Oklahoma Senior April 2-3
https://new.uschess.org/2022-oklahoma-senior-open-and-championship
Virginia Senior Open June 3-5
https://new.uschess.org/2022-virginia-senior-open
It’s the season for Irwin qualifiers! Keep 'em coming!
For the Oregon Senior Open, it used to be open to everyone, including out-of-state players, who were at least 50 years old on the first day of the tournament. Now it’s open to everyone, including out-of-state players, who will be at least 50 years old on the first day of the Irwin. Looking at the information about the Senior tournaments posted here, it seems states do it all sorts of different ways as far as the age requirement goes.
I think most states go by the day of their tournament, but to my knowledge US Chess places no restrictions on how the state selects their qualifier as long as the person they select meets the requirements to play in the Irwin. So either method of selecting the date for age requirements is perfectly OK. Similarly, the states get to decide if non-residents can play (but their nominee must be a resident), and states can choose other methods as well. Top scoring in their state championship and highest rated player willing to play are two fairly reasonable ways to do it for states who believe a senior only event isn’t viable.
Alabama Senior Apr 23
https://new.uschess.org/2022-alabama-senior-chess-championship
New Jersey Senior May 22
https://new.uschess.org/2022-new-jersey-senior-championship
Connecticut on April 30.
https://new.uschess.org/2022-connecticut-senior-championship
Nevada on May 15.
https://new.uschess.org/2022-nevada-seniors-championship
The Oregon Senior Open is being held May 13-15 and is open to out-of-state players. oregonchessfed.org/wp-conte … r-Open.pdf
I wonder how many Senior qualifiers are scheduled or have been held that aren’t listed on the US Chess website. Anything I find using a word search on Senior, I share here. Oregon didn’t come up. How many others? To date I am aware of 24 states with qualifiers scheduled, qualifiers held or representative appointed (no guarantees any of those representatives will actually choose to participate):
AL, S-CA (appointed), CO, CT, GA, IA, IL, MA, MI, MN, MO, NC, NV, NJ, NM, OK, OR, SC, TX (will appoint) SD, VA, WA, WV, WI (whose winner declined so they are still in play).
This list is not official; the US Chess Office handles the official participant lists. I am not aware of whether they have solicited official nomination forms or started confirming participants, nor am I aware of the deadline for the state chapters to submit nominees for the Irwin or any of the other Invitationals). But you can be sure they are on top of it.
Utah, May 7. Note that I didn’t find this on the US Chess website. I played in this a few years ago when I lived in Vegas and found it a fun tournament and a good site.
http://www.utahchess.com/event/2022-utah-senior-championship-5-07-2022/
Steve Erbach won a playoff and will be Wisconsin’s Irwin rep.
It looks like the Oregon Senior Open will be a strong event. There is already a GM and 3 NM’s signed up!
Tennessee May 20-22. There are both 3 day and 2 day schedules.
https://new.uschess.org/2022-tennessee-senior-open-chess-tournament
NY will be by the rating list for 2022. We hope to have a qualifier tournament in the near future, hard to build out, but I think there is a way soon.
Huh???
It’s not clear what you’re questioning. I’ll guess it’s on the difficulty of holding a qualifier, which only Danny could comment on intelligently.
Generically speaking, state chapters are free to select their representative however they wish, and US Chess has not to my knowledge taken a position on which is preferable. The three methods I’ve seen are 1) a senior qualifier event. 2) Highest finishing Senior in State Championship. 3) Highest rated willing to come. Clearly #3 guarantees the strongest possible representative. I personally wish everyone did #1 because I want to see more senior chess activity.
At this point, I am aware that S-CA, TX and NY will appoint a representative. The rest of the states I know about held or will hold qualifiers of one type or another; no guarantees that their qualifier will actually choose to attend. I am not aware of the plans for the following states:
Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, Northern California, Delaware, DC, Idaho, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont, Wyoming. In addition, Hawaii uses method #3 above, but the qualifier declined so they are in play. If you know anything about any of these states, I’d welcome a PM. If you’re from one of those states, 50 or over and would love to play in the Irwin, reach out to your state chapter and find out what their plans are!
As I’ve noted before, all the initial nominations go through the US Chess Office; I’m merely keeping score of what I know so that if the Senior Committee is asked to find representatives for some of the states we’ll be prepared to do so.
Kansas May 7-8, open only to Kansas residents
"Generically speaking, state chapters are free to select their representative however they wish, and US Chess has not to my knowledge taken a position on which is preferable. The three methods I’ve seen are 1) a senior qualifier event. 2) Highest finishing Senior in State Championship. 3) Highest rated willing to come. Clearly #3 guarantees the strongest possible representative. I personally wish everyone did #1 because I want to see more senior chess activity.
sorry, but, #3 guarantees no such thing as “strongest possible representative”. if it’s an active rating, yeah, probably but…
…scot…
For all nominees NY prefers to have a tournament, and not go by the rating list. Just have not gotten around to building a Senior qualifier, and needs to be more out of the pandemic really in order to do so in this region. The Marshall is holding a Senior classic event this weekend, so maybe there is a route there for the future.
Point noted. But at least one of the strongest. I’d say inactive players probably wouldn’t do this anyway, but I know that isn’t true. I recruited a player to represent Alaska in 2019, and he hadn’t played in over a decade. He won upset prizes the first two rounds! And IM Doug Root had only played once in the previous decade before he represented TX last year, finishing 2nd.
Idaho May 21
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScvoqO_u0zKp23QjChaWZFmhaA89Eb4vbtCm33cESXjjs5qGA/viewform
Northern California will have a qualifier, but I don’t see it scheduled as yet.
While I listed Ohio as a state for which I hadn’t seen a scheduled qualifier, I do see they held a Senior Event in Sept which appears to have determined their state champion, so I would guess that also served as their qualifier.