Trainings and practices are going on everyday and with a new found interest in the game, players are now improving rapidly with Nino Flores, Eric Ventinilla and Paul Garcia already beaten Roberto in practice games.
The likes of Arnel Pama, Jaime Guevarra and Zaldy Ranopa of Maintenance Department are catching up with better plays with the help of Hernandez and Ivan II Chess Computer, who will also participate in the tourney to give first timers of competitive chess a chance to improve their initial rating of 1500.
Senior player Abraham 'Abe' Francisco started practicing with others to regain his top form. He hasn't been playing chess for a long time and has been rusty for being inactive.
He can be one of the favorite to land in the top 3 while bartender Darwin Nisperos confirmed his participation through Hernandez, who will be the top seed with an estimated national rating of 2056.
Many more interested players are starting to be intrigued to the game as it is their chance to test their mettle against fellow newcomers to tournament play.
Chess clocks are being provided in their practice games.
To familiarize the players in annotating their games, Hernandez held a simutaneous chess match against Pama, Guevarra and Ventinilla.
He defeated Pama in 23 moves,Guevarra in more than 40 moves but surprisingly lost to Erick when he blundered away a rook in the middle game.
Eric showed his ware in finishing touch as Hernandez didn't have a chance to equalize even with an exchange disadvantage.
The format of the tournament is double round-robin with another weaker computer, Excalibur, to join the field.
The time control is 90 minutes for each player to finish the game and touch move rules will be applied in playing against the computers and humans.
Game time is flexible depending on the availability of players. Most games will be played after work -- 11pm onwards.
Registration fee is $5.00 with half of it going to the champion and the other half is for fund of a chess club to be founded through election of officers in the duration of the tourney.
To be added to the chess club property are two chessboards to be donated by Delfin Maligalig, a new father cafeteria cook.
Source:
Chessmate by Roberto Hernandez
Tia Belau Newspaper
Page 13
Volume 17
June 29-July 05, 2007
No comments:
Post a Comment