As the Hinsdale Central Chess Club progresses into the final stages of the season, its members had the opportunity to study under local Grandmaster Mesgen Amanov.

The status of Grandmaster in the chess world is highly regarded; there are approximately one thousand Grandmasters in the world.

Senior Aakaash Meduri, who has filled the position of first board for the club this year, deeply appreciates the lessons that Amanov provided. “Mesgen has made me a better chess player by helping me improve my openings and my positional play in particular. Almost every person who had attended the grandmaster sessions can probably list several ways in which Mesgen has helped them improve,” Meduri said.

Meduri also believes that studying under a Grandmaster will be most beneficial for Central when it comes to the sixth, seventh, and eighth competitors. “I think this is what separates us from most other teams at state. Almost every school had one or two very strong players. But after that, the rest of the team is comparatively weak. Our team is strong because every one of our boards has a good player playing. And this can partly be attributed to Mesgen,”  Meduri said.

Fighting for one of the last competing spots on the team is Senior Alex Nevling. He also feels that a significant portion of the improvements he has made to his chess game can be attributed to Amanov. “He has helped me the most in terms of planning. After you reach the middle-game, the most important skill to have is tactics, followed by planning. It is in planning that his lessons are the most helpful,” Nevling said. After two consecutive years finishing third at the state meet, these lessons could be the extra push necessary to bring home the championship trophy.

For Meduri, the team goal and his personal goal are exactly the same: to win state. “I think winning state for me would be a testament to how much we have worked as a team. Some of the other top schools like Niles North and Whitney Young have a bunch of players on their team who have been playing chess for their whole lives. We have people in our top eight who just started playing chess seriously in high school. So to win state with the great group that we have would be really satisfying,” Meduri said.