Kosovo takes the best of May Chess Open

    With the participation of 20 players we had our second tournament of the Bagram Chess Club. We had participation from 8 different countries: Colombia, Dominican Republic, Egypt, Kosovo, Mexico, Philippines, Puerto Rico and United States. On May 13, 2008 we had the tournament and this time I did not win the first place. That day was another story. The National Master from Kosovo Bekim Sejdiu beat all his opponents without mercy. His international rating is 2200, right know he is the higher ranking player in Bagram. He played very tough and without making mistakes. His experience in tournament he holds dominated the activity without problems.
    The second place was for Abdalraheem Ali from Egypt. Also he was undefeated in 3 games played, he missed the first round and for this reason he did not have the opportunity to play with the May Champion. But this will not be a problem because every month we will have 2 tournaments and I am sure Ali will face MN Sejdiu sooner or later. For the third place history was repeated, we had 3 players tied with 3 points of 4 possible. The players name and country were: Asani Shaban from Kosovo, Alexander Sayo from Philippines and myself from Puerto Rico. We had to play tie-breaker games to decide who would win the bronze medal. The control time for the tie-breakers was 5 minutes for each player. I started playing with Shaban using white pieces and we had a draw. Then I played with Sayo using black pieces and beat him. Then Sayo played against Shaban and he lost. After the tie-breakers games Shaban and myself were tied again with 1.5 points of 2 points possible. We had to play one more decisive game. I had the advantage the whole game but I let the king rock pawn to move without problems and when I figured out that this pawn was a lethal weapon it was too late. He crowned it and after that the game was held in his favor.  

   Our next tournament will be next Thursday 22 of May 2008 at 20:00 we will have the Sign Up at the 8 Ball MWR in the Ping Pong Area. This tournament will be the first professional tournament our club play’s. It will be rated for international ranking. The tournament will be 4 rounds, 2 rounds on Thursday and 2 on Friday. The time control will be 25 minutes with 10 seconds of increment for each move for each player. If all players use all the time and play 40 moves is approximately 90 minutes game. Very soon we will have Rapid-Transit Tournaments. On 3 of June, 2008 we will have our regular monthly tournament. We will play in two categories one for Beginners and Amateur players and the other categories for Intermediate and Advance players. The prizes for each category will be a polo t-shirt with the International Chess Corporation Logo with the Champion Name, second place will win a gift and third place a bronze medal.   

 

 

Writer: Jonathan Barreto Arzola
President of International Chess Corporation