This weekend I had the pleasure of attending the 2nd Annual Susan Polgar Foundation’s North American All Girls Championship held by Bay Area Chess at the beautiful Biltmore Hotel in Santa Clara, California. As always, Grandmaster Susan Polgar was very personable with all the girls in attendance. The huge efforts by Chief TD Martha Underwood and organizer Judit Sztaray made this tournament a delight to attend. Hopefully this tradition will continue in the Bay Area. It is wonderful to see so many girls (including my own) playing in a such a unique chess tournament.
Chris Torres is a nationally renowned scholastic chess coach working in the San Francisco Bay Area. His classes have attracted players of strengths ranging from rank beginners to world champions. A chess professional since 1998, Chris is widely recognized as one of the main driving forces behind the explosion in popularity and sudden rise in quality of scholastic chess in California. Chris Torres served as the President of the Torres Chess and Music Academy from 2005-2020 and currently is recognized as a correspondence chess master with the United States Chess Federation. Since 1998 Chris Torres has taught 6 individual national champions as well as led multiple school teams to win national championship titles. In addition, Chris Torres has directed and taught at 10 different schools which have been California State Champions at chess. In 2011 and 2012, several former and current students of Chris Torres have been selected to represent the United States at the World Youth Chess Championships. Mr. Torres’ hobbies include playing classical guitar and getting his students to appear on the national top 100 chess rating lists.
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