Markowski 05 Rd 6

2/09/05, Markowski Open, Round 6, reported by Chuck Ensey

Bruce Baker Alone In First Place

Kishinevsky, Corper & McGuiness Have Now

Clinched Spots In The Finals, 12 more slots are open

 

Bruce Baker won his 6th round game, while Carl Wagner lost to Dimitry Kishinevsky

With only one more round to go, only four players have definitely qualified for the finals, or the Championship Playoff rounds that start in 2 weeks (another 7 week Swiss). Bruce Baker (5 1/2) is a shoo in and is now favored to win first place in the Markowski Open. In Round 6 Bruce defeated NM Todd Smith (4) to grab first place all for himself.  Three other players who have scored 5 out of 6 points are also assured of a spot in the finals, which leaves 12 other slots open. Dimitry Kishinevsky (5) won a nice game as White against Carl Wagner (4 1/2) to assure a Ukranian presence in the Championship round, and the Great Brit, Adam Corper (5), crunched Carey Milton (4) to make Queen and country proud (even Camilla Parker-Bowles was smiling). Tim McGuiness (5) has set a record by qualifying already in Round 6, something no Class A player has ever done to my knowledge. Several A players made it into the Championship round last year, but they barely squeezed in after the 7th round, while Tim easily qualified in Rd 6 by pulling off yet another upset, this time against Expert George Zeigler (4).  

 

Shomari Mosi finally found someone who could outplay him, at least last night...

Then we have four players with 4 1/2. Three of these four players won their sixth round game to catch up with Carl Wagner, who as we know, lost to Dimitry. Ron Bruno (4 1/2) is the first player in our club who was able to defeat the young phenom Shomari Mosi (4), pictured in the colorful blue shirt above. Leonard Sussman (4 1/2) played "The Longest Game Of The Night" and finally won over Peter Bisgaard (3 1/2). Lenny is one of only four players who have not lost a game in this event, which is really not a surprise given Lenny's defensive expertise. The only other players without losses are of course Bruce, and then Adam Corper and Ron Bruno. The fourth player with 4 1/2 points is last year's Champion, Rick Aeria (4 1/2), who reluctantly whupped his good friend James Mahooti (3 1/2) upside the head in an effort to make it back to the pinnacle of San Diego chessdom.

       

Rick managed to drill a hole in Dr. Mahooti's toothy plans for stardom 

The four 4 1/2's will all play each next week if the schedule holds up. If these two games are drawn (Bruno-Aeria and Wagner-Sussman) then all four will be annointed into the winner's circle of 16 qualifiers. Why should they risk losing? Of course we don't condone Grandmaster draws, and I doubt if we will see any quick handshakes next week. You have to understand the fighting spirit all our players have. Last year in similar circumstances, the players all fought on for wins - they wanted to win the Markowski Open, not just qualify! I am just trying to figure out who is going to make it in with 4 1/2 points, and if these guys all draw and end up with 5 points, that would be the worst case for those with 4 1/2 trying to get in, because it would then leave only 8 other spots open...

And we also have 9 players with 4 points, so at most 5 of them could win and end up with 5 points, which then leaves only 3 spots for players with 4 1/2. That would be the worst case scenario for someone looking to get in with 4 1/2. But if Bruno and Wagner both win (or Aeria and Sussman) then there would be 5 spots open for players with 4 1/2. Hmmm.... very interesting. The big question is will Bob Richard (3 1/2), last years' Co-Champion, have good enough tie breaks to get in, assuming he wins his last game? One good thing in his favor is that Tim McGuiness, one of the players he lost to, is on a tear, so that helps Bob's tiebreaks. The other player he lost to, Tom Fries (3 1/2), needs to win his last round game to help Bob, but right now Tom is scheduled to play Peter Bisgaard, who is higher rated. Oh yeah, and Bob's likely opponent next week is none other than .... Shomari Mosi!! We will just have to wait and see how it all plays out...

 

Buddy Morris trying to qualify, but ran into the tough Ignacio Sainz in Rd 6

Some of the other players with four points who won their 6th round games against lower rated opponents were Ignacio Sainz (4), Tom Nelson (4), David Saponara (4), Jesus Orozco (4) and Ron Rezendes (4). Ignacio overcame the tricky play of the Bud Man, Buddy Morris (3 1/2), while Tom Nelson cooled off the red hot play of Dayne Freitag (3). Dave Saponara nursed a small edge to victory over Gary Tuttle (3), who was swindled badly last week while up several pieces against Carey Milton. Some people say every game Carey wins is some sort of swindle, since he plays almost purely tactically and usually ignores "positional nicities" as Rick Aeria puts it! So don't feel bad Gary, you are joining a large club of players who have been swindled by The Miltonian Institute (but is it of Tactical Play or Swindles?)

President Ron Rezendes has the lowest tiebreaks of anyone with 4 points, at least currently, and in Round 6 he won against the unrated, but quite strong, Franco Alejandrino (3).

There were a few draws last night, and the highest board with a draw was Board 10, where Esteban Escobedo (3 1/2) managed to overcome the dramatics and theatrics of the Chess Balladeer, Ed Baluran (3 1/2) and secure the half point. I don't know what was going on at that board, since I was fairly wrapped up in my own game, but there was quite a bit of commotion and then some laughter at the end, but this is not uncommon for the singing chess bard. At least one other player complained about the noise, and we are still looking into what happened.      

         

Jesus Orozco beat Joel Batchelor and still has a good chance to qualify...

if he can beat Carey Milton next week, his scheduled opponent! Be careful...!

Another, almost comical disturbance came from Fred Gerlach (2 1/2) who complained bitterly and loudly after losing his game about being paired with a master (Bob Richard) when he is only a 1700 rated player... Come on Fred, are you a man or a mouse? But we have been hearing this from Fred for years (his conspiracy theory about masters devising the Swiss system to keep lower rated players down), so it is nothing new. Maybe Fred should skip the Markowski, where big rating differentials are the norm. To me, playing someone much higher rated is not only an honor, it is a low risk opportunity because you can't lose many rating points, but you can gain a ton if you win or even draw. Fred is only happy when he gets to play a lower rated player, and even then he is often talkative during the game, which is frowned upon at our club. Especially if he loses anyway, when you can just about count on Fred to start muttering loudly to no one in particular... Fred is a really nice guy when you get to know him, but no matter how many times we tell him not to make noise during play, he seems to ignore our pleas. A Suspension from the club (if we get enough formal complaints) may be necessary to get Fred's attention and cooperation in providing the good playing conditions we strive for at the SDCC. By the way, if there is a disturbance of the sort we witnessed in the 6th round, you have the right as a player to pause the clock in your game until order is restored.  

Other draws recorded in round 6 were between Ron Soto (3) and Sunny Chu (3), Robert Henderson (3) and Chuck Ensey (3), (see Henderson-Ensey game here), Roberto Mercado (3) and Alex Garcia-Betancourt (3), plus Shaun Sweitzer (3) and Eric Addis (3). These draws were all on consecutive boards (#16-#19)! The other two draws of the evening were between Parviz Soltan (1 1/2) and Mark De Yoe (1 1/2) and then Roger Wathen (1) and Todd White (1 1/2).   

  

Packing them in at the Markowski Open. Roger Wathen plays Todd White...

Other winners in round 6 included Bob Draper (3 1/2), Pejman Sagart (3), Marc Adlam (3), Fred Borges (3), Tom Webb (3), Julian Rodriguez (3), Angelo Esposito (3), Brad Ross (3), Bill Murray (2 1/2), Karen Kaufman (2 1/2), Robert Samuel (2), Jachin (Reno) Tyrell (2) and Monica Ness (1 1/2). of these games, the only upsets were Brad Ross' win over Chris Borgan (1 1/2), Karen Kaufman's win over Erik Marquis (1 1/2) and Bill Murray's win over Alina Markowski (1 1/2). Angelo is unrated, but has won both his games so far.

Tomorrow I will be busy with the Gambito Open in National City... this report was slightly delayed due to some other committments I had... (or maybe I should be committed? as in to the loony bin...) to Rank & File and to my own daytime job... Yes, I do actually have a real job, although my boss (and my lovely wife, Gloria) sometimes speculate if I ever really think about anything other than chess, chess, chess!

 Isn't this rain ever going to stop? Very unusual for sunny San Diego...                  

          

Monica Ness got her first win of the Markowski against the lower rated Keith Wetterer, who had won against her the last time they played. She is learning the Royal Game rapidly...Plus she recently connected with an old friend though our website!   

I am only going to give the tentative pairings for the top 10 boards, as after that it is usually wrong anyway due to people taking byes or not showing up. Of course there are no 1/2 point byes in the last round, so sorry, but nice try...The player listed first has White. 1. Corper - Baker 2. McGuiness - Kishinevsky 3. Bruno -Aeria 4. Wagner - Sussman 5. Smith - Sainz 6. Saponara - Zeigler 7. Orozco - Milton 8. Nelson - Rezendes 9. Richard - Mosi 10. Fries - Bisgaard

Oh, OK if you insist, here's a few more, but they are probably going to change 11. Morris - Baluran 12. Amodeo - Escobedo 13. Mahooti - Fair 14. Draper - Soto 15. Malowney - Borges 16. Ensey - Webb 17. Betancourt - Rodriguez 18. Chu - Tuttle 19. Freitag - Henderson 20. Alejandrino - Sweitzer 21. Batchelor -Mercado 22. Addis - Sagart 23. Adlam - Esposito 24. Ross - Gerlach 25. Boyland - Kaufman 26. Murray - Juroshek. If you haven't sen your name yet you are probably out of contention for the Championship Round, even the Reserve Championship. If you don't make it into the Championship series, have no fear, you will be able to play in the Practice For Non-Qualifiers, which this year will be known as the Lasker Open. It will probably be in three sections with the lower section sort of a Booster Championship for players under 1400.