FIDE Mas­ter (FM) Joshua John­son and Women Can­di­date Mas­ter (WCM) Ysvett Her­moso Ro­driguez were named the T&T Chess As­so­ci­a­tion "Sports­man and Sports­woman of the Year" at the as­so­ci­a­tion's end-of-year prize-giv­ing cer­e­mo­ny on De­cem­ber 22 at the Cas­ca­dia Ho­tel and Con­fer­ence Cen­tre in St Ann's, Port-of-Spain.

Shar­ing the spot­light that day were Joshua Med­i­na (CM Con­di­tion­al) and Zara La Fleur (WCM Con­di­tion­al), who were pre­sent­ed the re­spec­tive youth ver­sions of the awards for their per­for­mances at both lo­cal and in­ter­na­tion­al events as well as their con­tri­bu­tion to the de­vel­op­ment of the sport of chess.

TTCA pres­i­dent Son­ja John­son was pleased by her as­so­ci­a­tion's ac­com­plish­ments through­out the year say­ing: “2023 re­sult­ed in the TTCA re­sum­ing its full cal­en­dar of ac­tiv­i­ties since the COVID-19 pe­ri­od. I am al­so very en­cour­aged by some of the chess tal­ent that is emerg­ing with­in the com­mu­ni­ty as well as the per­for­mances from some of the cur­rent pool of top tal­ents who demon­strat­ed that they were will­ing to lev­el up in 2023 and pro­duce some great per­for­mances.

"We are al­so thank­ful for the many per­sons who served as ar­biters, train­ers, or­gan­is­ers, vol­un­teers over the pe­ri­od which al­lowed all of our events to be a suc­cess.

"Fi­nal­ly, I am ho­n­oured to work with my cur­rent ex­ec­u­tive team who bring dif­fer­ent at­trib­ut­es to the ta­ble that al­low us to func­tion ef­fec­tive­ly. Chess is on a growth path, and we look for­ward to the wider com­mu­ni­ty and stake­hold­ers to join us on this jour­ney!”

John­son and Ro­driguez were in dom­i­nant form last year, start­ing off at the Na­tion­al Chess Cham­pi­onships Women (Ju­ly 29 - Au­gust 6) and Ab­solute (Sep­tem­ber 9-30).

The top men's play­er emerged as the new na­tion­al chess cham­pi­on with a score of 9.5/11 points at the re­turn of the Na­tion­al Cham­pi­onships af­ter four years at the Cas­ca­dia Ho­tel.

Ro­driguez al­so thrived at the event as she was crowned na­tion­al women’s cham­pi­on with a score of 8.5/9.

At the Na­tion­al Blitz Chess Cham­pi­onships which took place on Oc­to­ber 14 at St Joseph’s Con­vent Her­itage Hall, both play­ers ex­celled. John­son came away as the na­tion­al Blitz cham­pi­on, scor­ing 6.5 out of 7 to win his sev­enth ti­tle in this for­mat while Ro­driguez was the new women's cham­pi­on. She scored 5.5 /7 for the win.

The fol­low­ing week­end (Oc­to­ber 21-22), John­son just missed out on an­oth­er ti­tle at the Na­tion­al Rapid Chess Cham­pi­onships. The com­pe­ti­tion saw the re­turn of for­mer na­tion­al cham­pi­on CM Rav­ishen Singh who copped the ti­tle on tie break with 7/9 points. John­son and FM Quinn Cabralis were al­so tied on 7/9 points but came in sec­ond and third, re­spec­tive­ly, on tie break.

Zara La Fleur al­so tast­ed suc­cess at the event, cop­ping the top fe­male prize to be­come na­tion­al women’s rapid cham­pi­on with a score of 6/9.

At the awards cer­e­mo­ny, the win­ners of the Na­tion­al Swiss Chess Cham­pi­onships were al­so recog­nised.

Over two week­ends (No­vem­ber 18-19 and No­vem­ber 25-26) at the Cas­ca­dia Ho­tel, the Na­tion­al Swiss Chess Cham­pi­onships Ab­solute and Women were held and saw some com­pet­i­tive matchups. La Fleur was crowned the new na­tion­al Swiss fe­male cham­pi­on with a score of 5 out of 5 points and the na­tion­al Ab­solute Swiss cham­pi­on was Isa­iah Mc In­tosh, who scored 6.5 /7.

Al­so mak­ing a re­turn to the TTCAA cal­en­dar was the Na­tion­al Se­nior Chess Cham­pi­onships for 50 and 65-plus play­ers. The event, which took place al­so over two week­ends (De­cem­ber 2-3 and De­cem­ber 16-17) at the South­ern Chess Club in San Fer­nan­do at­tract­ed some of the coun­try's top vet­er­ans.

FIDE Ar­biter (FA) Rod­er­ick Noel emerged as the na­tion­al 65-plus cham­pi­on and the na­tion­al 50-plus cham­pi­on was Ian Ali.