By Jeremy Lister
I like lots of things like cricket, rugby league, military history and music, but the thing I’m best at is chess.
On Friday morning I knew there was going to be a chess tournament at the Stanthorpe State School, but I thought I wasn’t going. This is because Mr Flemming (the teacher in charge of the Chess Club at St Joseph’s) told me that only year 5 and 6 students could go.
But at morning tea time, Mr Flemming told me that a student had pulled out because they were sick, which meant that they needed a new person to fill in for them and even though I’m in grade 4, I could go. I was really happy that this chance happened to me. Mr Flemming told me that to get there we would need to go in his car and Mrs Stanford’s car because it was raining.
When we got there, it was still pouring down rain and we had to sprint to get to cover. The tournament was in the school’s library and I had to sit at the St Joseph’s B table, and I was 4th along the table. The first school that I played against was Amiens State School and of the two games I played against Amiens, I won both of them by checkmate.
Then we had a short break of 15 minutes and after that I played another two games against players from Stanthorpe State School A.
The first of those games was really close because the other player really thought about her moves and checked if each move was a good move before she did it. But at the end of that game, we ran out of time and a teacher had to come around to say who won if the game had kept going. She said I was the winner. The second game against Stanthorpe State School I won by checkmate again.
