February 2014 Chess Roundup

In the world of chess, it may not be major breaking news, but in February for the first time, a Surinamese women's champ, Rosangela dos Ramos, held on to 4th place, qualifying for the next round of the World Chess Championship for women.  The annual Brisith Problem solving championship took place with GM John Nunn winning it.  Columbia won the 4th annual Inter-Ivy League Chess Tournament.  The US Amateur Team Tournaments all took place: North, East, South, and West.  

Closer to home, Illinois high school chess was highlighted in the web-o-sphere this past month at least a couple times.  Betsy Dynako wrote an article for the USCF and it was also covered in Susan Polgar's blog.

Here's the results of tournaments from around the state.

February 1:  The February Game-60 Quad Fide Tournament in Skokie, IL had 22 players participating.  Shashank Bala was the lone player to win all three rounds.  Crosstables.

February 1 to 2:  The Greater Chicago Championships took place in Northbrook, IL.  131 Scholastic players participated.    In the K-9 Open, Martin Stukan went 5 for 5.  This same feat was accomplished by Georgia Wolf in the K-9 U1000 Section.  Sam Fayn won all games in the K-3 Open.  In the K-3 U600 Section, there was a four-way tie for first between Mengzhu Cai, Divyesh Anand, Patrick Burke, and John Waldo.  In the K-12 Open Minkee Lee finished first after drawing in the last round.  In the K-12 U1200 Section, Diana Shklover finished in first with 4 out of 5 points.   The K-6 Open Section had Joseph Buklis in first with 5/5.  Jackie Christiansen accomplished this same feat in the K-6 Open Section.  Crosstables.

February 2:  The February Blitz 3 +2 Tournament in Skokie had David Franklin walking away as the clear winner.  Crosstable.

February 7:  The G/5 Warmup tournament in Oak Lawn had 7 players.  After 7 rounds there was a three-way tie for first between Todd Freitag, Steven Tennant and Adrian Zolkos. Crosstables.

February 8:  The Benjamin Elemtary 2014 Tournament in Bloomington drew 240 players.  In the Lower Primary Section, Pugazhendhi Saravanan Jr. won all five rounds. In the Upper Primary Section, Nicholas Bruha and Herbert Lim both went 5/5.  In the Elementary Section, Advaith Prabu took first place and gained 14 points.  In the Junior High Section, Shanku Nair, Nikhil Pallem, Rithvik Musuku, and Vishal Chanrasekar all tied for first.  Crosstables.

February 8:  The HP Scholastic and Rated February 2014 Tournament in Highland Park had 14 players.  Beating all opponents over the board, Aidan Carey took first place with a 5 for 5 record.  Crosstables.

February 8:  The February Game - 60 + 30 (Fide) Tournament in Skokie had 50 players participating. In the Open Section, Karthikeyan Pounraj finished in first with a flawless win record.  In the U1500 Section, Lyle Rubin, Edward Dornbos, Erik Pyshnov, and Sohail Amin all finished tied for first.  Crosstables.

February 8:  The Scholastic Wheaton Christian Grammar School Tournament had 149 players.  In the K-1 Section, William Cahill took first.  In the K-3 Section, Vrishank Ramnath finished first with 5 points.  Siddhartha Kyaw and Jacob Horn tied for first in the K-5 Section.  Nathan Saltzman gained 126 points after beating all his opponents in the K-8 Section.  Crosstables.

February 9:  The Naperville Scholastic Open Tournament had three sections and 25 players.  In Section A, Christine Leung and David Leung tied for first place.  In Section B, Alexander Smirnov and Rahul Ravisundar tied for first with 3/4 points.  In Section C, there was a four-way tie for first between Deniz Gulecyuz, Pradeep Senthil, George Polski, and Kyle Kras. Crosstables.

February 9:  The February Rapid Quad Tournament in Skokie had 8 players and two sections.  In the Quad 1 Section, S.E. Henderson Jr. took first with 3.5/6.0 points.  In Quad 2, Raul Aillon swept all six rounds.  Crosstables.

February 14:  Valentine's Day Massacre Tournament in Oak Lawn had 12 players.  Todd Freitag had just a single draw in four rounds to take first place.  Crosstables.

February 15:  The Colene Hoose 2014 Tournament had 4 Sections and 210 players.  In the Lower Primary Section, Seth Parent swept all five rounds, and in the Upper Primary Section, Nathan Lee accomplished the same feat.  In the Elementary Section, Jai Mahajan drew in the last round to finish in first with 4.5/5.0.  The Junior High Section had 28 players and Advaith Prabu finished in first with an unblemished record. Crosstables.

February 15: The 64th Kumbaya Section had 40 players and three sections in Skokie.  The 1200 above section had Jonathan Lee winning all three rounds.  In the U1200 Section, Elijah Platnick won 3.5/4.0 to not only take first place but earn enough rating points to pass 1200.  In the U700 Section, Oleksa Zobkiv won all four rounds.  Crosstables.

February 16:  The 2014 Amateur Team Warmup in Glenwood, IL had 15 players.  David Vogel swept all four rounds to take first.  Crosstable.

February 16:  The 98th Knights Quest in Northbrook, IL had 4 Sections and 130 players.  In the Open Section, Jack Curcio went undefeated.  In the U1400 Section, three players went 4/4 to tie for first.  They were Jonas Vriend, Arthur Xu, and Kevin Roberts.  In the  U1000 Section, Dimitar Mardov and Matthew Li tied for first.  In the U600 Section, Alex Zhao had his provisional rating jump 246 points after winning all four games.  Crosstables.

January 20 to February 17:  The Last Chance Tournament in Peoria had 18 players participating.  After a month of games, Wayne Zimmerle and Yiliang Li tied for first.  Crosstable.

February 21:  The NYCC February 2014 Tournament had two sections and 10 players.  In Section A, David Chu took first place.  In Section B, Nathan Yuan finished 4/5 finished in the number one slot.  Crosstables. 

February 22:  The Hough Feb. 2014 Tournament in Barrington had 117 players.  In the Primary Section, after five rounds, Annika Geiersbach and Nathan Hiestand tied for first with no losses.  In the Elementary Section, Rahul Ravisundar was undefeated and gained 125 rating points.  In the Open Section, Sherwin Chan finished first with 4.5/5.0 points.  Crosstables.

February 22:  The Prarieland 2014 Tournament in Bloomington had 210 players and four sections.  In the Lower Primary Section, Pugazhendhi Saravanan Jr. swept all five rounds.  In the Upper Primary Section, Anusha Nadkarni went 5 for 5.  In the Elementary Section, Jacob Davis, Ashwath Ramesh, and Vasanth Ramesh all tied for first with 4.5 points.  In the Junior High Section, Vishvarath Karthikeyan finished in first  with a perfect 4.0.  Crosstables.

February 22:  The Illinois Blitz Championships in Schaumburg had 46 players in this Game 3+2 tournament.  In the end, after 10 rounds, Priyadharshan Kannappan won and went from provisional rating of 2525 to a regular rating of 2620.  Crosstable.

February 21 to 23:  The US Amateur Team North in Schaumburg, IL had 201 players and 53 teams.  To find the team results you can go here, and to see individual results you can click here.  You can also find the write-up on the USCF website.

February 11 to 25:  The Illowa February 2014 Tournament in Moline had 13 players participating.  Roger Kromphardt from Iowa swept all three rounds.  Crosstable.