(1155) PASTRANA'S 1st AND ONLY BLITZ TITLE (TBN-March 03-10, 2006)

PASTRANA SUPERVISING THE 12 YEARS AND UNDER DIVISION OF 2005-2006 CHESS TILT
     Eugenio 'Gene' Pastrana, 2nd from right, is checking the equipment and time clock of the game between Xyron Singson and his youngest son Geaury Ken Pastrana during the middle rounds of the hectic 2005-2006 Palau Rapid Chess Championship being held at the premises of his Jean's Boutique and Store. In the middle is Jielton Cabierte and coming from crossing the road is Parinas. The elder Pastrana will host the 2006 Palau National Chess Championship that will start on March 19.
                                                           (Photo by Roberto Hernandez)



PASTRANA'S 1st AND ONLY BLITZ TITLE
 

THERE ARE a lot of blitz chess competition in Palau that Eugenio Pastrana had joined but he never finished at the top in any of them except in the pre-National Chess Championship (2006) Blitz Chess competition that was held in his Jean’s Boutique and Store on March 05, 2006.

                As usual, it’s a double round-robin format with 10 minutes time control (no increment because Palau Chess Federation is using mechanical clocks at that time).

 Registration fee is peg at $5.00 with the champion/s keeping the half of it and the other half will be spent for drinks of players. In some occasions, the drinks were already consumed and the tourney is not yet finished. Some players, like Manuel Nedic, Consul General Julius Torres, and Eddie Grefiel have spent their champions’ purse to buy another round of drinks for players or whatever the cost of the rest of the purse.

                The participants are Pastrana, Roberto Hernandez, Cyril Montel, Jr., blitz chess specialist Edwin Eti and Jimmy ‘the Drunken Master’ Valenzuela. Because of the small purse for the champion ($12.50), it was decided no drinks will be given to the players while playing and the champion/s will keep all the cash prizes.

                Pastrana got his first ever chess title (in any time control) with a 5-1-2 win-loss-draw record. BUT, Hernandez tied him for top honor with a 6-2-0 slate. All blitz tourneys in Palau don’t use tie break with the tied players splitting the cash, which happened to Eugenio and Roberto.

                Eti finished the tilt with 3-5-0 card while Montel, Jr. and Valenzuela sported an identical 2-5-1 record. The blitz tourney was held 2 weeks prior to the opening round of 2006 PNCC.

PRE-CHAMPIONSHIP BLITZ TOURNEY

March 05, 2006

Double Round Robin

                   Players                                                               Win   Loss   Draw      Total

1. GENE PASTRANA                                                   5        1         2              6
2. ROBERTO HERNANDEZ                                        6        2         0              6
3. EDWIN ETI                                                               3        5         0              3
4. CYRIL MONTEL, JR.                                               2        5         1            2.5
5. JIMMY VALENZUELA                                            2        5         1             2.5

 Source: Chess Mate by Roberto Hernandez

                Tia Belau Newspaper

                Pages 9-10

                Volume 15

                Issue 10

                March 03-10, 2006

(1108) Looking Forward to 2006 World Chess Olympiad in Torino, Italy (TBN-Jan. 06-13, 2006)

A LITTLE LEAGUE OF THEIR OWN
     Left to right, Jielton Cabierte, Xyron Singson and Geaury Ken Pastrana will have their own 12-years and under category in the ongoing 2005-2006 Palau Rapid Chess Championship if there is at least 4 contestants. Arnel Vingcoy is a possible addition aside from Ivan II Chess Computer which will be set to E (Easy) strength.
                                    (Photo by Roberto Hernandez)


                LOOKING FORWARD TO 
          2006 WORLD CHESS OLYMPIAD
                  IN TORINO, ITALY  



There is a two-week break from competitive chess in the resumption of 2005-2006 Palau Rapid Chess Championship. The Sundays (Dec. 25 and Jan. 01) are Christmas holidays and players are enjoying the break. Plays will resume on Jan. 08, 2006 where the 19^th and 20^th round will be played.

                In the meantime, all eyes are focus to the 2006 World Chess Olympiad in Torino, Italy where Palau is eligible to play for the first time if the financial obligation would be met (the 2005 due to FIDE in the amount of $576.00 or 600 Swiss Francs).

                The total collection from various individuals is $418.00 including the $100.00 that Oceania Zonal President Gary Bekker had pledged.

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 already 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. He 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 defence 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 accomodations 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!

Solution to last week's puzzle: CONGRATULATIONS TO JOSE OMEGA for solving the puzzle in less than 15 minutes: 1. ... Ne3+  2. Kh2  Qxg3+ 3. Kxg3 Be5 mate.

Source: Chess Mate by Roberto Hernandez
              Tia Belau Newspaper
              Volume 19
             Page 14
             September 02-09, 2005

(395) A LITTLE LEAGUE OF THEIR OWN

A LITTLE LEAGUE OF THEIR OWN

THREE young boys showed interest in participating in the ongoing 2005 Rapid Chess Tournament sponsored by Helena Yoichi and Gene Pastrana of Jean's Boutique.

Jielton Cabierte, 8, Xyron Songson, 10, and Ken Pastrana, 8, and the youngest son of Gene, has requested the Knights and Rooks Chess Club Chairman Roberto Hernandez to have their own age group chess tournament since all of them are just learning the game.

Hernandez assured the boys that a 10 years and under tournament would be established if there are at least 4 participants, and Ivan II Chess Computer would act as the 5th contestant.

The tournament for the 10 years and under division will be a triple round-robin and Hernandez will put up the money for the first place and 2nd place trophies.

Nirblush Tmechtul showed in interest in taking the 4th spot, but maybe unable to attend. That would allow an opening for a beginner player(s) to enter the 10 years and under league.

The tournament will be held at Jean's Boutique on Sunday, November 13, 2005.

Invitation has also been extended to the Palau community to participate in the senior division, which has 7 new members participating in the rapid chess double-round robin tournament.

The league now has 23 players and each of them has played at least 44 games against participants with varying strategies and skill levels.

In the past weeks, newcomer Jess Gomez ended the 7-game winning streak of 2-time champion Menandro Manuel in an endgame of king and knight against his king, knight and a pawn.

This did not stop Manuel from extending his overall lead to 3.5 points advantage.

Top seed and defending champion Jose Omega clobbered Rogelio Menor in their Sicilian Defence game.

Cyril Montel, Jr. scored 2 easy victories over Menor and Flavin Andres. Jimmy Valenzuela swept Gene Pastrana and Menor and moved into the 9th spot after beating after beating both James dela Cruz and Em-R de Vera.

Menor, however, lost his match to Jerry Sermeno. Manny Nedic is now is 8th spot with his 4th straight wins.



Solution to last week's puzzle: 1. Bc6 and any move by black will lead to mate in 2.
This week's puzzle: Black to move and mates in 3
(Solution next issue)

Solutions: *Puzzles studied by Flavin Andres and Roberto Hernandez.

Source: Chessmate by Roberto Hernandez
Tia Belau Newspaper
Volume XIV
Issue 45
November 11-18, 2005