Hard work pays off for Ja’s youngest women’s chess champion

Jamaica’s youngest-ever national women’s chess champion, 14 year-old Gabriella Watson, says constant training and keeping focused helped her to rewrite Jamaica’s chess history this month.

Competing in her first women’s championships, Watson finished the competition with a perfect score.

However, she said her victory in the national championships did not come easy.

“I have been playing for almost eight years,” she said. “I had to do many training sessions with my coach (Deborah Richards Porter), as well as analyse games of my opponents.”

Watson, who attends the Immaculate Conception High School, said she has chosen to play chess because it is relaxing and enjoyable, but she never saw herself creating history in the sport locally.

“It felt very cool. I never thought I could accomplish something like that, so it is definitely a confidence booster,” she said.

Her coach from the R&D Chess Academy, Richards Porter, said she was very happy with Watson’s victory, as the young champion’s hard work paid off.

“Naturally, I was very happy for her, she had been putting in the work, so I’m pleased that it paid off,” Richards Porter said. “She has been training consistently, so most of the preparation during the event was about employing techniques to keep her settled, focused, and in the right frame of mind to perform at her best.”

Watson who has represented Jamaica before at junior events, is now preparing for the 44th Chess Olympiad in Chennai, India, which will be staged from July 28 to August 10 this year.

Porter said she is expecting her to do well.

“The Olympiad will provide very good learning experience for her, and I’m sure she will perform above her rating,” she said.

The tournament committee chairman, Warren Elliott, has also predicted that the Jamaican team will do well at the Olympiad.

“I expect them to perform really well as they’ll be training leading up to the Olympiad and they are very confident,” he said.

He said although the COVID-19 pandemic affected the federation and the players, careful planning and effective measures helped them to keep the sport active.

“The Jamaica Chess Federation acted proactively and started to host the regular tournaments online,” he said. “We reached our membership through digital communications and kept the sport active. Ironically, chess boomed during the pandemic, as it was able to be played online with almost similar rules and format,” Elliott said.

The women’s team to the Chess Olympiad will also include Nickaylah Curwin and Kaia Gayle, who were second and third, respectively, at the championship, Rachel Miller and Adani Clarke.

Shreyas Smith, who successfully defended his men’s national absolute title; second-placed Jaden Shaw; Jhustice McDonald, who placed third; Joshua Christie and Malaku Lorne will be the members of the men’s team.