Albany 7th Grader Competing In International Chess Championship
I'll start this by saying, I wasn't the best student.
History wasn't my thing. I failed math...twice. I don't even know if I've ever watched anyone play chess, let alone know how to play it.
What I'm trying to say is, I'm incredibly jealous of Martha Samadashvili, a 12-year old girl from Albany who is literally representing the entire country right now in this international chess championship.
The championship goes over the course of two weeks in Batumi, Georgia.
Here's something else I didn't know, there are chess coaches. No, for real. Martha has a chess coach, his name is Bill Matters and after she beat out a Polish competitor earlier today he told the Times Union, "We finally got her mentally into her 'No Mercy Martha' fighting-zone and that took several rounds to get her there. Under the stress of a world championship, every draw and every loss is a wildly emotional event."
You might wonder what goes into the prep for a chess match, well, Martha has been preparing with her coach now for over a year. You play and play and play and test out techniques and moves and like anything else, sometimes they work, sometimes they don't. Plus, some of these games can get intense. The game on Sunday, that got her into the international championship last 5 hours!
She has another week of competing with girls 12 and under in the championships and we wish her all the luck!
Check and mate! Wait...is that chess or checkers? *shrug*