Why Tri-Bridges Chess Club

Founded on the idea of the traditional community chess club (e.g. Marshall in New York City, Mechanics Institute in San Francisco), Tri-Bridges strives to be of use to all chess players in the community. For some, this means teaching how to move the pieces and getting kids excited about the game. For others this means teaching them about concepts like forks, pins, and skewers, so they can do better in tournaments. We have various guest lecturers and lectures on subjects ranging from attack to zugzwang. Finally, some need one on one lessons and we have space for people to take private lessons if the main area is being used.
For the serious and beginning tournament players, we run a variety of tournaments/matches, from the fun and frivolous (bughouse and blitz) to serious events for youngsters such as standard G/25, d5 tournament. We even have longer events for the adults and up and coming strong young players and do occasional team events of varying types ..
Just as we have various guest lecturuers, we will have other events such as simuls, when very strong players come and play games against a bunch of people at once. We host various other events through the year.
Finally, we are the only organization in the area with significant library. We have over 1500 bound volumes and periodicals (lending privileges are available), and the books range from late 1800s to current (some volumes are not allowed to leave the building) with more puzzles than anyone can do in a lifetime and many books with various and original opening ideas. ¬¬¬¬
All of these are great reason to come and visit the club, but here is another. While many clubs at states will put players in the section that is best for the club, we have always told players to play in the section that is best for them. In spite of doing this, we have tied for first in at least once section every year for the past 4 years.
For the last 7 years our club has met to serve the community by teaching chess, running chess tournaments, and encouraging people to enjoy the game! We hope you come and join us.

Just as our facility allows for almost every type of chess experience, my experience is varied:
As a chess player, I have tied for first in the Reserve Section of the Pennsylvania State Championship (1995), played in 4 Pan-American Collegiate Chess Championships, finishing on teams that regularly came in around the top 5, including a 3rd place finish in 1993. I am currently in the top 10% of all players in US Chess.
As a teacher, I have taught classes and camps for over a decade including the 2014 Pennsylvania Elementary School Champions – Skyview Elementary. I have also had schools adjust their schedule so that I could teach at their school. I have taught over 100 private students in the last decade. Several have been state champions, such as Shawn Wang and Aneesh Raparla. I currently have numerous former students on the Top 100 lists including Shawn Wang and Jack Lieberman. Their experiences with me not only taught them a great deal but provided them with the foundation they needed to continue working on improving long after they stopped working directly with me.
As a tournament director and organizer, I am one of just a handful of Senior level tournament directors in the state of Pennsylvania. I have directed over 200 hundred tournaments and well over 550 sections. Since 2009, I have directed (and organized over the last few years) the Holly Heisman Memorial, one of the largest yearly charity events in the country.
As a chess journalist and scholar, I have been President of the Chess Journalists of America for the past five years and Chief Coordinating Judge of the Chess Journalists of America Awards for seven of the past eight years. I have won national awards for Best Feature Article – 2018 and Best Historic Article – 2019. Currently I am under contract with McFarland Publishing for a book about the Byrne brothers, contemporaries of Bobby Fischer. I occasionally help US Chess with special projects of a historical nature (such as digitizing their 80-year run of Chess Life.) I am also leading a joint Chess Journalists of America/ U.S. Chess Trust/World Chess Hall of Fame project to collect oral histories of older U.S. Chess players.