Canada continues to suck at World Youth
SPRAGGETT ON CHESS
Ok, so remember that this year (2012) the 28 Canadian representatives achieved 2 top-ten results. And 15 representatives scored 50% or more.
IN 2008, Canada sent 24 representatives; there were 3 (three) top ten-results. And 14 scored 50% or more. Including Jonah Lee who achieved a wonderul 7th place finish in U8 section with7.5 pts out of 11 games.
IN 2009, Canada sent 21 representatives. Richard Wang was number 3 (three) in the U12 section, which was Canada’s ONLY top-ten position that year. Future GM Eric Hansen was 16th in the U18, but already sported an impressive 2404 elo rating. Twelve of the 21 Canadians scored 50% or more.
Jason Cao won the U10 in 2010. In 2011 he did not participate. This year Jason returned to the WYCC, but only scored 50% in the U12 section.
IN 2011, 40 Canadian representatives. Four (4) top-ten results, but only 8 (eight) scored 50% or more. One even lost ALL of her games.
This year India and Russia stood out for collecting the most number of medals, 8 each! Congrats! This can mostly be understood as being the result of a deliberate promotion of the game amongst the countries’ youth. In Russia chess is the national sport and India has the actual world title holder (Vishy Anand).
But how does one explain the result of the American team? Four medals (!!) for a country that does not place much importance or prestige on chess is quite remarkable. No doubt the abundance of school-chess programs and chess foundations goes far to explain this year’s excellent result. The USCF sent 89 representatives to Slovenia (India sent 55). There are some very wealthy chess foundations in the US (some that contain tens of millions of dollars) whose primary focus is on the promotion of chess amongst American youth today. It works!
FINALLY, if you take a close look at Canada’s results since 2003 at the World Youth Chess Championship (WYCC) you will find that most of Canada’s chess youth stop participating in the WYCC before the age of 18. This year Canada sent ONLY one male (unrated!) and one female (rated less than 1600) to the U18 category. Both scored poorly. Where were the others? What is more, in some previous years at the WYCC there absolutely were NO Canadian representatives to the U18!
WHAT HAS HAPPENED? I think that years of poor (negligent) WYCC management by the CFC has resulted in most of the youngsters soon enough coming to realize that because of their basic lack of chess qualifications, years of lack of training and a COMPLETE absence of any rigorous qualification standards, they simply can NOT compete with the 18-year olds from other countries. And no doubt they grow tired of losing…every year their opponents from other countries are getting stronger.
