Is there a danger we lose our top chess players? Irina Krush- got her just reward. There was an interesting announcement made today when Irina Krush was declared winner of the Cairns Chess Queens award, which came with a cheque for $100,000. Rather eye-watering, don't you think? This is probably more prize money than I've won over my entire career. But what it reminds everyone of is that the United States of America (and specifically St Louis chess club, backed by the financial power of Rex and Jeanne Sinquefield) remain one of the heavy financial hitters in the chess world, if not the heaviest. That might explain why players of the calibre of Levon Aronian, Wesley So, Lenier Dominguez and others have joined the United States Federation in recent years. I would mention Fabiano Caruana as well but his ties with America were so strong to begin with, t