9 States Represented at 60th Iowa Open; Brooks Repeats

Missouri's Michael Brooks repeated as the undisputed champion of the Iowa Open, defeating Illinois' Angelo Young in the final round. Going into their game, Young had been leading the tournament with the only 4-0 record.

Brooks had begun the two-day, five-round event with a draw, finishing 4.5. Young's 4.0/5 resulted in a four-way tie for second with Awonder Liang (WI), Robert Keating (IA) and Arshaq Saleem (IA).

Young, Liang and Keating had all been runners up to Brooks in the 59th Iowa Open in 2013. Brooks was also the co-champion in 2012.

The tournament was hosted at the Marriott Hotel and Conference Center in Coralville, IA, completed August 17.  Crosstables viewable here.

The event was organized by Mark Capron through the Iowa State Chess Association. In the Open Section, 57 players competed on both days including 15 USCF Experts or better. 11 players crossed the Mississippi River from Illinois to play in the Open.

Wisconsin's Wesley Ferguson and Adream Liang along with Kaustubh Nimkar of Kansas all posted 3.5 tallies representing the top scores for Under 2000 players. Nimkar actually won the Under 1800 designation.

Illinois' Leonard Koziol had the top U1600 score with 3.0/5. Koziol drew four matches and won one. Also in that score group were Illinois' Mariano Acosta, Ricky Wang and Marissa Li.

At 2.5 were Illinois entrants Joseph Cygan and Advaith Prabu. Prabu drew a pair of Iowa experts, Daniel Vasto and Karthikeyan Pounraj, boosting his rating to 1770.

Also competing from Illinois were Abhy Venkat, Ken Marshall, Luis Peralta, and Joe Willett.

In the 39-player Reserve Section, Kansas' Bill Qian compiled the lone perfect record. The four-round Reserve featured a Game/75 time control with a 5-second delay.

Iowa's Austin Scharosch and Daniel Deyoung finished a half-point back at 3.5/4, both winning their last three matches after first-round draws against different opponents.

In the 63-player Rated Beginners Open, Iowa's Rishabh Swamy ran the field 5.0/5, finishing a half-point ahead of Nathan Wei. Eight others posted 4.0/5's. Malcom Wei and Amrutha Venkat posted 2.0 scores representing the Land of Lincoln.

The RBO featured Game/30 time controls with a 5-second delay.

While the field of 166 players across the three sections was predominately Iowan, competitors were also registered from Illinois, Wisconsin, Missouri, Minnesota, Nebraska, Kansas, and Arkansas. Even a pair of brothers from Massachusetts represented the east coast.