The age of the Nerd is dead in chess.
If it's not, it's certainly wheezing its last asthmatic breathes. That's obvious after spending a few hours watching the
Whatcom County Scholastic Chess Championships on a cold and wet day in January.
Of the more than 150 participants at the K-12 Whatcom County Championship, there are no pocket protectors, no thick black
glasses with white tape in the middle, no high-wasted pants to be found.
Call it the Harry Potterization of America -- a time when being smart is the new cool. It's a time when spectacles and high
grade-point averages are the new leather jackets or bellbottoms of decades past.
It's a time for a game like chess to thrive.
So what is it about Whatcom County that has some kids thinking about Kasparov and Castling the same way they think about long
boarding and Xbox?
"All of those stereo types that people associate with chess are gone," said Washington High School Chess Association board
member Randy Walther while knowingly pushing an imaginary pair of glasses off his nose. "You don't see any pocket protectors
around here. These are just normal kids. It isn't a certain type of person that plays chess. We have swimmers, wrestlers, all
types of kids. The old days are gone."
BOARD GAMES
There's an upset taking shape at board three, and Walther, a coach at both Sedro-Woolley and Sehome high schools, is doing
his best to suppress the broad grin that's beginning to curl across his lips.
Dustin Smith, a student at Sedro-Woolley High School and one of the players Walther coaches on the Cubs' chess team, has set
himself up to beat one of the best high school players in the area.
Smith, with stringy red hair hanging out from under the hood of his black zip-up, looks more punk than buttoned-down chess
player. With ear buds planted on his head and a 1,000-yard stare, he’s got his opponent worried.
There are certain things that happen during the course of a usual chess match — an early attempt to control the middle of the
board, a sequence of attacks, and then some basic endgame strategy. Beating an opponent rated four or five hundred points
higher isn't one of them.
In this case, on paper at least, the game should be a mismatch. Thomas Witecki, a skilled and experienced player with a
rating of 1,520 should be easily handling Smith, who checked into the tournament with a rating of 1,061. In other words, if
this was a kung-fu movie, Smith would be a lucky to come out alive.
"The ratings start to mean a little less when there's more pressure," Walther said. "When you play matches in a situation
like this, anything can happen."
As the other games around them start to finish, a small crowd of players gathers around the board where Smith and Witecki, a
ninth grader at Lynden High School, are sitting. It's an interested bunch, eyeing the action with concern while attempting to
appear unenthused as they hover over both players' shoulders.
Even without the ubiquitous energy drinks within arms reach, there's still a palpable liveliness.
Brows crinkle in the crowd as Smith fingers a bishop. Other players nod when he taps the game clock to single his move is complete. Though there's more than enough room inside the Expo Hall at the Northwest Washington Fairgrounds, things are starting to close in on Witecki.
GAINING IN POPULARITY
For the better part of the last decade, chess in Whatcom County has enjoyed a relevance and resurgence that is usually
reserved for larger cities and metro areas.
At any given time, several hundred school-aged children and young adults are signed up to play organized chess at high
schools, middle schools and elementary schools throughout the area.
With as many as 100 players competing at the high school level, the Northwest High School League is the second largest in the
state in terms of participants behind only the Seattle Metro area, Walther said.
"I kind of see chess following the same trajectory as soccer has for young people in the U.S.." said Randy Kaech, who formed
the Northwest High School League in 1998 and serves as its director. "It's a very popular game in Europe, and it's gaining in
popularity here, sort of the same way soccer has."
The Internet, of course, has played a large role, bringing relatively high-level, competitive chess to the masses at an
inexpensive cost, just a few clicks of a mouse. Nostalgia, fueled by the chess craze of the 1970s that swept the nation when
Bobby Fischer was making headlines, could be another factor.
All of it adds up to the continued mainstreaming of a sport that was once largely thought of as a pastime for brainiacs.
"Bobby Fischer sent a big ripple through the chess community and brought a lot of players to the game in the 1970s," Kaech
said. "Now a lot of those players that came to the game are parents. Part of the growth in today's game could be the result
of the influence of those parents who played when they were young."
THE LYNDNE INFLUENCE
Opportunity is another reason for the growth of the game in Whatcom County, and nowhere in the area is there a stronger chess
base than in Lynden.
In a town known mostly for its raspberries, dairy farms and Dutch heritage, chess is supported both financially and
culturally. Lynden boasts perhaps the only trust fund in the United States established specifically to encourage chess play
among its school-aged residence -- the Theresa Tromp Foundation -- and it is also home to one of the larger online chess
supply stores in the nation, The Chess House.
"The opportunities that young players in Lynden have are definitely unique," said Theodore Neff, who sits on the board of the
Tromp Foundation. "And it's mostly because of the Theresa Tromp Foundation."
Each April the Theresa Tromp Foundation holds a prize-money tournament in which school-aged players from Lynden can win as
much as $1,200. The foundation, established by the late Mrs. G.A. Lonnquist in the 1970s, also helps fund tournaments for
kids in Whatcom County throughout the year.
"It's possible that this is largest cash-prize tournament in the nation for young players, and it is right here in Lynden,"
Neff said.
The Neff family is another reason for chess' high-profile in Lynden. Theodore's brother, Elliott Neff, is a United States
Chess Federation National Master who has opened a chess school in Bellevue called Chess4Life. Along with sitting on the board
of the Tromp Foundation, Theodore also helps organize many of the tournaments around Whatcom County.
Their younger brothers operate The Chess House, which Theodore and Elliott purchased with money earned from playing in the
Tromp Foundation Tournaments while in high school. Elliott is perhaps best known around the area for putting on chess playing
exhibitions while blindfolded at the Northwest Washington Fair.
The family, along with people like Kaech and Walther, has been instrumental in keeping interest in chess elevated.
"The Neffs are a chess dynasty in Lynden," said Tami Blankers, whose two sons play chess at Lynden Christian. "When you talk
about chess in Lynden, that's the name that comes up."
SCHOOL DAYS
Though more and more players are staying with the game through middle and high school, the highest number of school-aged
players in Whatcom County remains in grades K-6.
The allure for younger players is simple — it's a game with basic rules that most can pick up quickly and have fun playing.
For parents, it's a game that engages a child’s mind.
Several studies have shown that learning to play chess at a young age can help children improve their reasoning and
mathematical skills. One of the most often cited studies on the benefits of chess was done by Dr. Robert Ferguson in the
early 1980s at a school for gifted students in Bradford, Pa.
Ferguson performed a five-year study of seventh, eighth, and ninth graders comparing students who played chess to students
who took part in other mentally stimulating activities such as creative writing or computer-based problem solving.
He found that the average annual increase on critical thinking tests among the chess players was 17.4 percent, while it was
only 4.56 percent for the other groups.
"It's a little like the Mozart Effect where studies have found that music can help stimulate the brains of babies and
toddlers," Kaech said. "Several studies have shown that chess helps with problem solving, that it's really something that
helps with learning."
Learning to be coached is something else students can take away from the game. At the Whatcom County Scholastic Chess
Championships Walther moves around the Expo Hall, going from table to table, game to game, talking with the younger players
if they have a question or peaking in on the older players' matches to check the action.
He's one of several coaches on hand at the tournament, including Bert Rutgers who coaches Lynden High School and works at
Chess4Life, and Peter Witecki, who coaches at Assumption Catholic School in Bellingham.
The players get in the act, too. Discussing theory and diagramming successful moves and gambits with each other is common
place following matches.
"One of the neatest things is watching how the kids interact after matches," Blankers said. "They'll sit down and show each
how they set up something or talk about strategy. It doesn't matter if the players are from different schools. In what other
sport does something like that happen?"
WHY THEY PLAY THE GAME
As with anything where a score is kept, eventually a player's competitive nature starts to take form.
As the day wears on it becomes clear the tournament won't belong to Smith. After defeating Witecki in round two he pulls off
another upset in round three. Then he starts to struggle.
Playing for sole possession of first place against Lynden Christian’s Terren Honcoop, he makes a bad decision and gives a
rook away. It sets up a string of events that sends him to his first defeat of the tournament. The loss drops Smith out of
top 3. He eventually finishes sixth with three matches won.
Honcoop, who spends most of the tournament stone-faced, goes on to wins four of his five matches and then takes first place
based on a tie-breaker. He had to pull off a few upsets of his own to take the title. He's a good player, but with a 1,165
rating, not the most highly regarded at the tournament. It's the competition that draws him to sport.
"It's about winning," Honcoop said. "You play to win."
Something he doesn't do, though, is play to brag. With a face that would make a poker player jealous, Honcoop talks about how
he'll celebrate with his friends.
"I don't tell them I play chess," Honcoop said. "I don't want people to know I do this."
Reach Joe Sunnen at joe.sunnen@bellinghamherald.com or 756-2862.