RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

Six years af­ter they start­ed play­ing Chess, the Bal­li­ram Broth­ers of San Fer­nan­do TML Pri­ma­ry School have emerged win­ners of the Trinidad and To­ba­go Chess As­so­ci­a­tion (TTCA) Sec­ond Na­tion­al In­di­vid­ual Pri­ma­ry School Chess Cham­pi­onship.

The com­pe­ti­tion was held last Sat­ur­day at C3 Cen­tre in Corinth, San Fer­nan­do. Fifty -six par­tic­i­pants from 27 schools par­tic­i­pat­ed in the com­pe­ti­tion.

The Bal­li­ram twins Tris­tan and Tay­dan told Guardian Me­dia their goal now is to en­ter more in­ter­na­tion­al tour­na­ments.

Both of them scored 5.5 points each while Alexan­dra Ku­mar of Scar­bor­ough RC Pri­ma­ry School had a score of 5.

Smil­ing as they were giv­en the 2022 Na­tion­al Pri­ma­ry School Cham­pi­on Chal­lenge Tro­phy, the broth­ers said chess had im­proved the qual­i­ty of their aca­d­e­m­ic lives as they con­tin­ued to be straight-A stu­dents in all sub­ject ar­eas.

The twins as well as Aiden Tin­nie and Samaara Ali scored a to­tal of 17 points which earned them the tro­phy.

Cedar Grove Pri­vate Pri­ma­ry had won the com­pe­ti­tion last year but this time, they placed sec­ond to San Fer­nan­do TML with a score of 14.5, thanks to the com­mend­able ef­forts of the Al­lum broth­ers- Adri­an and Do­minic; De­nae Headley and Kar­ish­ma Ram­per­sad. 

The third-place win­ner was Maria Regi­na Grade School which scored 13.5 points. 

The Best Fe­male per­for­mance went to Adaya John­son of Maria Regi­na Grade School. 

Thank­ing play­ers, coach­es, school prin­ci­pals, and par­ents for their con­tin­ued sup­port in keep­ing the sport of chess alive de­spite the chal­lenges of Covid-19, of­fi­cials of the TTCA al­so paid trib­ute to Chief Ar­biter, FA Rod­er­ick Noel, and as­sis­tant ar­biters, David Mar­tin, Keevin James, and TTCA Sec­re­tary Sandy Razark. 

The twins were first en­rolled in a chess class when they were five years old along with their el­der broth­er Luke. 

Their moth­er Tisha Bal­li­ram said the cog­ni­tive skills her chil­dren learned from the game have giv­en them pa­tience, time man­age­ment skills, and an­a­lyt­i­cal think­ing far be­yond their years.

Mul­ti­ple stud­ies have con­firmed that chess im­proves aca­d­e­m­ic per­for­mance, con­cen­tra­tion, log­i­cal think­ing, judg­ment, cre­ativ­i­ty, prob­lem-solv­ing, emo­tion­al in­tel­li­gence, and so­cial skills.

It al­so re­duces anx­i­ety, de­pres­sion, and the risk of get­ting Alzheimer's and de­men­tia as it im­proves brain func­tions.

Prin­ci­pal of San Fer­nan­do TML Wahi­da Mo­hammed-Nar­ine and Stan­dard Five teacher Shaz­ara Mo­hammed com­mend­ed all stu­dents for par­tic­i­pat­ing in the com­pe­ti­tion. All tro­phies are ex­pect­ed to be dis­played at the school as an in­cen­tive for oth­er bud­ding chess play­ers.