11. 2012-K Canadian Junior Chess Championship (Bob Armstrong)

[Vladimir Drkulec]

Let me ask you a simple yes/no question:
Do you want Alexandra Botez to participate at Canadian Junior or not?

Yes. Yes. Yes.

[Christopher Mallon]

Vlad,

Of course, you're entitled to your own opinion...

But did you read the Andrei's post ?
Here it is again:
http://www.chesscanada.info/forum/sh...15440#poststop

Let me ask you a simple yes/no question:
Do you want Alexandra Botez to participate at Canadian Junior or not?

Given that the event starts in two days you say, and the vote on this motion won't even start before that, it's a bit of a moot point wouldn't you say?

[Vladimir Drkulec]

Given that the event starts in two days you say, and the vote on this motion won't even start before that, it's a bit of a moot point wouldn't you say?

Affirmative.

[Ken Craft]

I'll be voting against this motion. I support Hal's "use it or lose it" point of view.

[Hal Bond]

Michael, I am astonished that an opinion stated on this private board can have such retroactive consequences!

As I said, I believe the Junior struggles because the prospective players have already had 10 years of age specific competition. In addition, the Canadian delegation is much smaller - often just the player alone. A third factor is the advancing age of the players - they are moving into career related training at University so the parental budget for extra cirricular learning experiences may be more strained.

By the way it's not just the Junior - look at the U18 categories at the CYCC.

[Michael Barron]

Yes. Yes. Yes.

Thank you, Vlad!

The next question:
What could we do to make Canadian Junior more attractive for our players?

Unfortunately, it's too late for 2012 Canadian Junior...

But we still could make the necessary changes for 2013.

[Michael Barron]

Michael, I am astonished that an opinion stated on this private board can have such retroactive consequences!

As I said, I believe the Junior struggles because the prospective players have already had 10 years of age specific competition. In addition, the Canadian delegation is much smaller - often just the player alone. A third factor is the advancing age of the players - they are moving into career related training at University so the parental budget for extra cirricular learning experiences may be more strained.

By the way it's not just the Junior - look at the U18 categories at the CYCC.

Hal, of course, there are many reasons for the Junior to struggle...
Some we can't change, unfortunately.
But some reasons we can eliminate.

The question is:
What could we do to make Canadian Junior more attractive for our players?

By the way, you could look at the U18 categories at the CYCC as example:
this year we had IM, 4 FMs, including Canadian Junior Champion, Canadian Chess Challenge Champion and BC Closed Champion, North American medalist, 2 members of Canadian Olympic team...

[Ken Craft]

Return it to a round-robin event.

[Fred McKim]

Return it to a round-robin event.

I think the climate has changed from the years when the thought of qualifying for a round-robin event was sufficient to draw the best players from all regions. We don't have the membership base to finance the winner any more.

I think the answer is sponsorship. Of course then a quality round-robin could be held.

[Pierre Dénommée]

If the only question is how to make it appealing, then it is clear that a return to the traditional time slot of December 26th to December 30th would be in order. All juniors in Canada are not in school at this time and almost none are working. Summer is another possibility, but many students do have jobs in the summer. Spring Break is a poor time because even in Quebec, not all schools are breaking in the same week,

The problem that I have faced is that the rental price for a venue is much higher at this time of the year. On my last attempt, the Junior Coordinator told me that the bid was not acceptable because of the prohibitive cost of the venue. The problem is that most non-profits with inexpensive venues to rent are closed at this period of the year and they charge a hefty premium for opening.

Since I have moved away from Montreal, I am now facing another problem which is a lack of accommodations. Irrespective of the price of the venue, the players would have nowhere to stay and we have only a single small restaurant. A shuttle service would be required to moved the players from the hotel to the playing venue. The largest hotel around has a whooping 47 rooms.

Another problem is that the participants to the Junior Championship are mainly local residents. We should find a sponsor to cover the cost of travel. This alone should increase the participation.