Gambito #328

Gambito #328   July Super Gambito   07/07/07

 

Michael Chen's father watches 2 exciting games at once, Baluran - Lakdawala and Liu - Madriaga  

A really nice turnout of 38 players today - thanks everybody. The Open Section was very strong with 4 Masters and the top 14 players all over 1900+. The Reserve Section had 20 players and was larger than the Open Section (18), the first time this has happened in a really long time. But we want even more to attend this event, so next time try to recruit a friend to come with you! After all, we are still not even close to the record of 49 players which has been achieved twice before. Can we at least break the 40 barrier for a Super Gambito? Hurting us a little bit was the conflict with the World Open, the HUGE event back East, which stole several of our regular players with it's gigantic prize fund.  

Remember, for us, the more players, the bigger the prize fund, $600 is just the minimum guaranteed amount. We paid out $850 today. We pay out almost all the entry fees as prizes, keeping only $75 for the club with big turnouts like this. On smaller turnouts we keep only $30. The prize fund and the club fees are determined in advance on a schedule that is posted on the wall with other tournament rules, history and information such as the list of top money winners for the year to date. Cyrus leads this ranking of course, but Tom Kuhn, a Class C player, is very high on the list with $570 in winnings, behind only Cy, Carey and Bruce. We try to have similar prizes in all the rating classes (Master, Expert, A, B & C) to encourage everybody to play and to have a chance to win money. We have already paid out over $10,000 so far this year.

Of course it is not about the money, it's really the beauty of chess we are all about and there were many sparkling games today. Ed Baluran deserves credit for giving both Cyrus Lakdawala and Bruce Baker very tough games, fighting in time trouble down to the last tick before resigning. Varun Krishnan upset Bruce in the first round (it's that first round curse for Bruce again, he is most vunerable early in the day, after he gets his mojo working later in the day, well, forgetta about it...). It was also nice to see Adam Corper back in action and several new players too...Plus FIDE Master Elliott Liu made a rare appearance, I guess school is out for him now...  He and Bruce played the Best Game in the Open Section, see it on Cyrus Annotates , along with several other games.  

 

Young phenom Varun Krishnan notches another win against an Expert, Raoul Crisologo in this case, as spellbound spectators are entranced with the magic...

For more photos, see the Pictures section. 

Alan Tsoi was on cover of The Reader a few weeks ago and today he justified that prominence by winning the Reserve Section - so what's next: The Rolling Stone? Chess Life? or at least Rank & File?

Best Unrated: Jason Arbeiter (1 1/2) no cash prize, but congrats on your first event, next time you will be eliglible for a prize. And welcome to the Gonzalez father-son team, visiting from Texas for the summer...  

Best Game Prize winners: Bruce Baker ($25) in the Open Section and William Delaney ($25) in the Reserves

Open Section Wall Chart

	Name/Rtng/ID	Rd 1	Rd 2	Rd 3	Rd 4
1	IM Cyrus Lakdawala	B 11	W 4	B 2	W 5
	2514  2515  1st Place $200	1	2	2쩍	3쩍
3	Bruce Baker	B 14	W 15	B 11	W 2
	2277  2275  2nd Place* $75	0	1	2	3
7	Carey Milton	B 18	W 17	W 8	B 4
	2067  2077  2nd/BU2200* $75	쩍	1쩍	2	3
8	Leonard Sussman	bye	W 18	B 7	W 6
	2058  2072  2nd/BU2200* $75	쩍	1쩍	2	3
13	Ben Barquin	W 10	B 5	W 9	B 17
	1971  1997  BU2000 $100	1	1	2	3
5	Adam Corper	B 16	W 13	W 6	B 1
	2185  2188	1	2	2쩍	2쩍
2	FM Elliott Liu	W 12	B 9	W 1	B 3
	2309  2310	1	2	2쩍	2쩍
4	Romeo Ignacio	W 15	B 1	W 12	W 7
	2200  2200	1	1	2	2
6	Rick Aeria	W 17	W 14	B 5	B 8
	2140  2130	쩍	1쩍	2	2
11	Ed Baluran	W 1	B 19	W 3	B 15
	1997  2004  BU2000* $12	0	1	1	2
14	Varun Krishnan	W 3	B 6	B 17	W 9
	1918  1932  BU2000* $12	1	1	1	2
17	Roberto Aiello	B 6	B 7	W 14	W 13
	1825  1837	쩍	쩍	1쩍	1쩍
12	Hercules Madriaga	B 2	W 16	B 4	W 19
	1990  1984	0	1	1	1쩍
19	Haochi Shi	B 9	W 11	B 16	B 12
	1807  1814	0	0	1	1쩍
9	Raoul Crisologo	W 19	W 2	B 13	B 14
	2051  2031	1	1	1	1
15	Joselito Quiba	B 4	B 3	W 18	W 11
	1856  1855	0	0	1	1
18	Richard Jensen	W 7	B 8	B 15	W 16
	1846  1836	쩍	쩍	쩍	1
16	Vincent Broman	W 5	B 12	W 19	B 18
	1848  1826	0	0	0	쩍
10	Alan Sebeckis	B 13	----	----	----
	2036  2026   (house)	0	0	0	0

 

Gene Arnaiz and Alan Tsoi in the first round. Gene missed a mate in 4 and was checkmated himself a few moves later! Caissa can be cruel, but Alan was grinning ear to ear at the end, knowing that he dodged a bullet.  

Reserve Section Wall Chart

	Name/Rtng/ID	Rd 1	Rd 2	Rd 3	Rd 4
3	Alan Tsoi	W 13	B 7	W 12	B 1
	1782  1805  BU1800 $100	1	2	3	3쩍
12	Nestor Dagamat	B 20	W 6	B 3	W 14
	1621 1667  2nd U1800* $6	1	2	2	3
1	Pejman Sagart	bye	W 11	B 8	W 3
	1777  1795  2nd U1800* $6	쩍	1쩍	2쩍	3
11	Aaron Ibarra	W 19	B 1	W 7	B 10
	1627  1666  2nd U1800* $6	1	1	2	3
5	Jesse Orlowski	B 14	W 8	B 2	W 6
	1742  1759  2nd U1800* $6	1	1쩍	2쩍	3
6	William Delaney	W 15	B 12	W 13	B 5
	1737  1733	1	1	2	2쩍
4	Jerry Soelberg	bye	B 10	W 15	W 8
	1761 1758	쩍	1	1쩍	2쩍
14	Tom Kuhn	W 5	B 17	W 9	B 12
	1565  1570  BU1600 $100	0	1	2	2
7	Shaun Sweitzer	B 16	W 3	B 11	W 19
	1720  1701	1	1	1	2
10	Keith Bresee	B 18	W 4	B 19	W 11
	1644  1629	쩍	1	2	2
2	Chuck Ensey	bye	B 9	W 5	B 15
	1769  1757	쩍	1	1	2
9	Bill Rhoads	bye	W 2	B 14	B 16
	1683  1671	쩍	1	1	2
15	Ryan Nichols	B 6	W 20	B 4	W 2
	1516  1523  2nd U1600* $8	0	1	1쩍	1쩍
13	Gene Arnaiz	B 3	W 18	B 6	W 20
	1523  1509  2nd U1600* $8	0	1	1	1쩍
8	Dayne Nix	W 17	B 5	W 1	B 4
	1692  1676	1	1쩍	1쩍	1쩍
20	Jason Arbeiter	W 12	B 15	W 17	B 13
	unr.  1379/04	0	0	1	1쩍
18	Xavier Gonzalez	W 10	B 13	W 16	B 17
	1229  1245 2nd U1600* $8	쩍	쩍	쩍	1쩍
19	Javier Jose Gonzalez	B 11	W 16	W 10	B 7
	unr.  1383/04	0	1	1	1
16	Michael Chen	W 7	B 19	B 18	W 9
	1353  1339	0	0	1	1
17	Fred Cleveland	B 8	W 14	B 20	W 18
	1266  1222	0	0	0	0

*tie    Total Prizes $850

 

A clean shaven Keith Bresee (what, no beard?!) and the dapper Aaron Ibarra