Markowski 05 Rd 1

1/05/05, "The Markowski", the 2005 Club Championship Qualifier, Reported by Chuck Ensey, Pictures by Chuck & Rick

1st of 7 Rounds To Qualify

In Markowski Open 2005

Only 1 Upset + 1 Draw in Mismatch Round

Experts versus Class C = David & Goliath??  

 

Class C Player Alina Markowski Had Only A Small Chance Against Expert Adam Corper 

Once a year the club plays a tournament with only one huge Open section, which means in the first round, the top half versus the bottom half pairings (mandated by Swiss System rules) will produce very large rating mismatches. With the late start due to getting everyone signed up and entered properly, maybe it is a good thing to have a quick round 1 slaughter (the "silence of the lambs", as we dubbed it last year) so the night won't go too late. Some people enjoy the challenge of playing someone rated 400 points higher because you have nothing to lose (about 1 or 2 rating points), but you have a lot of upside if you win. Plus you can always try to learn something from the game; they say you can learn much more from your losses than from your wins. Maybe, or is that just what the powers that be tell us so they can foist this injustice on us poor innocents? ...welcome to the conspiracy theories of Fred Gerlach!

 

"Speech, Speech!!" the crowd called out and 2004 Club Champion Rick Aeria complied by thanking his "training team" of Cyrus Lakdawala, James Mahooti and Adam Corper.

At any rate, it is always fun to see which higher rated player stumbles in the first round. Last year, as I recall, Dayne Freitag beat Rick Aeria in Round 1. Rick recovered and went on to win the Club Championship, but the win for Dayne was an omen that foretold his success later in the year when he came close to winning the Reserve Championship and then at the end of the year he did win the Class B trophy in the Class Championships.         

 

Dayne displays his Class B trophy won at the year end Class Championships and presented before the first round of the Markowski Qualifier

This year Dayne nearly got upset himself by Chris McLaren, rated 400 points below him, although it is only a provisional rating based on just 4 games. Although a piece down for a few shaky pawns, Dayne managed to hold on for a draw, the only draw of the night.

The only big upset was by Kristopher Juroshek, rated 1088, who beat Esteban Escobedo, rated 1860. Esteban was fairly equal for most of the game but walked his King right into a simple mate at the end. I've done that before, you really feel stupid. Esteban was probably very low on time.  Kristopher is new to the club, so I don't know much about him. Looking at his tournament record, I see his rating is based on only 6 games played in 1997 in New Jersey, so he has probably improved a lot since then. In 1997 Khris had two draws, 3 losses and one win over the fashionable Hana Itkis, who some of you may know from the North American Open. Back then Hana was an 1100 rated player, now she is a strong Expert, rated over 2100!  

There was one other minor upset in a game that featured two closely matched Class A players (a late pairing put in after the main pairings were already done). Ramin Sinaee won a nice game from Thirunathan Sutharsan (1944), who is rated just 46 points higher than Ramin, who checks in at 1898 now. The new ratings reflect the Capablanca Open. The Class Championships are not yet rated, having just been concluded in late December.  

Other games all went as expected. The Masters all won - Bruce Baker rebuffed an interesting gambit by Fred Borges, Todd Smith stomped on Tom Webb, Peter Bisgaard won a very long and tough game against Marc Adlam, Carl Wagner also took a long time to defeat Robert Draper and finally, Robert Richard had a pretty tough fight but came out the winner against Roberto Mercado. Bob also picked up his Best Master Trophy from the Class Championships early in the evening.

 

Carey Milton won the Best Expert in that year-end tournament and was happy to receive the trophy. The Masters and Experts played together in one section, unlike all the other strickly pure Class sections. Carey actually finished with a higher score than NM Robert Richard. Last night Carey had no trouble putting away Helmut Keil. In other games, Dimitry Kishinevsky beat Stefan Boyland, Tom Nelson handed Robert Henderson a loss, Rick Aeria walloped Keith Wilson, George Zeigler rolled over Julian Rodriguez (the winner of the Class C Trophy, last year he won Class D!).

 

Julian Rodriguez Accepts The Class C Trophy From President Ron Rezendes 

In other Expert games, Leonard Sussman mauled Eric Marquis, Ignacio Sainz subdued Robert Samuel, Ed Baluran mutilated Bill Murray and Dave Saponara took forever to overcome Karen Kaufman. Oh, and Aaron Wooton cold-cocked James Coulston.

  

Roger Wathen Collected His Class D Trophy For His Mantleplace  

In the Class A "division" Mario Amodeo took care of business against Reno Tyrell, Dr. James Mahooti laid waste to Roger Wathen, Tom Fries defanged Mark DeYoe, Chuck Ensey added a point to his score from Eric Addis, Alex Garcia-Betancourt edified Patrick Edwards, Buddy Morris commited a felony against Noel Phelan, Pejman Sagart won with Black against Todd White, and Tim McGuiness locked up a win against Monica Ness. Ron Rezendes and Jim Malowney took byes. Jim was sick, Ron was chicken. Just kidding, I think he was just too tired, but was it from working or partying?  I'm not sure, maybe both!        

 

Tim McGuiness and His Beautiful & Well Deserved Class A Trophy

In the Class B world, some were paired up, some were paired down. Shaun Sweitzer won the Longest Game Of The Night against Brad Ross. Joel Batchelor got a pass from David Hall, Gary Tuttle cruised against Thomas Kuhn and Fred Gerlach got the fish he always wanted in the unrated Franco Alejandrino.  

If you missed the first round, you can still join and get a half point bye for the first round. Just come by a little early (6:30 or so) next week to get signed up. So far we have 65 players. The top 16 scoring players in the Markowski will qualify to go on to the Club Championship, another 7 round Swiss amongst themselves. Also the top 16 players under 1800 with the best scores in the Markowski will go into a separate 7 round Swiss to determine the Reserve Club Champion. No round robins this year, maybe next year if the demand is high.

For more pictures, see the "Pictures" Section.