SA kids king of castle at chess tournament
CHECK THIS: Chess champ Naseem Essa SOUTH African chess whizz kids have bagged 13 medals at the African Youth Chess Championship in Zambia.
Naseem Essa, 12, and Talia Govender, 7, both brought home gold for their first spots in the under-12 boys and under-8 girls divisions respectively two weeks ago.
Naseem, a Grade 6 pupil at Glenwood Preparatory School in Durban, said: “I was familiar with many of the others I played against, but it is always nice playing people you have never met before and interacting with people from different cultures.”
The straight-A pupil starts his day at 4am, playing chess, reading up on chess programs and learning and analysing the game online.
“Chess has helped me with my maths, science and history, especially memorising dates and events in history,” he said.
“Chess involves a lot of thinking of the moves in your head and calculating before playing it on the board.
“When at home I play against computer programs or online against a friend in Namibia, who I met at the championship.”
Naseem is working to become a grandmaster — the highest level a chess player can attain.
He started playing chess at the age of six when he received a chess board for his birthday.
“Grade 3 was my best year in chess, representing South Africa and the year I beat a Grade 7 pupil who was a top player in school. I then started taking chess seriously,” he said.
Apart from chess, he enjoys playing table tennis and cricket. He has thus far spent his holidays learning computer programming and has been for cricket coaching.
Talia’s mother, Sandra Govender, said her daughter was elated when she won because she played and beat girls older than her.
“Although she won in the under-8 category, she played girls from the under-10 division,” said Govender.
The Grade 2 Crawford College Pretoria pupil, who started playing chess in Grade 1, participated this year for the first time at an international level when she went to the Commonwealth Chess Games in India in July.
“We are very proud of her achievement. This year she also won an award for participating in the most number of tournaments in her division,” said Govender.
Talia, who is ranked No 1 in South Africa in the under-8 division, and Naseem are due to head to Cape Town next week for the junior national championships.