The January Action Challenge – Wednesday, January 8th at 6 pm Eastern Time (5 pm CT, 4 pm MT, or 3 pm PT)
We encourage players to complete the registration process and join the tournament online before 5:45 pm ET. If you're late to the tournament you could end up missing round 1!
• Anyone can participate, regardless of geographical location.
• This tournament will feature Swiss pairings. There will be three rounds.
• This tournament will be USCF-online regular rated! An active USCF membership is required. You can join the USCF or renew an expired USCF membership at this link: https://new.uschess.org/become-member
• Before signing up for the tournament, please register for a lichess.org account (it's free!) if you do not have an existing account. Please provide your lichess username in the "Online Username" field when you complete the registration form. If you have any issues try watching this video about how to register an account on lichess: https://www.
• START TIME: The tournament will begin at 6 pm Eastern Standard Time (5 pm CT, 4 pm MT, or 3 pm PT) and end sometime around 8:30 or 9 pm Eastern Standard Time at the latest. In many cases, the tournament will finish much earlier than this.
• There will one section for this tournament. Players of all levels from beginner to advanced are welcome to participate. This tournament is open to kids and adults. We have prizes based on age (see below).
• Trophies: Trophies for 1st place, top K-12, and top K-5. To be eligible for grade-based prizes, make sure to fill out the "grade (scholastic)" field in the registration form below. Tiebreaks are calculated based on the Sonneborn–Berger method, after which we use lichess performance ratings as a secondary tiebreak. 1st-place trophies are always awarded to players with a perfect score, even in the event of a tie. If a player in grades K-5 wins the top K-12 prize, no separate K-5 trophy will be awarded, as one player cannot win multiple prizes. Likewise, if a K-12 player wins 1st, there will be no separate K-12 prize. If a K-5 players wins 1st, there will be no K-5 or K-12 prize awarded. Trophies will be mailed. If you live outside of the contiguous United States, we might not be able to mail your trophy due to the increased shipping costs for international orders (or we may ask the foreign player to pay a shipping fee).
• The time control will be game in 25 minutes with a 5-second increment. There will be three rounds.
• There are no predetermined round times after the first round. Rounds will start as soon as possible after all the games have ended.
• Online computer analysis of all games will be possible immediately after the tournament! See our video about how to analyze your games on lichess: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tv1Kx0yEM10
• Entry fee: $15 by Tuesday 1/7/2025 11:59 pm ET, $20 on Wednesday 1/8/2025
• After you register, you will receive an email from us with instructions on how to join the tournament online. If you don't receive the email, please check your spam folder.
• Questions? Contact DMV Chess at 703-415-6600 or tournaments@dmvchess.com
DMV Chess also offers online courses for scholastic players and private lessons for both children and adults. For more information, please visit dmvchess.com/courses-overview
Don't forget to check out our online summer camps for scholastic players! For more information, please visit dmvchess.com/camps-overview