Lakdawala Championships Round 7

Last Round Results on 4/08/09  7 PM

The following comments were written before this round was played: 

Three of our 5 sections already have a clear winner, but the Club Championship and the Borges Open are still hotly contested.

The Women's Championship is over, they had 7 players, so only 6 rounds were possible and the clear winner is: Maria Elena Villarreal ($80) with 5 out of 6 points. She lost only to the Second Place winner, Monica Ness ($40), who scored 4 1/2. Monica also gained an estimated 149 rating points to 1363 while Maria Elena gained about 86 to bring her up to 1531. In Third Place was Mayra Murra ($20) with 4 points. Congratulations to all of the fine women players and we are happy to see this event be such a success. Thank you again ladies for participating, now you can get back to busting the guy's openings and breaking their hearts! Last year's Women's Champion was Rocio Murra, and she graciously bestows the crown to the new champion Maria Elena.   

In the Reserve Championship the #1 seed William Wijaya has cliched First Place with 5 1/2 out of 6 so far. Donald Klass has 4 1/2, but he already arranged for a bye in the last round, so he will end up with 5 and at least tied for Second Place. Fighting for a share of Second, or at least Third Place, is still wide open amongst quite a few contenders: Larry Vikander (4), Tom Kuhn (4), Steve Gordon (3 1/2), Jerry Soelberg (3), Anthony Harbone (3) and Fawsi Jose Murra (3).     

In the Fred Borges Reserve, James Couston has clinched First Place with 5 1/2 and he can't even play the last round, but he doesn't need to. That was impressive...he says he has been studying tactics on the web and trying to keep his opponents out of their favorite book lines by playing somewhat unusual but sound variations. Sounds good to me! Fred Borges and Bryan Harms are currently tied for Second Place with 4 points, but David Tagatac, Cristhian Garcia and Mark Lawless are right behind them with 3 1/2...  

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OK sports fans, it's OVER, finally after 14 rounds (Markowski plus Lakdawala Opens) we have closure. I am glad there were not tie breaks to decide the winners, in all cases the winner of each section was clear. Congrats to ALL the winners!! The cash prizes are listed below...        

Club Championship

First Place: John Funderburg (5 1/2), $100; 2nd Place (tie): David Hart (4 1/2), Todd Smith (4 1/2) and Raoul Crisologo (4 1/2), $40 each   

Bd 1  John Funderburg (4 1/2) - Todd Smith (4 1/2)  1-0

Bd 2  Raoul Crisologo (4 1/2) - David Hart (3 1/2)  0-1

Bd 3  Peter Graves (3) - Thomas Fries (2)  1-0

Bd 4  Pejman Sagart (1/2) - Brad Salz (3)  1/2-1/2

Withdraw: Bruce Baker (3 1/2), Ignacio Sainz (3 1/2), Manuel Herrera (3), Carl Wagner (2 1/2), Ben Barquin (2), Dimitry Kishinevsky (1 1/2), Alejandro Garamendi (1 1/2)   

Biggest rating point gainer (estimated): John Funderburg +57 to 2137

Reserve Championship

First Place: William Wijaya (6 1/2), $80; 2nd Place (tie): Donald Klaas (5) and Larry Vikander (5), $40 each  

Bd 6  Tom Kuhn (4) - William Wijaya (5 1/2)  0-1

Bd 7  Steve Gordon (3 1/2) - Larry Vikander (4)  0-1

Bd 8  Michael Ryan (2 1/2) - Jerry Soelberg (3)  1-0 

Bd 9  Anthony Harbone (3) - Mike Friedel (2 1/2)  0-1

Bd 10  Bryan Kelly (2 1/2) - Steve Perry (1 1/2) 0F-1F

Bye: Donald Klaas (4 1/2)

Withdraw: Fawsi Jose Murra (3), Hector Gonzalez (2), Morgan Fox (0) 

Biggest rating point gainer (est): Larry Vikander +130 to 1580 

Fred Borges Open  

First Place: Jeff Turner (5 1/2), $80; 2nd Place: Joseph McDougall (5) and Paul Agron (5), $35 each; BU2000: Buddy Morris (5), $70; 2nd U2000: Jason Qu (4), $50; 3rd U2000: David Delgadillo (3 1/2) and Dayne Freitag (3 1/2), $10 each 

Bd 11  Jeff Turner (5) - Joseph McDougall (4 1/2)  1/2-1/2

Bd 12  Paul Agron (4) - Alejandrino Baluran (4 1/2)  1-0

Bd 13  Buddy Morris (4) - Mario Amodeo (3 1/2)  1-0

Bd 14  Dayne Freitag (3 1/2) - Lennart Mathe (3)  0-1

Bd 15  Alfredo Deleon (3) - Jason Qu (3)  0-1

Bd 16  Eric Marquis (1) - Robert Draper (2)  1/2-1/2

Bd 17  Philip Skiba (1) - Chuck Ensey (2)  1/2-1/2

Withdraw: Damani Fair (1 1/2), Saeid Abdoli (3), Marty Lower, Ron Rezendes

Biggest rating point gainer (estimated): Buddy Morris +85 to 1899 

Fred Borges Reserve

First Place: James Coulston (5 1/2), $80; 2nd Place: Fred Borges (5), $50; BU1400: David Tagatac (4 1/2), $40; 2nd U1400: Bryan Harms (4), $20   

Bd 18  Cristhian Garcia (3 1/2) - Fred Borges (4)  0-1

Bd 19  Bryan Harms (4) - Mark Lawless (3 1/2)  0-1

Bd 20  David Tagatac (3 1/2) - Helmut Keil (1)  1-0

Bd 21  Robert Samuel (2 1/2) - Patrick Edwards (3)  1-0

Bd 22  Roger Wathen (2 1/2) - Darryl Woodson (2 1/2)  1/2-1/2

Bd 23  Michael Herzog (1) - Tom Lavoy (2)  1-0  

Bd 24  Samuel Odenina (0) - Matt Souza (2)  0-1

Bd 25  Karen Kaufman - Keith Wetterer  1-0

Withdraw: James Coulston (5 1/2)  First Place winner!  and Glenn Rose (2 1/2)

Biggest rating point gainers: David Tagatac +256 to 1288 and James Coulston +93 to 1520

Match Play - Joel Batchelor won once again, giving him 6 wins in a row after a first round loss to Shaun Sweitzer.  

Congrats to new Club Champion John Funderburg!! Wow, and he almost didn't get in, what a wild ride for John. He embodies the best of the club: he is a true gentleman at all times, a scholar of the game and a scrappy fighter. I am sorry that Todd Smith couldn't quite seal the deal, he came very close to winning this year, but had a bit of bad luck. John Funderburg is a repeat champion, he joins Ronald Bruno as the only two players to win the title twice since Cyrus abdicated. Early on it looked like it was going to be Bruce Baker's year to win, but a loss to Todd and then a loss to John put an end to that dream. Raoul Crisologo surprised a lot of people and might have even won the trophy if John and David Hart had faltered in the last round, but it wasn't in the fates. There is always next year guys!  

Next week is the simultaneous exhibition by John Funderburg versus all club members who want to try to beat him. A new tournament starts the following week on 4/22/09, the 5 round Robert Samuel Open...details to follow...