Please see all the necessary information below, including the "Terms and Conditions," which explain how to withdraw, process refunds, and change your registration information.

2023 Caveman Beginner Open 

The 2023 Caveman Beginner Open is part of the Caveman Chess Festival. Below is brief information about other aspects of the Festival, followed by information about the tournament.

Caveman Chess Camp

The Caveman Chess Camp has sections for all ages and strengths.  The Adult Fundamentals section is for Adults only and has a maximum strength of around 1600. The class focuses on chess fundamentals that people may have missed over the years. (Do you know Steinitz's Six Principles?) Another class is Advanced Adult, which does allow juniors rated over 1700. The Master Class is open to players of any age rated 2000 and up. Classes have counselors to assist in keeping class decorum.

We strongly encourage seniors to participate in the camp. If a group of seniors would like to register together, we are willing to consider an additional discount.

Tournaments at the Festival

There will be other tournaments at the same time as the US Senior, which may offer you an opportunity to travel with friends. All events are in separate playing areas.

1. US Blind Championship
2. US Senior Open
3. US Junior Open
4. Caveman Medior Open (For players who are neither Juniors nor Seniors)
5. US Junior Blitz (Sat 7/22)
6. US Senior/Medior Blitz (Sat 7/22)

Non-Chess Events

The Festival includes several non-chess events, for adults, for campers, tournament players, parents, and spouses. These events include:

1. Dinner and theater with the Grandmasters, Dury Lane Theater, Oakbrook, Thursday July 20
2. Shopping Excursion (likely Friday, July 21)
3. Fitness Class (likely Saturday, July 22)

 Other non-chess events may be added. Please reach out to us if you have a suggestion.

On-Site Accommodations

The Festival will have an on-site cafe hot meal plan. There are no taxes or tips for the cafe.

The Festival will also have a dormitory plan. Both of these plans will be up by early December.

Shuttle

There will be a shuttle plan from O'Hare and possibly Midway. We are currently working on this.

Summary of Key Terms and Conditions

This is a summary of essential Terms and Conditions. To see all Terms and Conditions, go to https://www.cavemanchess.com/terms-conditions

Withdrawals: To withdraw from an event, go to https://cavechess.cc/withdraw and fill out the form. Emails will be ignored.

Refunds: To see the entire policy, go to the Terms and Conditions link above. Here are important points:

• Processing refunds is secondary to running the event without a hitch
• While we will attempt to pay refunds sooner, our policy is to pay within ten business days following the event. We had some issues with this in 2022 because of medical issues, but we are changing some procedures to simplify the process and stay on track
• In our standard refund policy, refunds take the following forms:
  

  • Type 1: A credit of the full fee towards future tournaments or events, or

  • Type 2: A refund of the fee minus the greater of a 10% or $5 service charge. This charge is necessary because entries include processing fees not refunded to us, and time is involved in processing refunds. This is why we also provide a full fee credit alternative.
  • For the Caveman Chess Festival, Early Bird and Early Registrations will receive a full Refund. However, no Early Bird or Early Registration Refunds will be processed until the end of the Early Registration period (June 1.)

      

Registration Corrections and Changes: In the past couple of years, we have received an excessive amount of emails concerning registrations. To both cut down on this and better process it, please note the following:

1. Please verify the information before submitting the registration.
   1. For example, some browsers with very persistent "autofill" tools have frequently overwritten a participant's name with the name of the person completing the registration.
2. To make a change/correction, do not email. Go to https://cavechess.cc/change, to process changes.
3. There is a $5 fee for each (set of) changes. 

Caveman Beginner Open Information

This event is not a US Chess national title event.