In a room normally filled with silence, and the occasional flip of a page, the room is full of laughter, chess pieces clinking together and the exclamation of victory. The Chess Club meets after school in the library from 2:45 p.m. to 4:00 p.m. to play all the different varieties of chess: untimed games, blitz, bullet chess and more. Chess club co-presidents junior Jackson Burrows and sophomore Lucinda Hendrickson are the organizers of the club.
“It’s a really fun way to just spend time after school,” Burrows said. “It’s not so serious. Like it sounds like it might be really boring or intense. But no, we’re mostly just hanging out and having fun.”
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Since his freshman year, Burrows has noticed the club has steadily been gaining members. The club now has about 15 active members. “[It was] definitely smaller when I [first] joined it,” Burrows said. “I think a bunch of new people have been getting into chess lately. And we’ve done a bit more to recruit lately.” Photo by Mason Sajna
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Juniors Max McMahon and Lincoln King debate whether McMhaon had a checkmate or not as chess club co-president Jackson Burrows watches. It ended up being a checkmate, with McMahon as the victor. Photo by Mason Sajna
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Junior and chess club co-president Jackson Burrows taps the chess timer on his phone as he plays against junior Ethan Brown. The phone is used as a timer for each person’s turn, which is dictated by which type of chess game they are playing, such as blitz or bullet. “Your timer only goes down when you’re spending time thinking on a move,” Burrows said. “So if it’s your opponent’s turn, your timer is frozen, and their timer is going and then when they move they’ll hit the timer and they’ll start your time until you move and hit your timer.” Photo by Mason Sajna
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Juniors Max McMahon and Ethan Brown play a type of chess game called bullet. Bullet, compared to other types of chess, is the fastest variant with only one minute of playtime for each person. Out of all of them, it is the least common type of game played at the club. “I think the strongest strategy in bullet is to move very quickly regardless of the quality of the moves,” Burrows said. Photo by Mason Sajna
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Juniors Daniel Au and Ethan Brown pack up after the club, which finishes at 4:00 every Monday. Photo by Mason Sajna
