajkumar. Baker brought home second place hardware; Lee took third on tiebreaks.
Artemii Khanbutaev - 1st place
Rockefeller
The K-5 Rockefeller competition saw a pair of Candidate Masters require a blitz playoff after compiling 4.5’s and drawing head-to-head in the third round. Aiden Li will represent Illinois in Grand Rapids, Michigan this summer after prevailing, while Matthew Yu nabbed the second place trophy. Krish Vignesh was the lone 3.5 tally to earn the third place trophy.
Vignesh finished ahead of a five-pack of 3.0’s including Vaibhav Juturu, Reyansh Singh, Tanish Sen, Bishrelt Munkhsuld and Dylan Vogel.
Ashley
For the first-time ever, the Maurice Ashley section fielded competitors up to third grade. Top-rated Emily Tang opted to play against a field of 19 boys – and compiled a perfect 5.0 score.
A full-point back, Adhvik Mohan came back from a first-round loss to win clear second place with his 4.0 result. Ethan Li and Srihan Komarina tied for third with 3.5, with Li earning the third place trophy on tiebreaks.
MoSaloh Ahmadaliev, Samarth Gupta, Tarak Jeyanthkumar, Nimalan Manmathasivaram and Ness Mehta comprised the youthful five-pack who tied for fifth place with 3.0’s.
Emily Tang - 1st place
The national Denker, Barber Rockefeller, Ashley and Haring competitions will be held in early August. Combined with the results from Senior winner GM Dmitry Gurevich, the youth representatives will vie for the top score with the other represented states.
Read MoreApril - IL Top Girl Players
US Top 100 Girls From Illinois – April 2026
Illinois saw its allocation of Top 100 girls grow from 43 in March to 50 in April of this year!
Emily Tang, winner of the very first Ashley section of the Illinois Youth Invitational (IYI), remains the number one 8-year old girl in the United States this month.
10-year old Elizabeth Xia, winner of the Haring division of the IYI, dropped slightly from second to fourth for her age group across the US.
Gaofei Wang also dipped slightly, from third to fourth among 14-year olds.
Amazing 6-year old Vidhaatri Rao saw her rating climb over 200 points, raising her from 70th to 34th on the Ages 7 and Under list.
Celebrating birthdays this month, resulted in Madhuvanti Sathish and Suhana Sharad moving up age lists.
Joining (or rejoining) the Top 100 rosters were 18-year old Kaylee Zheng, 15-year old Joyce Zheng, 12-year old Reshmitha Dabburi, 11-year old Kinzie Chavez, 10-year old Shanaya Banoth, 8-year old Shrinika Biswal, and three 7-and-unders including Shreya Chakravarthy, Colette Christoff and Caroline Ekebrg.
2026 KCF All-Girls National Chess Championship
2026 KCF All-Girls National Chess Championship
The Illinois Chess Association is happy to congratulate David and Sheila Heiser from Renaissance Knights on running their 21st annual All-Girls National Chess Championship. The event was held from April 10th to April 12th, 2026 in the McCormick Place and we want to thank the Renaissance Knights Chess Foundation, Kasparov Chess Foundation and United States Chess Federation for bringing the tournament to Chicago.
The tournament was open to girls under 18 years old as of January 1, 2026 and participants competed in the following categories: Under 8, Under 10, Under 12, Under 14, Under 16, and Under 18. The Champion in each age group earned the honor of representing the USA at either the World Cadet or World Youth Championships, depending on their age, in accordance with US Chess Scholastic National and International Invitation Events and Awards.
The tournament had over 600 participants and all games were 90 minutes with a 5 second delay.
Under 18 Championship
Entering the final round, both Jasmine Su and Megan Paragua were tied with 4.5 points out of 5. However, they drew each other in the previous round and were forced to play other opponents, games which both of them won. By tiebreakers, Jasmine got first overall. Due to the 4 point players, Allyson Yu and Elizabeth Xia, losing, as well as other players, Chloe Zamoski was awarded third place alone with 4.5 points.
Here are the players that finished with at least four out of six points, listed in tiebreak order. Players highlighted in yellow are from Illinois. The first 8 places received awards:
Under 16 Championship
Entering the final round, Khanim Ismayilove was the only player with a perfect 5 points, while only Leah Yang had 4.5 points of a possible 5. Once they drew each other, Khanim won first outright with 5.5 points while Leah was joined with Audry Zhou, Evelyn Qiao, and Sunny Zhang with 5 points to tie for second place.
Here are the players that finished with at least four out of six points, listed in tiebreak order. The first 8 places received awards:
Under 14 Championship
Entering the final round, only Alive Chovanec had a perfect 5 points, while 3 players – Pavithran Sajish, Anqing Wang, and Violet Duran – had 4.5 points. Alice and Pavithran drew while Anqing defeated Violet, leaving Alice and Anqing tied. However, Alice had stronger tiebreakers and was awarded first place overall.
Here are the players that finished with at least 4.5 out of six points, listed in tiebreak order. Players in yellow are from Illinois. The first 16 places received awards:
Under 12 Championship
Entering the final round, both Alexandra Liu and Kate Stripunsky had a perfect 5 points, and they drew in the last round, leading to a tie for first between the both of them which Alexndra won based on tiebreakers. They were followed closely behind by 5 players tied with 5 points out of 6 possible, who you can see below.
Here are the players that finished with at least 4.5 out of six points, listed in tiebreak order. The first 16 places received awards:
Under 10 Championship
Entering the last round, only Giallian Gao was undefeated with a perfect 5 points, and she defeated Abigail Zhou in the last round to finish with a perfect 6 points. In the meanwhile, Charlotte Chang entered the last round with 4.5 points and defeated Grace Peng who had also entered the final round with 4.5 points – leading to Charlotte placing in second outright with 5.5 points.
Here are the players that finished with at least 4.5 out of six points, listed in tiebreak order. Players in yellow are from Illinois. The first 16 places received awards:
Under 8 Championship
Entering the final round, there were 3 players with a perfect 5 points: Siddhishree Sundaram, Dhiriti Singh, and Aadya Pavithra Rajesh. Both Siddhishree and Dhriti won their games to tie for first with a perfect 6/6 points, but Siddhishree got first due to tiebreakers. After that, 9 players tied for third with 5 points out of 5, who you can see below.
Here are the players that finished with at least 4.5 out of six points, listed in tiebreak order. The first 16 places received awards:
Illinois Chess Association would like to congratulate the following players that represented Illinois and received awards:
Amy Zhan - 8th place U14 - Courtesy Chess Community
U12 top 900-1199 - Kaarthisha Vepari - Courtesy Chess Community
Elizabeth Xia - U18 4th place - Courtesy Chess Community
And we also want to give a shout out to the following teams from Illinois that won awards:
Gregory Middle School - U14 Champs - Courtesy Chess Community
Linked here is a complete cross-table for the event, including all individual and team awards, courtesy of Renaissance Knights, and linked here is the US rating report. Following these links, you can view the full results across any sections instead of the abbreviated standings above. Once again, we are happy to congratulate everybody who participated and gave it their best in this tournament and to congratulate David and Shiela Heiser along with Renaissance Knights for running the tournament so smoothly.
April - IL Top Players
US Top 100 From Illinois – April 2026
Happiest of birthdays to Hardy Gu, rated 2201, as he transitioned from the US #1 9-year old in March to the #1 10-year old in April.
Illinois saw its total top 100 roster grow from 40 to 41 in April. 17-year old Michael Li returned to the top 100’s after a brief absence.
The 41 top 100’s include 37 boys and four girls: Gaofei Wang, Elizabeth Xia, Valerie Yan and Emily Tang.
In addition to Hardy, other Illinois top 10’ers this month include Dimitar Mardov, #2 17-year old, Artemii Khanbutaev, #6 13-year old, #6 11-year old Matthew Yu, #2 10-year old Aiden Li, and #6 8-year old, Emily Tang.
Altogether, Illinois enjoys 40 top 100’s on the dozen youth age lists this month.
March - IL Top Players
US Top 100 From Illinois – March 2026
Illinois proudly boasts two of the top-rated players by age in the US – 10-year old Aiden Li and 9-year old Hardy Gu. Aiden’s 2243 is 15 points higher than that of US #2 Matthew Yu.
Hardy’s incredible 2201 rating represents a 150-point increase since March of 2025.
International Master Dimitar Mardov is the 2nd rated 17-year in the US at 2579, leading a talented pack of four other Land of Lincoln age-mates in the top 100’s: Sreekar Gangavarapu, Andrey Dmitriev, Justin Zhang and Dario Pjevic.
Aiden is one of seven Illinois 10-year olds in the top 100’s along with Matthew, Elizabeth Xia, Edward Tang, Valerie Yan, Vaibhav Juturu and Kavinvel Murugan.
Altogether, Illinois enjoys 40 top 100’s on the dozen youth age lists this month.
2026 Illinois K-8 State Chess Championship
2026 Illinois K-8 State Chess Championship
The Illinois Chess Association is happy to congratulate Glenn Panner and Maret Thorpe from Chess Weekend for an impressive organization of our 2026 Illinois K-8 Chess Championship from March 6-8, 2026 in Schaumburg, Illinois.
Photo courtesy of Erik Czerin
The tournament had four sections:
- Lower Primary K-1: 7 rounds of G25d5
- Upper Primary 2-3: 7 rounds of G40d5
- Elementary 4-5: 7 rounds of G55d5
- Junior High 6-8: 7 rounds of G55d5
As well as bughouse, blitz, and puzzle solving side events – taking place during the nights of the tournament.
Pictured below are the trophies given out during the tournament: 1st - 25th individually in each section, 1 - 10th place teams in each section, class awards based on rating in each section, class awards based on grade in each section, and, of course, awards for each of the side events.
Photo courtesy of Erik Czerin
Kindergarten and First grade
Going into the last round, Shivakumara Vellapandi led with a perfect 6 points against Muhammadsaloh Ahmadaliev with 5.5 points. Muhammadsaloh defeated Shivakumara to win the K-1 outright with 6.5 points. Six players, Abir Sumbhate, Alexander Choi, Arjun Kolluri, Advaya Chingalwar, Vidhaatri Rao, and Shinsuke Yamaguchi, started the last round with 5 points.
Photo courtesy Muhammadsaloh's family
Here are the players that finished with at least five points:
Grades 2-3
Photo courtesy Emily's family
Entering the final round, both Emily Tang and Ethan Li were tied with a perfect 6 points. Emily defeated Ethan to win outright with a perfect 7/7. Here are the players that ended up with at least 5.5 points:
Grades 4-5
Dylan Vogel entered the last round with a perfect 6 points and there was a three-way tie with a 5.5 points for second between Kavanvel Murugan, Tanish Zen and Krish Vegnesh. This created two exciting games where Kavinvel defeated Krish and Dylan drew Tanish to create a two way tie with 6.5 points for first place. Dylan was awarded first place due to tie-breaks.
Photo courtesy Dylan's family
Here are the players that finished with at least 5.5 points:
Grades 6-8
Three players entered the final round with a perfect 6 points: Aidan Baker, Sachit Srinivas Rajkumar and Kaden Kassim. Meanwhile, one lone player had 5.5 points: Anirudh Sai Jeeju. In the final round, Aidan defeated Kaden and Sachit defeated Anirudh causing a two way tie with a perfect 7 points. Aidan was awarded first place due to tie-breaks.
Photo courtesy Aidan's family
Here are the players that ended up with at least 5.5 points:
Linked here is a complete cross-table for the event, which will show tie-breaks and all side events, courtesy of Chess Weekend, and linked here is the US rating report. Following these links, you can view the full results across any sections instead of the abbreviated standings above.
Once again, we are happy to congratulate everybody who participated and gave it their best in this tournament and to congratulate Glenn Panner and Maret Thorpe along with Chess Weekend for running the tournament so smoothly on behalf of the Illinois Chess Association. We also want to thank the 58 Illinois Chess Association members out of nearly 700 players that came out and supported our K-8 State Championship.
We also want to thank Amy Greene, Henry Getz and Catherine “Kats” Poffenbarger of the Illinois Chess Association board for coming out and supporting this great state event. Please come out and support next year’s K-8 downstate. The event information will be published on the ICA website.
