Markowski 05 Rd 7

2/16/05, Markowski Open, Round 7, Reported by Chuck Ensey

 

Adam Corper & Dimitry Kishinevsky (In Last Year's Electoral College Open)

Kishinevsky & Corper Tie For First w/ 6,

Baker & Wagner Are 3rd & 4th w/ 5 1/2

7 with 5 points, and 6 with 4 1/2 - All 4 1/2's Qualify Except For the one with the lowest tie breaks = Ed Baluran, Sorry, Ed

Smith, Zeigler, McGuiness, Nelson, Bruno, Aeria & Orozco Score 5 to Qualify

Sussman, Richard, Fries, Mahooti and Amodeo make in with 4 1/2 Points - Congratulations Gentlemen!

As far as the Reserve Championship, the following players have made it in. Please let us know immediately if you do NOT plan to play in the Reserve Championship (a 7 round swiss starting next week) so that we can arrange for a replacement. Right now the winners are:

Players U1800 with 4 points: 1. Marc Adlam 2. Fred Borges 3. Sunny Chu 4. Shaun Sweitzer 5. Joel Batchelor. Players with 3 1/2 points 6. Damani Fair 7. Robert Draper 8. Khris Juroshek 9. Fred Gerlach. Players with 3 points (Robert Henderson has 3, but has declined to play, he is unavailable) 10. Pejman Sagart 11. Keith Wilson 12. Roberto Mercado 13. Julian Rodriguez 14. Helmut Keil 15. Brad Ross and 16. Mark De Yoe. Mark had to play an extra tie breaking "playoff" game with Reno Tyrell when they ended up tied for 16th place with identical tie breaks! Mark won that game on Saturday. Again please let us know either by email or the message board or by calling the club if you cannot play in the Reserve Championship, or even the Club Championship for that matter. We think everyone is set to play, but we just want to be sure. Players not in either Championship will play in the Lasker Open, probably in three sections, 1) over 1700,  2) 1700-1400 and  3) U1400.          

 

Adam Corper had a surprise for Bruce in the Marshall Attack of the Ruy Lopez

Back to the action in the Markowski. Adam Corper (6) upset tournament leader Bruce Baker (5 1/2) with an apparently prepared line against Bruce's Marshall Attack in the Ruy Lopez. The famous pawn sacrifice didn't work out so well for Bruce in this heavily analyzed line introduced by Frank Marshall against Capablanca in New York 1918. See the game here.

On Board 2 Dimitry Kishinevsky (5) won against the inspired play of Class A player Tim McGuiness (5). Tim has been upsetting lots of higher rated players, and last night he nearly pulled it off again. It was the second to the last game to finish, and it was interrupted when Tim made a time forfeit claim against Dimitry which was not upheld. I think Tim may have left out a move, so Dimitry did make 40 moves and Tim thought he hadn't. Dimitry went on to win once the game resumed.

Only one game was drawn last night, as I mentioned last week, we have a lot of fighting spirit in our club, no there were no short draws. Ron Bruno (5) and Rick Aeria (5) did play to a draw on Board 3, but it was a hard fought battle.

 

Lenny Sussman in trouble as Black against NM Carl Wagner

On board 4, Dr. Carl Wagner (5 1/2) went all out for the win against the defensive Expert Leonard Sussman (4 1/2) and did manage to snag the full point. A quick draw would have let them both in the Championship, but Carl wanted to place high in the tournament, and he did, tying with Bruce Baker for Third Place.

There were 9 players with 4 points before this last round started, so the brutal math of elimination meant that these players would all play each other, and that who ever won would be assured of a spot in the Championship, but whoever lost was definitely out of it. Talk about pressure... on Board 5, Todd Smith (5) knocked Ignacio Sainz (4) out of the Championship, and on Board 6, George Zeigler (5) ruined the bid of Dave Saponara (4) to get in. Dave had his chances, if he had sacrificed one more Rook, there was apparently a win there that many people were kind (or was it cruel?) enough to point out to Dave after the game was over.

 

Cyrus is a spectator as Rezendes & Nelson and others battle for playoff spots

On Board 7, Jesus Orozco (5) knocked out the Grand Swindler, Carey Milton (4) and on Board 8, Tom Nelson (5) managed to finally find the win against Ron Rezendes (4) in "The Longest Game Of The Night". Gee, a long game and Tom's flag didn't fall? Amazing...

  

Shomari plays the Alekhine's Defence, Bob hits him with an offbeat line

On Board 9, the drama of last year's Co-Champion, Robert Richard (4 1/2) unfolded. Would he be knocked out by the new whiz kid, Shomari Mosi (4)?? Many people thought it would be a shame if last year's Champ was eliminated in the Markowski, but Bob came through with a win and joined the group of five lucky players who made it in with the minimum of 4 1/2 points. Ed Baluran (4 1/2) won on Board 10 against Buddy Morris (3 1/2), but it wasn't enough to put him over the top, as his tie breaks were slightly lower than those of Mario Amodeo (4 1/2), the last player to squeeze through the door before it slammed shut. Mario won his game against Esteban Escobedo (3 1/2). See Ed's win over Bud here.  This was a good game and I had a tough time deciding between it and Mario's game. Mario game finally won me over and took the Best Game Prize.

The other players to make it in with wins in the last round were James Mahooti (4 1/2) who edged out Damani Fair (3 1/2) on Board 12, and on Board 13, Thomas Fries (4 1/2) got past Big Bob Draper (3 1/2).

Out of the 16 highest rated players, 5 were knocked out by lowered rated upstarts. Tim McGuiness (#34) was the lowest rated player to get in. The others were pretty high up on the rating list - #17 Mario Amodeo, #19 James Mahooti, #20 Jesus Orozco and #21 Thomas Fries. So who were the ones to get knocked out of the sweet sixteen you ask? How uncouth and nosy of you to even ask, but we tell all here and if you must know... #6 Peter Bisgaard, #11 Carey Milton, #13 Ignacio Sainz, #15 Ed Baluran and  #16 David Saponara. Better luck next year fellows, hope springs eternal and as they say in baseball, there is always next year... Plus we have plenty of great tournaments still to come this year, this was just the first of many.

In other games that did not affect the Club Championship, but did have some impact on the Reserve Championship, a big upset was on Board 14 where Fred Borges (4) assured himself  a spot in the Reserve Championship by defeating the higher rated James Malowney (3) with a stunning Kingside attack ending in checkmate. I was playing on the next board over and suddenly I noticed Jim was grinning and shaking his head as his King was trapped in a mating net. Well done, Fred! In my game, I, Chuck Ensey (4) sacrificed a Bishop for three pawns in front of the King of Roberto Mercado (3) and it worked out well, and although the sac was a bit unclear, at least it was ambitious. On Board 16, Alejandro Garcia-Betancourt (4) won against Julian Rodriguez (3) and on 17, Sunny Chu (4) won against the higher rated Gary Tuttle (3). Gary recently cut off all his long hair, possibly in an effort to reverse his bad luck lately on the chessboard!  Gary is still smarting from his loss to Carey where one inattentive move ruined hours of solid play that should have been rewarded with a win. I talked to Gary and we shared ideas on how to prevent such blunders. It's hard to maintain concentration for four hours or more, and that one time you don't go through the routine of asking what your opponents best reply to your candidate move might be, that's when it always hurts you the most! Amazing how that happens...

Most of the games on the lower boards were won by the higher rated player with only a few exceptions. Winners included Ron Soto (4),  Dayne Freitag (4), Shaun Sweitzer (4), Joel Batchelor (4), Fred Gerlach (3 1/2), Keith Wilson (3), Helmut Keil (3), Alina Markowksi (2 1/2), Keith Wetterer (1 1/2) Roger Wathen (2) and Eric Marquis (2 1/2).

 

Another packed night at the San Diego Chess Club, Round 7 of the Markowski

Upsets were scored by Khris Juroshek (3 1/2) over Stefan Boyland (2 1/2), although Khris' rating is a really old scholastic one,  and then Mark De Yoe (2) managed to upset Robert Samuel (2), which knocked Bob out of the Reserve Championship and stormed Mark right into it.  Finally, Todd White (2 1/2) won against the higher rated Parviz Soltan (1 1/2).