Wolmer’s Boys’ on top in National High School Chess Champs

WOLMERS’ Boys’ ‘A’ team are the champions of the National High Schools Chess Championships for 2025 contested over two days and six rounds at Calabar High School.

Wolmers’ dominated the field from the preliminary round in which they scored a perfect 20 wins from 20 games across four boards, while in the finals they had 16 wins, six drawn games and two losses, again across four boards. Second went to defending champions Campion College ‘A’, third was St Catherine High School ‘A’, fourth was the top seed St Jago High school ‘A’, with Manning’s ‘A’ rounding out the top five.

St Jago High School ladies’ team won the award for the top all girls team, having achieved the distinction of making the national finals in which they placed 22nd from a field of 24 teams that contested the finals. Regional team awards were won by Titchfield High School for Northeast, Green Island High School for the Western region, St Jago High School for the Middlesex region, and Campion College for all the Kingston and St Andrew contested teams.

Top board awards went to Fide Master (FM) Jaden Shaw of Wolmer’s Boys’ School for board one, perfect on 6/6 points; Corbin Harvey of Wolmer’s Boys’ School for board two, 5.5/6 points; Brian Thompson of Glenmuir High School for board three, perfect 6/6 points; Khatroy Cato of St Jago High school for board four, 4.5/6 points, with the top reserve award going to Aaron McKoy of Campion College, 3/3 points.

Winning team captain for Wolmer’s Boys ‘A’ team, FM Jaden Shaw shared, “we won because we worked as a team all season, supporting each other each step of the journey”. He dedicated the win to the entire Wolmer’s schools community that will be celebrating its 296th anniversary on May 21, 2025.

The National High School Campionships is a Jamaica Chess Federation annual event, contested by 70 schools islandwide in six zones, with the top two teams automatically advancing to the grand finals and the next 12 teams advancing from a play-off of the remaining teams.