THE Westport Public School Chess team have completed a highly successful year by winning the NSW Country Chess Championship on November 25.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
The team, consisting of Harry Freudenstein, Bill Butlin, Lachlan Gough and Jack Shoobert, defeated St. Augustine’s Primary, Coffs Harbour 8 boards-0, Modanville Public School 6-2 and St. Mary’s Primary, Armidale 5-3 on the road to the NSW Country Championship.
There, they recorded a tight 4.5- 3.5 victory over Millthorpe Public School in an exciting match.
Immediately after their win the team played off for the NSW School Championship and the right to represent NSW at the National tournament against Emmanuel College, Sydney.
Although beaten in the City vrs Country playoff for the state championship, every match had winning opportunities for the Westport champions who fought bravely and made the highly favoured Sydney school work for their win.
The brilliant result places the Westport Public School Chess Program in the number one position from over 800 entries across country NSW and runner up in NSW from over 1200 entries from all schools.
The following weekend the One Day team of Harry, Bill and Jack were once again in action for the NSW One Day Championships representing the Lower North Coast region.
Once again they threw down the gauntlet to the city schools in a fifteenth place finish from over 50 qualifiers from across NSW.
This brings to an end a greatly successful year for the school’s Chess Program team, with coach Mr Craig Ainsworth proud that this calendar year the squad recorded six Lower North Coast tournament victories.
“The Girls team finished second in NSW, not to mention the open side winning the school’s sixth straight North Coast Championship title along the way to 2016 NSW Country Championship,” he said.
“The program has been undefeated on the Lower North Coast now for fourteen years. They have a record that would be the envy on any competitive sports program”.