My chess in 2026:

First, the Australian Junior Championship starts tomorrow in Canberra at St Edmunds College. I won't be in Canberra, but will be working with many Tasmanian juniors who are playing.

I have also dumped chess dot com, and am moving fully to lichess.org. They had a question to answer about why I have decided to leave, and my response was "I don't want to buy American products". Of course, I might rejoin later if the USA comes out of this Orwellian freakishness, but then again, I doubt it.

I will play in a tournament in Hobart but I am debating whether to stop playing internationally rated chess as I have a lot of issues with the current International chess federation. I'm loathe to do this, as I believe that the organisation is fine for running chess, but the personnel in charge are toxic at the moment. I'll have about a month to debate before the Tasmanian Championships happen, here in Launceston.

#chess #Australia #Canberra #tasmania #lutruwita @lichess #lichess