ALL SMILES FROM ROUND 5 WINNERS AT NORWAY OLYMPIAD
Three players from Palau Chess
Team score a victory each in the 5th round of 2014 World Chess
Olympiad in Tromso, Norway. From left, Roberto Hernandez, Angelica Parrado
(Both Board 1 of Palau Open and Women’s Team respectively) and Board 2 Cyril
Tomas Montel, Jr.
(Photo by Roberto Hernandez)
10 YEARS OF PALAU
JOINING FIDE
ALMOST two years of persistence
bears fruit as Palau's application for International Chess Federation (FIDE)
membership was approved by the FIDE Executive Board at its meeting in Dresden,
Germany from August 1. In an email from FIDE Secretariat Elli Sperdokli, the
membership is under the condition of fulfilling the financial obligations in a
period not later than 3 months. And to contact the FIDE Treasurer, David Jarret
for further information at david@fidechess.freeserve.co.uk
Knights and Rooks Chess Club Chairman
Roberto Hernandez immediately notify Tutii Joe Chilton and they will have a
meeting soon about the good news where chess players from Palau can now
participate in international competitions. Many interested young and old
players can now start training for World Chess Olympiad in Dresden, Germany.
In 2004, Chess Olympiad was held
in Mallorca, Spain with 124 countries participated. Turin, Italy will host the
2006 Olympiad but it's too soon to prepare for it and Palau might be an
observer first before it can participate in the biennial event.
Hernandez also notified the
players about the development in the 13th round of the 2005 Open Chess
tournament held Sunday, August 28 at Privilege Family Store and sponsored by
Bendix N. Lakobong, Leo Lacambra, Jr. and Roswell Macapagal of T-Shirt Printing
Atbp.
Jose Omega is now the solo
leader after defeating Joel Azana in 38 moves of Modern Defence. He also
collected half point after Dennis Gonzales accepted his offer of draw of the
said game. Mario Ramos will withdraw from the tournament due to his
transportation problem as he resides in Ngchesar.
Omega's win-loss-draw record is
8-1-1 and will play against Bong Alipoon in a special game on Wednesday at
Omega's residence. This is allowed because Alipoon had only 2 days off in a
week, Wednesday and Thursday. James dela Cruz, who resides in Airai View Hotel
Annex and neighbor of Hernandez, is a late comer but still managed to play 3
games in semi-blitz format (15 minutes for each player to finish the game).
He lost to Jimmy Valenzuela,
Alipoon and to Palauan bet Morton Sawaichi but won by default over Rodriguez
and Chilton, who was very busy on Sunday and most of his games were losses or
draws by default. Manny Nedic (8-3-0) is now in solo 3rd spot after clobbering Azana
in 33 moves of another Modern Defence game where Azana missed the right queen
defense and was mated instantly. Nedic lost to Alipoon later in the night and
Alipoon is still the only remaining undefeated player.
Idle
Cyril Montel, Jr. (8-1-0) collected 2 default wins over Rodriguez and Chilton
to keep abreast with Omega at 2n place. Their anticipated match seemed to be
the championship game and will be their first ever title. Hernandez emailed
Gary Bekker, the Oceania Zone 3.2b President and he responded with a very
encouraging email.
He had made similar donation of
chess sets and books to other Oceania nations such as Fiji and PNG, in an
effort to further develop the chess community within the Oceania Zone. He encouraged the Palau Chess Federation to
stage an international event in the future. He said by joining FIDE, Palau will
be able to stage international rating tournaments and send representatives to
international competitions such as Oceania Zonal Chess Championships and the
World Chess Olympiad. All Oceania chess federation sent teams to the 2004 Chess
Olympiad. He also hopes to personally come over and help organize a FIDE rated
tournament in Palau sometime in the future.
His suggestion is to run a
10-player all-play-all (round robin) tournament, in which the top six players
from Palau compete against four overseas players with relatively low
international rankings.
He suggests playing 2 games per day, like at 10:00 am and
4:00 pm over a period of one week. It would be necessary to provide a suitable
tournament venue (a local hall or conference center), a reasonable prize fund,
and discount accommodations for the international players.
He said that it would be
important that all games are played, without any forfeits or withdrawals, and
that each player scored a rating comparable to FIDE standard. The 3 best Palau
players could expect to gain an international ranking. Such an event was held
in Fiji during 2003 and several Fijian players gained their international
rating from the event. He is sure to encourage 4 international chess players to
take a chess-holiday in sunny Palau!
AND LOOK NOW, AFTER 10 YEARS OF
JOINING THE WORLD CHESS FEDERATION, PALAU HAS ALREADY SENT PLAYERS TO OCEANIA
ZONAL CHESS CHAMPIONSHIP IN AUSTRALIA IN 2009, IN 2010, 2012 AND 2014 WORLD
CHESS OLYMPIADS, TWICE AT GUAM INTERNATIONAL CHESS TOURNAMENT IN 2013 AND 2015,
IN WORLD YOUTH U-16 CHESS OLYMPIAD IN MONGOLIA AND CURRENTLY IN THE 2015 DATU
ARTHUR TAN MALAYSIAN OPEN.
At
Oceania Zonal Chess Championship in June, 2009 with eventual champion
GM David Smerdon, left, and 2009 Gold Coast Open Champion GM Gawain
Jones, 2nd from left, and CM Joselito Marcos, who became the best friend
of Roberto. (Photo by Roberto Hernandez)
At 2010 World Chess Olympiad in Khanty-Mansiysk, Russia with GM Wesley So and GM Darwin Laylo.
(Photo by Roberto Hernandez)
(Photo by Roberto Hernandez)
(Photo by Jan-Olav Berglund)
This Sunday, Sept. 13, 2015 and
the next 2 Sundays (Sept. 20, 27), the Palau Chess Federation will hold the
non-FIDE rated event of choosing the No. 8th, 9th and 10th
top chess players of Palau by a tourney for reserves players like Manuel Mahor,
Jr., Gonzalo Escapatoria, Jr., Eugene Labarda, Felix Oling, Glen Navarroza,
Allan Alcid, Arnolfo Inres, John Mark Tamayo, Nilo de Jesus, Neph Macasaet,
Josef Moyet and Sofronio “Pons” Mahor. Other players are also invited in this
event where the Top 7 of Palau will not participate – 1. Roberto Hernandez 2.
Cyril Tomas Montel, Jr. 3. Tito Cabunagan 4. CM Bernardo Garcia 5. Jeffrey
Balbalosa 6. Paquito Suringa, Jr. and 7. Dennis Gonzales.
Solution to last week’s puzzle
No. 3785: 1. Qh7+!! Nxh7 2. Ng6+ Kg8 3. Bd5 mate.
This week’s puzzle No. 3786:
White to move and mates in 3 (Solution next issue)
Source: Chess Mate by Roberto Hernandez
Tia Belau Newspaper
Pages 9-10
Volume 24
Issue 74
September 14, 2015
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