2025 Greater Chicago Championship

Details

Written by Jacob Plotnick - Editor in Chief Jacob Plotnick - Editor in Chief

•  2025 Greater Chicago Championship

 

The Illinois Chess Association is happy to congratulate David Heiser from Renaissance Knights for running their 15th annual Greater Chicago Championship. The event was held on February 8, 2025. The Renaissance Knights Chess Foundation, Kasparov Chess Foundation, Chicago Public Schools Academic Chess program, and SBB Research Group worked together to bring the tournament to Chicago at the McCormick Place.. 

The tournament had eleven sections with almost 700 participants. There were two High School sections, consisting of K-12 Championship and K-12 Reserve. The following each had three sections, composed of Championship. Reserve and Novice: Junior High (K-8), Elementary (K-6) and Primary (K-4).  The Championship section consisted of four rounds with game 40 with a 5 second delay. The reserve and novice sections had five rounds of game 25 with a 5 second delay.

High School K-12 Championship

 

There was a very exciting last round with four players entering the last round with a perfect three points: Artemii Khanbuyaev, Dario Pjevic, Sachit Srinivas Rajkumar and Avi Harrison Kaplan. Artemii defeated Avi, leaving him alone in first with a perfect four points. Dario drew against Sachit to both end up with 3.5 points; Whitman Kosak also ended with 3.5 points. 

 

Here are the players that finished with at least three out of four points:

 

High School K-12 Reserve

 

We had a close last round with two players entering the last round with a perfect four points: Alp Bahadir Caputlu and Julian Plascencia. Alp defeated Julian to win the K-12 reserve section. There were a further eight players that also went into the last round with 3.5 points.

Here are the players that finished with at least 3.5 out of five points:

 

Junior High K-8 Championship

 

There was a close final round with Andrew Gerelt Od being the only player going into the last round with a perfect three points. However, he was defeated by Isaac Chan-Osborn who went into the round with 2.5 points out of three.

 

Here are the players that finished with at least two out of four points:

 

Junior High K-8 Reserve

 

There was an exciting final round with two players entering with a perfect four points: Ayush Geddamuri and Dustin Tallacksen. Ayush defeated Dustin to be the winner of the Junior High Reserve section. Meanwhile, Sameehan Nikhil Jadhav and Zakaria Isahnounen both had 3.5 points after round four.

 

Here are the players that finished with at least 3.5 out of five points:

 

Junior High K-8 Novice

 

There was an exciting final round with four players entering the last round with a perfect four points out of four games: Munther Kurdi, Eric Cheng, Kingsley Ng and Anlun Ping. Kurdi defeated Kingsley and Eric defeated Anlun creating a two way tie with a perfect five points. But, Kurdi was awarded the Junior High K-8 Novice winner on tiebreaks. At the same time, Theodore Hoffman was the only player going into the final round with 3.5 points. 

 

Here are the players that finished with at least 3.5 out of five points:

 

Elementary K-6 Championship

 

We had a very exciting last round with four players with a perfect three points:  Anirudh Sai Jeeju, Angad Saran, Ishaan Jean and Bishrelt Aiden Munkhsuld. Anirudh defeated Bishret, while Angad and Ishaan played to a draw. This gave the Championship for the Elementary K-6 to Anirudh. Angad and Ishaan finished tied with 3.5 points and Angad was awarded second place due to tiebreaks. 

 

Here are the players that finished with at least 2.5 out of 4 points:

 

 

Elementary K-6 Reserve

 

There was an intense final round with two players entering the last round with a perfect four point: Alex Milewski and Dev Guru. Alex defeated Dev to end up with a perfect score. Meanwhile, both Ranvir Kochar and David Bobrov entered the final round with 3.5 points, culminating in Ranvir defeating David, giving him outright second place.

 

Here are the players that finished with at least 3.5 out of five points:

 

Elementary K-6 Novice

 

In this section, an impressive five players entered the final round with a perfect four points: Liam Kane, Srihitesh Adusumalli, Cindy Pelka, Lincoln Seiler and Isalinda Wu. There also were two players with 3.5 points: Luis A Narvaez and Adam Mckee. In the end, Liam defeated Isalinda and ended up in first place due to tiebreaks. Srihitesh defeated Luis to get second place on tiebreaks. Cindy defeated Lincoln to get third place via tiebreaks. 

 

Here are the players that finished with at least 4 out of five points:

 

Primary K-4 Championship

 

Four players went into the final round with a perfect three points: Danzan Dashdemberel, Vaibhav Juturu, Vihaan Narisetty and Roydin George. Danzan defeated Vihaan. Vaibhav defeated Roydin. This caused a two player tie with a perfect 4 points; of which Danzan became the Primary Champion on tiebreaks.

 

Here are the players that finished with at least 2.5 out of 4 points:

 

Primary K-4 Reserve

 

There was a close fight in the final round between Albert Yan, who entered the round with 4 points, and Alvin Fang, who entered the round with 3.5 points. After Alvin defeated Albert, he ended alone in first place with 4.5 points and Albert finished tied with four other players with four points. However, Albert placed second place via tiebreaks. 

 

Here are the players that finished with at least 3.0 out of five points:

 

Primary K-4 Novice

 

We had a very exciting final round with five players entering the last round with a perfect four points: Adam Michura, Daze Duncan, Brendan Kobe, Ronald D Finley, Jr. and Anthony Caetano. There were an additional four players with 3.5 points: Charlie Mazzuca, Aarav Dhadankar, Curtis Kwan, Karter Hill, and Kyrihn Cooper. In the final round, Adam defeated Ronald to end up with a perfect 5 points. Duncan defeated Anthony to also finish with a perfect 5 points. Adam finished in first place due to tiebreaks. Meanwhile, Brendan drew against Krihn–giving him third place alone. 

 

Here are the players that finished with at least 4 out of five points:

 

The Illinois Chess Association would also like to congratulate the following players that increased their ratings by at least 50 points.

 

 

Linked here is a complete cross-table for the event, courtesy of Renaissance Knights, and linked here is the US rating report, courtesy of US Chess. 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 Heiser along with Renaissance Knights for running the tournament so smoothly.