The annual Christmas Dinner was held on Nov. 29 in the beautiful Georgian dining room of the United Arts Club. Chef Anthony O'Grady served up a wonderful traditional Christmas feast. This was followed by presentation of the Club Championship Trophy to Daniel Otero winner of the senior section of the Club's Summer Tournament.
​A well attended enjoyable night - the pictures, courtesy of Ross O'Mullane, tell the tale.

Committee for 2019-20
The 2019 AGM was held on Nov. 13 in the Club. The discussion of some lively topics was followed by the election of the Committee for the 2019-20 season. The following outgoing officers and members were re-elected:
President; Eddie O’Connor, Hon. Sec. Rory Broderick, Hon. Treasurer; Ronan Nolan, Martin Schmidt, Joe Durkan & Daniel Otero. These are joined by new Committee members Robert Murtagh, Vihanga Gamage & Andy Whelan. 
Blitz Event
The AGM concluded with a blitz competition with Daniel Otero winning the senior section and Denis Dempsey the junior one.
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A blitz event for members and friends was held on Sept. 18. As shown in the photo below it was a busy night with the entrants filling the club room to capacity

The Senior section winner was Luca Varriale a strong chess player with a rating of 2200 who was visiting from Italy. He is shown holding his prize on the right in the following picture with runner-up Mark Collins in the middle and blitz organiser Rory on the left.

The Junior section was won by new member Darren McLean, playing in his first competition in the club and shown below proudly holding his prize.

Due to the large number of entries (24) the Summer Tournament this year was run in three separate sections - starting in May and finishing in September. All played all in each section on a round robin basis.
Daniel Martinez Otero was the winner of the Senior section with a fine result of 5.5/6.
Patrick Spillane won the Intermediate section, winning all his games to finish on 7/7.
The Junior section finished with Dylan Higgins and Andy Whelan both on 5/6. So a play-off was needed in which Dylan prevailed.
​The prizes will be presented at the Club Christmas Dinner planned for Nov. 29.

This Autumn course has been cancelled but may be run again in 2020. 
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​A new members' night was held in the Club on April 24. This followed an influx of eight new players who had recently joined. The occasion allowed them to meet each other and the more long standing members and to learn about the Club's history.
Club President Eddie O'Connor gave a brief talk on the Club's long history and this was followed by a chess blitz graded into two sections each of eight players.
The higher section was won by Daniel Martinez Otero but not without having to triumph over the other Daniel (Schlachter) in a series of play-offs as both had finished on 5.5/8. The other section also resulted in ties for first place between John Baragwanath, Dave Hunter and visitor Adrienne. As time had run out no play-offs took place and John took the modest prize.
The evening finished with refreshments in the bar which concluded a very enjoyable evening.

Chess lessons are being offered again for those interested in improving at this game. The course will be run by club member Daniel Martinez Otero who is a highly rated player and experienced chess instructor. These lessons are for players of 18 years or older who know the basic rules of chess. It is recommended for unrated players and those with a rating below 1500.
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Venue: The venue is Dublin Chess Club (United Arts Club at 3, Upper Fitzwilliam St., Dublin 2). Our room (Room No. 9) is located on the top floor of the building.

Structure: 13 lessons of 2 hours each on the following dates:
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​If you are not able to attend some of the lessons, the materials will be provided through email.
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Extras:

• More exercises of the topic covered in the lesson will be provided after each lesson.
• A group in www.chess.com will be created where students can play positions related to what is covered in the lesson.

Price: The cost of attending the course is shown in the table below. This is equivalent to a very reasonable €7.7 per hour including the extras above. A 10% discount is available for Dublin Chess Club (DCC) or United Arts Club (UAC) members, even if you only join the club at the start of the course.

​An introductory talk free of charge will be provided on the 5th of February at 19:00.
If you are interested please contact Daniel Martinez Otero at daniotero93@gmail.com or Tel. 083 8477712 (Whatssap if possible).

The Club's Annual Christmas Dinner was held on Nov. 30 in the United Arts Club dining room. Some 30 guests, which included spouses and partners of members, had a very enjoyable evening in the Georgian ambiance of this beautiful room.
​Special guests at the dinner were Kaye O'Mullane widow of recently deceased member Brian and Denis Dempsey with his wife Joan. This year Denis attained 50 years membership of the Club. He was presented with an engraved chess ornament from the Club to mark the occasion.

Prizes for the Club's Summer Tournament were also presented after the dinner. Eddie O'Connor presented Ronan Nolan with the Senior Section winner's trophy and Patrick Spillane with the Junior Section winner's trophy.

The Annual General Meeting of the Club was held on Nov. 14 in the club premises. The meeting considered new club rules which had been drafted by the Committee as the old rules were now out-dated. The new rules, with one amendment, were passed with unanimous approval.
The other main business at the AGM was the election of the Officers and Committee  with the following team appointed:
​President: Eddie O’Connor, Hon. Secretary: Rory Broderick, Hon. Treasurer: Ronan Nolan,
Committee members: Martin Schmidt, Joe Durkan, Nezar Ammari, Daniel Schlachter, Patrick Spillane and Daniel Otero.
Following the AGM, a blitz event was held with Daniel Otero winning the Senior Section and Ronan Nolan successful in the Junior Section.

The senior and junior sections of the tournament finished on Aug. 30. There was a clear winner in each section with no need for play-offs.
Congratulations to the Senior winner Ronan Nolan with a fine score of 5/6 and the Junior winner Patrick Spillane who was unbeaten with a very impressive score of 6/6.
A total of 48 matches were played in the tournament over the summer and the competitors deserve credit for participating and arranging their own matches.
The tournament prizes will be presented at our Christmas dinner.