The Jamaican chess community got a huge boost with the visit of world-renowned chess
grandmasters Fabiano Caruana and Maurice Ashley at the S Hotel in New Kingston on Wednesday (July 24), where they interacted and provided insight to young chess enthusiasts.

The event, organised by the Jamaica Chess Federation as part of the wider ‘GM-in-10: Grandmaster Initiative Programme’, was designed to find and cultivate local Jamaican talent, in a bid to produce the country’s first home-grown and trained grandmaster – the highest rank a chess player can hold.

Both Caruana and Ashley are respected grandmasters across the globe, with Caruana ranking as one of
the top three highest-ranked chess players of all time. Grandmaster Ashley, Jamaican-born but raised in
the United States, is just as much of a trailblazer, having made history as the first Black individual to
ever reach the position.

Ashely would express elation and eagerness at the opportunity to give back to his place of birth and
help foster an atmosphere where chess could thrive.

“I take it as my personal responsibility to do this, to help create a home-grown grandmaster for Jamaica,” he commented. “It was a dream that I had that came true…Jamaicans must know how to fight. Chess is a sport of endurance, where grit is important.”

Ashley and Caruana had flown to the island from the US to lead a week of coaching and practising for young, aspiring Jamaican chess athletes, with the Wednesday meeting to be the official start of the seven-day training period.

A highlight was a simultaneous exhibition with Grandmaster Caruana and select members of Jamaica’s chess talent pool.

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The grandmasters were joined by local Jamaican chess master Warren Elliot, alongside Minister of Finance Nigel Clarke—who first announced the GM-in-10: Grandmaster Initiative Programme in 2023—Sports Minister Olivia ‘Babsy’ Grange.

In his own speech, Clarke expressed his hope and goals for the initiative, highlighting the example of India as a standard for Jamaica to follow.

The finance minister would note how in the late 1970s, India had no chess grandmaster, but due to interest and cultivation of the sport locally, they had within the span of a few decades managed to accumulate some 30 grandmasters of their own.

“This is a long-term mission,” Clarke stated. “This will not happen overnight; it is a marathon and not a
sprint…Jamaica must go together to produce a grandmaster, creating a positive and affirmative culture
for the sport.”

The minister would go on to note how without any major support from the government, Jamaicans in
chess had managed to thrive for years. Now, he aimed to combine this natural spirit and interest with
proper funding and support to create something great.

“Chess is a sport but also a market of human and social development,” the minister concluded. “It
is due to the vision, hard work, ruthless focus, meritocracy and talent discovery, that Jamaica can excel.”