Announcing: Finals of ChessKid Speed Chess Championship of India!

The Chesskid Speed Chess Championship of India finals will be held on Friday, March 13. 
Friday the 13th sounds spooky but this time it will be different as six lucky kids will be winning the grand prize of a paid trip to a :Meet & Greet with Indian superstar GM Viswanathan Anand."

Five-time world champion Vishy Anand has been ChessKid's Chief Mentor of India since July 2019. Anand has been a huge influence for all chess players in India (including yours truly!) and this unique prize will be a lifetime memory for all kids.

The event can be followed on Chess.com/TV. ChessKid's Chief Chess Officer FM Mike Klein and ChessKid India's Director of Marketing and Ops, IM Rakesh Kulkarni (yours truly) will be your commentators for the evening. You can follow all the live-action on Chess.com/TV at 7 pm local time IST, 5:30 am PST, 8:30 am EST and 2:30 pm CET.

ChessKid had earlier conducted the preliminary stage of the championship from January 15-19, 2020.

More than 500 kids had participated in the qualifiers. Each day had four qualifiers and the top five finishers of every qualifier will be taking part in Friday's finals.

Finals Format:
The finals will be held on the ChessKid Fast Chess live server. The event is a nine-round open Swiss. The top six finishers at the end of nine rounds will punch their ticket to meet Anand. The time control is 5+1 (five minutes plus one-second increment per move) which is the same as the qualifiers in Jan.

Date and time:

On Friday, March 13, The action begins at 7 pm local time in India. ChessKid's Chief Chess Officer FM Mike Klein and ChessKid India's Director of Marketing and Ops, IM Rakesh Kulkarni (yours truly) will be your commentators for the evening.

You can follow all the live-action on Chess.com/TV at 5;30 am PST, 8:30 am EST and 2:30 pm CET.

Grand Prize:
All winners will be contacted by email, so make sure your ChessKid account has a valid email address associated with it.

The date of the Anand meeting is yet to be determined. A nice bonus for the 10 winning ChessKids: You get to bring one parent with you for the occasion, and the prize includes airfare for both of you!

The gathering with Anand will likely be in Chennai and will include games and instruction with India's most famous chess player. Anand was India's first-ever GM, first world junior champion and first world champion...but it remains to be seen who will become first-ever ChessKid Speed Chess Champion of India. Good luck to everyone!