Saturday, March 28, 2015

Experts Guan & Do Co-Champions at Three Mile Island Open; Matt Riddle, Philip Song, Abhi Prabhu Win Sections, 63 Play

63 players battled in four all-age sections at the 2015 Three Mile Island Open, held March 28 in DeKalb.

In the Open, Naperville North's Bradley Guan and Rockford middle-schooler Vincent Do drew in the fourth round to claim the co-championship. Both had gone a perfect 3-0 up until their match.

Due to a membership issue there was a delay in the posting of the updated USCF ratings, but that has now been resolved.

Sam Henderson and Glen Gratz tied for third with 3.0/4. Sam had the top score for U1800 players in the Open. Guan's teammate, Danny Emge had the top score among U1600's with 2.5.

Matt Riddle won the Reserve section with 3.5/4. Matt drew Jonathan Gaenzle in the third round before beating 8-year old Vrishank Ramnath in the final round. Jonathan, Vrishank, Geoffrey Trager and junior Alex Zhao all tied for second place with 3.0's. Geoffrey was returning to USCF play after 13 years!

All five players in the Reserve hit ratings milestones: Matt rose back above 1600, Jonathan eclipsed 1500, Vrishank surpassed 1400 for the first time (1434), Geoffrey went above 1400 for the second time in his life, and Alex saw his rating jump 147 points to an all-time best 1349.

Naperville North's Philip Song was perfect in the Booster Section (USCF-rated 1000-1250's), defeating teammate Harrison Loh in the final round. Loh and Joe Riddle tied for second in the section, both with 3.0's.

Waubonsie's Abhi Prabhu was 4-0 in the U1000 Super-Booster section, defeating Indian Creek's Sean Insley in the final round. Sean, along with Arin Nair and Steven Ma, both of Naperville North, all finished with three points to tie for second.

Abhi was participating in his first rated event ever, as was Steven and his Naperville North teammate Maya Ross, Cortland's Will Olson and Malta's Chris Wellendorf.  High schooler Michael Ruiz was also facing USCF competition for the first time, entering the Booster section.

Nikhil Kuricheti of Bloomington-Normal, Bryce Lawson of Rockford and Stephen Brazier of Sycamore posted the best scores among U800 players with 2.5's.

Amrutha Venkat took top honors among U600 entrants.

Monday, March 23, 2015

Core Registrations Getting Dangerously Hot for 3 Mile Island

UPDATED: You can't even see a first-run movie these days for $5 but the DeKalb Chess Club will be hosting another full day of rated chess matches Saturday at a family-friendly price.

8 hours of entertainment for $5? Such a deal! ($10 as of noon Friday).

Complete details can be found on the ICA calendar. Registrations for other sections are looking solid -- we could use a few more USCF Experts and Class A Players to join us.

So far, Vincent Do and Bradley Guan have signed up -- Vincent recently turned 13 and is ranked 27th in the country for that age. Bradley was first board on the state champion Naperville North High School team and was the top-ranked 17-year old in Illinois as of March listings.

As things stand now -- subject to change -- I am looking at splitting the Booster into an Under 1100 section and a 1000-1250 section, allowing folks to move where they are comfortable and eligible to play. As of 7:00 am Friday, this would give us 10-12-12-14 in the four proposed sections. But the day is young, right?

Last month's M*A*S*H event attracted 50 players but it's looking as if we'll surpass this. Capacity is limited to 64 players to keep player comfort at an optimal level. Advance registration is STRONGLY recommended, particularly if you are coming as a group.

Wednesday, March 18, 2015

Marshall, Kauffman, Cahill Victors at M*A*S*H Memorial

A third round victory over Wisconsin junior Ritika Pandey gave James Marshall clear first place at the M*A*S*H Memorial Open. A fourth-round draw against fellow-Illini alum Glen Gratz secured top honors for Marshall with 3.5/4.0.

Ritika, appearing in her first DeKalb tournament, took clear second place with 3.0.

Glen and Leslie Bale tied for third place with 2.5 scores.

The February 28th event attracted 50 players primarily competing in three sections. USCF Crosstables are available here.

In the 20-player Reserve section, Zachary Kauffman, now a Freeport High School senior, compiled a 3.5/4 score to claim first,  His only blemish was a second round draw versus Indian Creek chess coach Dane Bell.

Rockford Guilford coach Erik Czerwin and Jonathan Gaenzle tied for second place in the Reserve, both with 3.0 scores. Erik surrounded three victories with a third-round loss against Zach while Jonathan finished out his day with a pair of draws after two victories.

In the Booster, William Cahill compiled the tournament's lone perfect score, going 4.0/4. William was a half-point better than James Marchert who posted a 3.5.

Zhu Zhu Cai, Ben Rodriguez and Jim Stack all tied for third place with 3.0/4, all three playing in DeKalb events for the first time.

For Ben and Jim, it was their first USCF-rated event ever, posting provisional ratings in the mid 800's out of the box. Keep it up, guys!

The M*A*S*H event observed the anniversary of the airing of the last episode of the long-running Korean Conflict-set television series.