By Bryon Doyle
St. George

August 2, 2010

The St. George Chess Center, founded By Alan Crooks, Is one of the nicest chess facilities in the country. Thanks to Alan's tireless work and contributions, St. George has had the privilege of some high quality chess at a first-rate facility. We run tournaments at the center monthly or bi-monthly, with classes on Wednesdays, taught by myself and Steve Bowers, as well as great casual chess on Fridays! Alan also runs a Grand Prix tournament every year in December, called the Igor Ivanov Memorial Tournament. The tournament is held in honor of the Grandmaster and dear friend of all from Utah, including myself, who passed away in 2005. It truly is one of the finest tournaments in the country and gives players a great opportunity to play titled players! The author would just like to thank Alan for all he has done and continues to do for St. George Chess!

The Chess Center ran a USCF-rated tournament July 31st with two sections. In the open section Jon Hesson upset three higher-rated players to take first place with 3.5/4! Jon also beat the author of this article for the first time in his chess career, and picked up 140 rating points! Truly a remarkable performance! Enoch Israel from California tied for second with Antonio Padron. A strong performance was shown by all the players!

In the under 1200 section Jacob Thompson ran away from the rest of the field with a 4/4 performance taking clear first place! Very nice job from Jacob. Finishing a strong second in the under 1200 Section was Brett Abel, who scored 3/4 in his first tournament ever! Nice job by both players!

Below are some pictures of the center and the tournament winners.

The tournament was held in the beautiful St. George Chess Center

Winners of the open section

The winners pose for a quick photo