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Grandmaster Irina Krush is awesome. She is an eight-time U.S. Women’s Chess Champion, and the current reigning champion. She won her first championship in 1998 at the ripe old age of 14 and is the first American woman to become a grandmaster.Â
Irina has played  for the U.S. national team in the Women’s Chess Olympiad since 1998, and helped lead the team to a silver medal in 2004 and a bronze metal in 2008. Irina graduated from Edward R. Murrow high school in Brooklyn (but does not speak with a Brooklyn accent).
She earned a BA in International Relations from New York University, though she has yet to be appointed as a diplomat (but we expect to build The Diplomat Event around her when that happens). Most importantly, Irina is really fun, personable, and down to earth and a pleasure to get to know.
Jen Shahade is a rock star and renaissance woman. Jen is a two-time U.S. Women’s Chess Champion, the Woman’s Program Director of U.S. Chess, a poker player and poker championship winner, and an author of three books, which you can learn about here.
When she’s not playing hula chess, doing television commentary, nor doing any of the other aforementioned activities, she finds time to host a chess podcast called Ladies’ Knight and the GRID poker podcast.
Unlike Irina, I have no idea where Jen went to high school, but she also graduated from New York University albeit with a degree in comparative literature.
Explore the Chess of the Queen’s Gambit with reigning U.S. Women’s Chess champion Irina Krush, the first American female grandmaster, and Woman Grandmaster Jennifer Shahade, the Program Director for U.S. Women’s Chess. Irina and Jen will share their chess stories, then they’ll break down the chess of selected clips from the popular Netflix series, The Queen’s Gambit. We’ll end with a Q&A with Irina and Jen. You do not need to know how to play chess in order to enjoy the event.
Before the event, we’ll send each person a special package with a chess set and a chess-themed snack package. If you want to be really cool, we’ll also send the ingredients for making the Gibson Martini that Beth and her step-mom love drinking and make it live during the program. How’s that for fun?!
Pricing for the Chess Event includes the Base Event Fee plus a per participant charge based on the package option selected.