2015 ANU Chess Festival comes to an end

The 2015 ANU Chess Festival wrapped up today with the final event, the ANU Secondary Schools Championship. 22 teams took part in this event, meaning that over the 2 week period of the Festival, 341 players took part in the various events. Numbers were up in all events from last year (by around 25% on average) so I would consider this years festival a big success.
Here is a list of the winners from each of the events:

• ACT Teams Blitz - ANU Scholars (Harry Press, Miles Patterson)
• ANU Open - IM Andrew Brown
• ANU Minor - Nohrval Valle
• ANU Primary Schools Teams - Kaleen Primary
• ANU Secondary Schools Teams - Lyneham High School

The ANU Chess Festival has now been running for 23 years, and has contributed a great deal to the vibrant ACT chess scene. A number of strong players have played in the ANU Schools competition including homegrown IM's Andrew Brown and Junta Ikeda. In fact there are now some second generation players starting to pop up, and even a couple of school teachers first attended the event when still in short pants.
The Open itself generally provides an opportunity for local players to develop there skills. While not quite at the size of the Doeberl Cup, there is still enough 'starch' in the field to provide a stern test. And the blitz championship (now in its third year) is a fun/serious event for the speedier players.
Such an event could not take place without significant help from the chess community. Special mention should go to Shun Ikeda (Festival Director), Paul Dunn (Festival Treasurer), Cam Cunningham (ACTCA President) and Mirabelle Guo, who put in a huge amount of work to make the event a success.
Next year the organisers are looking to make some small improvements to the events (schedule changes, and a bit of extra prize money), so keep your calendars free for the last weekend in July 2016!