Chess in Maidstone

Maidstone is one of the better-served chess towns in Kent: the county town has two clubs on different nights of the week, so whether your free evening is Wednesday or Thursday there is a board waiting.

Maidstone Chess Club is the longer-established of the two, meeting on Wednesday evenings at St Faith’s Centre. It runs competitions through the year at both standard and rapid time controls, fields teams in the Kent county leagues, and juniors are very welcome on club nights.

Maidstone Knights offers a second bite of the week on Thursday evenings, and plays in the county leagues in its own right.

If those nights don’t suit

Maidstone sits in the middle of a good cluster of clubs, most within a twenty-minute drive:

• Snodland — Mondays, 7:30pm, just down the A228.
• Medway — two clubs on Wednesdays, in Rochester and Rainham.
• Cranbrook — Weald of Kent Chess Club, Mondays at Cranbrook Library, for the villages south of town.

The full county picture, with every club’s night and venue, is on Chess in Kent.

Juniors

Maidstone Chess Club welcomes juniors on its club night, and Kent has a busy junior tournament scene — see Junior chess in Kent for school clubs, junior events and how ratings work for young players.