05.14.06 Seven thousand handshakes later, the 2006 National Elementary School Championship is over. The kids played their hearts out and there were many thrills and some disappointments. Here are the results from Maine's view of the world.

To see the names of Maine players competing in this event click the following link, click "Advance Entries" in the left margin then click on ME in the "States Represented" category. List of Maine Players

To see the final results of the tournament click on the following link then click "Results" in the left margin. Final Results You can then click "Standings" or "Team Standings."

Final Results: Team

Maine fielded two teams in this year's championship. Deer Isle-Stonington Elementary competed in the K-6 Under 1000 section and the Airline Community School in the K-3 Under 800 section.

Deer Isle-Stonington placed 13th out of thirty-eight teams with 15.5 points. The top point getters from the Deer Isle-Stonington team were as follows:

Hayden Ciomei 4.0
Connor Morey 4.0
Eric Babbitt 4.0
Sam Grindle 3.5

Unfortunately for the Airline School, their four-player team was divided into three sections (K-3 Under 800, K-3 Unrated and K-1 Championship) by the tournament directors. With only two of a possible four students' scores tallying for the Airline, the team placed 50th out of 59 teams.

Andrew Jones 4.0
Haley DeLuca Lowell 3.0

Final Results: Individual

The top scorer from Maine was Matthew Fishbein of Cape Elizabeth with 5 points. Matthew placed 23rd out of 307 players in the K-3 Under 800 section.

K-6 U1000:

Hayden Ciomei 4.0, 61st of 202
Conner Morey 4.0, 67th of 202
Eric Babbitt 4.0, 91st of 202
Sam Grindle 3.5, 110th of 202
Lucas Oliver 3.0, 133rd of 202
Janelle Ciomei 3.0, 143rd of 202
Nick Eaton 3.0, 150th of 202
Chelsea Brown 2.0, 162nd of 202
Jacob Starkey 2.0, 168th of 202
Andrew Turner 2.0, 171st of 202
Nathan Davis 2.0, 182nd of 202
David Mcmanus 2.0, 190th of 202
Alec Eaton 1.0, 200th of 202

K-5 Championship:

Paul Rudnicki 2.5, 226th of 283

K-3 U800

Matthew Fishbein 5.0, 23rd of 307
Andrew Jones 4.0, 126th of 307
Haley DeLuca Lowell 3.0, 190th of 307

K-3 Unrated

Laddy DeLuca Lowell 3.0, 53rd of 85

K-1 Championship

Max DeLuca Lowell 3.0, 186th of 284

To give you a flavor of the national-nature of this event, here is where one player's opponents were from:

Round 1 California
Round 2 New York
Round 3 Arizona
Round 4 Texas
Round 5 Manhatten
Round 6 New York
Round 7 New Mexico

Matthew Fishbein with his 23rd Place Trophy in the K-3 Under 800 section

Deer Isle-Stonington Elementary, 13th in the K-6 Under 1000 section

Andrew Jones, top scorer for the Airline School

The mass of trophies

GM Joel Benjamin, himself a triple crown winner (Elementary National Champion, Junior High National Champion and High School National Champion) at the K-1 Championship.

Chess was everywhere: in restaurants,

in the hotel lobby,

on the floors,

and in the halls!

Signing off from Denver, Colorado. Hope you enjoyed the reports. As one Chess Mom aptly put it, "I'm so exhausted!"