All set for chess fest

Today is the eve of the Malaysia Chess Festival and tomorrow, the first of six main events – the Merdeka individual rapid open tournament – will kick off the 11-day chess festival at the ballroom of the Cititel Hotel at the MidValley shopping centre in Kuala Lumpur. 

Elsewhere on this page is a summary of the various events that everybody can look forward to. Take your choice: there is something for everyone, be it a simultaneous chess game, a five-minute blitz tournament, a 30-minute rapid chess tournament or a full 90-minute normal time regulation tournament.  

Concerns that I voiced last week about the Malaysia Chess Festival taking a possible beating from a major rival tournament being planned at the same time in nearby Manila looks to have eased.

The whole of this week as I continuously checked with the organizers, their confidence seemed to have returned to normal levels. To paraphrase a song by Harvey Schmidt in the mid-1960s, their “cup runneth over”. The organizers are brimming with joy that the response to the Festival has exceeded last year’s.

For example, tomorrow’s one-day event has attracted at least 74 players. This was the number told to me three days ago and no doubt, as more chess players arrive in Kuala Lumpur, the number of participants is set to go up further. 

Similarly too, there are at least 67 teams in the Merdeka team rapid open with foreign grandmasters from Australia, Bangladesh, Uzbekistan, Germany and India joining in the fray with local players. 

But the real icing on the cake is the increased entries for the main event, the Datuk Arthur Tan Malaysia open, that will start on Sep 1. Last year, the field consisted of exactly 100 players. Until Tuesday, 135 players had already registered for this year’s edition. 

For a long time, the organizers had been overly cautious about disclosing publicly the list of participants for fear that the foreign entries could be persuaded to withdraw and play elsewhere. Maybe the fear was unfounded but then, anything can happen in the world of chess today.

Nevertheless, today being the eve of the Malaysia Chess Festival where everything comes together, I can now safely whisper out loud that the grandmasters registered for the Malaysia open include: 

Abhijeet Gupta (India, rated 2587), Zhou Weiqi (China, 2570), Ziaur Rahman (Bangladesh, 2543), Cao Sang (Vietnam, 2540), Prasad Arun (India, 2535), David Smerdon (Australia, 2526), Dao Thien Hai (Vietnam, 2516), Wen Yang (China, 2507), R.R. Laxman (India, 2503), Xu Jun (China, 2503), Nguyen Anh Dung (Vietnam, 2500), Saidali Yuldachev (Uzbekistan, 2496), Jha Sriram (India, 2490), Xu Yuhua (China, 2488), Marat Dzhumaev (Uzbekistan, 2484), Gerhard Schebler (Germany, 2474) and Niaz Murshed (Bangladesh, 2406).

They may not be the top echelon of grandmasters in the world but hey, the Malaysia open was never about attracting the crème de la crème of grandmasters in the first place. Much as like water finding its own level, grandmasters and international masters will find the right level of tournaments to suit their own playing levels. 

Anyway, the Malaysia open will also feature two woman grandmasters from China and Vietnam, at least 18 international masters, several Fide masters and woman Fide masters. 

The Malaysian challenge will be spearheaded by international masters Mok Tze Meng and Jimmy Liew. 

There is a sizeable number of Malaysian entries and apart from Mok and Liew, we have no less than four national masters in the field too, namely, Lim Chuin Hoong, current national champion Tan Khai Boon, Edward Lee and Evan Timothy Capel. There will also be spotlight on Yeoh Li Tian. 

And I should also particularly mention the presence of two of our woman national masters, current women’s national champion Fong Mi Yen and Alia Anin Azwa Bakri, as among the competitors. They are being very good sports.

Up next  

Malaysia chess festival

Here is a summary of all the events at this year’s Malaysia Chess Festival. All games will be played at the Cititel Midvalley ballroom:

a)Datuk Arthur Tan Malaysia open: Fide-titled event, nine rounds, Sep 1-7, USD4,000 first prize, entry fees range from USD50 to USD200 depending on player’s rating;

b)AmBank Malaysia chess challenge: Fide-rated event but player’s rating not to exceed 2200 points, nine rounds, Sep 1-7, RM2,000 first prize, entry fees range from RM75 to RM150 depending on player’s rating, 20 percent discount for players below 16 years old;

c)Merdeka national age group rapid open: seven rounds, Sep 5, medals as prizes, RM25 entry fee;

d)Tan Sri Lee Loy Seng international seniors open: Fide-rated event, nine rounds, Sep 1-7, RM4,000 first prize, entry fees range from RM100 to RM400 depending on player’s rating;

e)ASTRO Merdeka individual rapid open: seven rounds, Aug 28, RM1,000 first prize, entry fees are RM30 (adults) and RM20 (under-16 players);

f)ASTRO Merdeka team rapid open: nine rounds, Aug 29-31, RM5,000 first prize, entry fees range from RM150 to RM375 depending on number of players in the team;

g)ASTRO simultaneous chess display: Sep 3, 10 grandmasters and international masters against 250 players below 16 years old, entry fee RM20 per player per ASTRO account;

h)Malaysia blitz open: details to be announced later, Sep 7.

More details from Hamid Majid (019.3158098, fax 03.40244337, aham@pc.jaring.my or aham4you@gmail.com).

UTP rapid chess

As part of Universiti Teknologi Petronas’ convocation programme this year, there will be a national rapid chess open tournament at the main hall of the university’s campus in Tronoh, Perak on Oct 9-10. The Malaysian Chess Federation and the Perak International Chess Association are the co-organisers with the University. Entry fees are RM35 for adults and players below 18 years old, RM30 for players below 16 years old and RM25 for players below 12 years old. More information available from Saeksarn Sinnaso (saeksarnskill@gmail.com) or Wan Fatin Izyan (eyanzdaqpe@gmail.com). 

 

Spanner in the works

There are just nine days to go before the start of this year’s Malaysia Chess Festival. Are you ready for it? A highlight of this year’s festival programme will be a second visit to our shores by the 12th world chess champion, Anatoly Karpov.

He won’t be playing in any of the tournaments at the festival. Rather, he will be here for only a few days in early September before jetting off elsewhere to continue with his worldwide campaign to become the next president of the World Chess Federation (Fide).

Nevertheless, spectators and participants alike at the Malaysia Chess Festival can expect to bump into the former world champion. If you need him to autograph any of his chess books, this will be an opportunity for you. Chess enthusiasts can also look forward to attend a special subscription-based Buka Puasa function with him on Sep 5.

When I was speaking to the organizers of the festival earlier this week, I was reminded that they were facing possibly the greatest and gravest challenges to their organizational capabilities in the last seven years. 

For the first time since the inception of the Datuk Arthur Tan Malaysia open chess championship in 2004, the organizers are bracing themselves for a rival competition in nearby Philippines to pull away some of the entries.

Yes, there is also an international chess tournament that’s been planned in Manila at almost the same time. Normally, federations would work together to ensure that international tournaments would not overlap. 

It’s not difficult to understand why. If tournaments do not overlap, players – especially the professional chess players – would be easier to persuade to play in these events one after another. It maximizes their investment of time and money to fly into this region to play in the chess competitions, and all organizers are happy with the quality of players that they can attract.  

Not this time. The National Chess Federation of the Philippines (NCFP) has been promised USD100,000 by Kirsan Ilyumzhinov, the current Fide president, to hold a tournament in memory of his predecessor, Florencio Campomanes, who died earlier this year.

Now, with Campomanes being a Filipino and all that, there was no way that the NCFP was going to say no to holding this memorial event. But then for some reason, the dates chosen for their event were pushed from mid-August to the end of August. Naturally, this then overlapped substantially with the dates for the Malaysia Chess Festival. 

Some people say that it had been done with a purpose. It’s not that the NCFP is not aware that the Malaysia Chess Festival is an annual event. The festival is already in its seventh year and is well publicized around the world. In the past, Filipino chess players have always turned up to support both the Datuk Arthur Tan Malaysia open and the Merdeka rapid chess team tournaments. 

But not this year. Word has been going around that the NCFP had advised their players in no uncertain terms that they should be playing in Manila instead of Kuala Lumpur. Worse still, there is unconfirmed news that the top Filipino players have been threatened with bans by their federation should they ignore this “advice”.

In all likelihood, the Filipino players will not be here. Certainly, those players who have already been selected by their federation for the Chess Olympiad in Khanty-Mansiysk will not want to jeopardize their selection status. Those players not in the Filipino team can’t be bothered with the ban but they may be attracted to the larger prize moneys at the Campmanes memorial tournament in Manila.

All this is, of course, very sad because if Campomanes were alive today, the last thing he would want was for his memorial tournament to clash with the Malaysian Chess Festival. Campomanes has always been a very good and supportive friend of Malaysia. It was a friendship that started in 1974 and even until last year, he had been a regular visitor here.

But why, you may ask, is the NCFP risking to upset the other federations in the region? The answer may be simply that it all boils down to relationships and the charged atmosphere that’s presently enveloping chess, an atmosphere created by the Fide election campaign. 

In the world of chess, there is a close bond between Fide and the NCFP. It had all started with Campomanes’ own election as Fide president in 1982. The bond remained after Ilyumzhinov took over the Fide reins. Even Campo’s death has not changed this relationship.

It is publicly known that the NCFP is supporting the Ilyumzhinov ticket at the Fide elections next month while Malaysia’s stand has been to side with Karpov. There are claims by Karpov’s team that the Ilyumzhinov team has been going around the world to promise great rewards to national federations that support them.

Whether or not this claim can be substantiated is not for me to say but in the absence of any other explanation, any observer will be guessing that if this claim is true, then there’s every reason for the NCFP to want their Campomanes memorial tournament to succeed at the expense of the Malaysian Chess Festival.  

Nevertheless, the organizers of the Malaysian Chess Festival are quite confident that the Manila event will have little impact on the success of our local festival. 

“We are still enjoying very good response from the foreign players. They know Malaysian hospitality well and they know that when they play here, they are among old friends. Friendship counts a lot among real friends,” said one of the organizers.

Up next  

Malaysia chess festival

Here is a summary of all the events at this year’s Malaysia Chess Festival. All games will be played at the Cititel Midvalley ballroom:

a)Datuk Arthur Tan Malaysia open: Fide-titled event, nine rounds, Sep 1-13, USD4,000 first prize, entry fees range from USD50 to USD200 depending on player’s rating;

b)AmBank Malaysia chess challenge: Fide-rated event but player’s rating not to exceed 2200 points, nine rounds, Sep 1-13, RM2,000 first prize, entry fees range from RM75 to RM150 depending on player’s rating, 20 percent discount for players below 16 years old;

c)Merdeka national age group rapid open: seven rounds, Sep 5, medals as prizes, RM25 entry fee;

d)Tan Sri Lee Loy Seng international seniors open: Fide-rated event, nine rounds, Sep 1-13, RM4,000 first prize, entry fees range from RM100 to RM400 depending on player’s rating;

e)Merdeka individual rapid open: seven rounds, Aug 28, RM1,000 first prize, entry fees are RM30 (adults) and RM20 (under-16 players);

f)Astro Merdeka team rapid open: nine rounds, Aug 29-31, RM5,000 first prize, entry fees range from RM150 to RM375 depending on number of players in the team;

More details from Hamid Majid (019.3158098, fax 03.40244337, aham@pc.jaring.my or aham4you@gmail.com).

Penang rapid chess

The Penang Chess Association (PCA) is holding a rapid chess tournament on Aug 22 as a warm-up event for players before they participate in the Malaysia Chess Festival. Entry fees are RM10 for  PCA members and RM25 for non-members. To register, contact Tan Eng Seong (012-4299517 after 7pm, estan64@streamyx.com or estan64@gmail.com). Entries close on Aug 20.

UTP rapid chess

As part of Universiti Teknologi Petronas’ convocation programme this year, there will be a national rapid chess open tournament at the main hall of the university’s campus in Tronoh, Perak on Oct 9-10. The Malaysian Chess Federation and the Perak International Chess Association are the co-organisers with the University. Entry fees are RM35 for adults and players below 18 years old, RM30 for players below 16 years old and RM25 for players below 12 years old. More information available from Saeksarn Sinnaso (saeksarnskill@gmail.com) or Wan Fatin Izyan (eyanzdaqpe@gmail.com). 

 

Clash of the titans

Who do you think will win if a match were to be played today between Russia and China? Russia is, of course, the traditional chess power house of the world while China is the top chess-playing country in Asia.

If the top 10 players in each country are taken as the basis of comparison, the Russian men leads their Chinese counterparts by 89 rating points today. And if a comparison is made of their women chess players, the difference is even smaller: a mere 11 points separate the 10 best players from both sides.

Therefore, a match between these two chess super-powers would make a very good reason to determine which country is superior.

And actually, there is such a match going on today. It is the seventh such encounter between the two countries but it did not start out as an annual match because after the first one was played in Shanghai in 2001, there was a three-year gap before the second match was organized in Moscow in 2004.

After that, the chess federations of the two countries thought it best to have an annual match and so, Argun in Russia was the host in 2006, followed by the fourth match in Nizhni Novgorod in 2007, Ningbo in China in 2008, and last year’s match in Sochi, Russia.

This year’s match is taking place today in Yinzhou, Ninbo in China, having started on Aug 4 and will end this Sunday. Each side is fielding five men’s players and five women’s players.

The match comprises a Scheveningen style of team event where the members of each team will play the members of the opposing team once at normal time controls, followed by rapidchess games and finally, a series of blitz games. Of course, to ensure an even playing field, the men are competing among themselves only and likewise, the women are playing among themselves too.

In the first round, the China men’s team won with a 3-2 score but the Russian women won 3½-1½. In the second round, the Russian men were almost whitewashed when China won by 4½-½. However, the women’s teams fought to a 2½-2½ draw. In the third round, Russia and China tied at 2½-2½ in both the men’s and women’s contests.

The fourth round saw the men drawing on all the boards while the Russian women edged out their Chinese opponents by a 3-2 margin. In the fifth, both the Chinese men’s and women’s sides won by 3-2. 

The final score at the end of the normal time control games on Tuesday was 27 points to the China team and 23 points to Russia. 

The Chinese men’s team could take credit that they did not lose any of the rounds. At their worst, they drew the third round but at their best, they almost totally blanked out the Russian men in the second round.

Here are two Wang Hao games from the match. Wang Hao is the current national champion of China. He is also a previous winner of the Malaysia open chess tournament in 2005. The first game below was from the fifth round while the other one was played in the fourth round.

White: Vladimir Potkin (Russia)

Black: Wang Hao (Chinese) 

1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nc3 Bb4 4.e3 0-0 5.Bd3 d5 6.Nf3 c5 7.0-0 Nc6 8.a3 Bxc3 9.bxc3 Qc7 10.Bb2 Na5 11.cxd5 exd5 12.Ne5 Re8 13.a4 Rxe5 (A rather inspired exchange sacrifice. In exchange for the rook, Black gets a dominating knight into the game.) 14.dxe5 Qxe5 15.h3 c4 (This fixes White’s black-squared bishop and after which, Black can look to exchanging off White’s other bishop.) 16.Bc2 Bf5 17.Re1 Bxc2 18.Qxc2 Nb3 19.Rad1 Re8 20.f3 Nc5 21.Rd4 Nd3 22.Re2 (It was time to eliminate the black knight with 22.Rxd3.) 22...Nh5 23.e4 (23.Rxd3 is too late because of 23...cxd3 24.Qxd3 Nf4.) 23...Nhf4 24.Rd2 f5 25.Ba3 fxe4 26.fxe4 Qg5 27.Kh2 Rxe4 28.Qd1 Qe5 29.Rxe4 dxe4 30.Qg4 h5 0-1

White: Wang Hao (China) 

Black: Sergei Rublevsky (Russia) 

1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 e6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nc6 5.Nc3 a6 6.Be2 Qc7 7.0-0 Nf6 8.Be3 Be7 9.f4 d6 10.a4 0-0 11.Kh1 Re8 12.Bf3 Rb8 13.Qd2 Na5 14.b3 b6 15.Rad1 Bb7 16.Nde2 Rbc8 17.Bf2 Nc6 18.g4 d5 19.e5 Ne4 20.Nxe4 dxe4 21.Bg2 Nb4 22.c3 Red8 23.Bd4 Nd5 24.Qc2 e3 25.Qd3 Bc5 26.c4 Bxd4 27.Qxd4 Nf6 28.Qxe3 Nxg4 29.Qg3 h5 30.Nd4 Bxg2+ 31.Kxg2 Qb7+ 32.Kg1 Rd7 33.h3 Nh6 34.Rd2 Rcd8 35.Rfd1 g6 36.Qe3 Kg7 37.Kf2 Qc7 38.Ke2 Kh7 39.Rd3 Qb7 40.Qf3 Qc7 41.Qc6 Rc8 42.Qxc7 Rdxc7 43.Nf3 Nf5 44.Ng5+ Kg8 45.Rd8+ Rxd8 46.Rxd8+ Kg7 47.Ne4 h4 48.Kd3 Rc6 49.b4 Rc7 50.Nf6 Rb7 51.Ra8 a5 52.b5 Ng3 53.Ne8+ Kh6 54.Nd6 Rc7 55.Rh8+ Kg7 56.Rb8 Rc5 57.Rxb6 g5 58.Rc6 g4 59.Ne4 gxh3 60.Nf2 Rxc6 61.bxc6 Nf5 62.Nxh3 Kf8 63.c7 Ne7 64.Kd4 (This was a mistake that threw away the full point. White should have played 64.c5 and 65.c6 to cut off Black’s king from the queenside.) 64...Ke8 65.Kc5 Kd7 66.Kb6 Kc8 67.Ng5 Nf5 68.Kxa5 Kxc7 69.Kb5 Nd4+ 70.Kb4 Kc6 71.a5 Ne2 72.Nh3 Nd4 73.c5 Kb7 74.Kc4 Nc6 75.Kb5 Nd4+ 76.Kc4 Nc6 77.Ng5 Nxa5+ 78.Kd3 Kc6 79.Ke4 Nb3 80.Kf3 Nxc5 81.Kg4 Nd3 82.Nh3 Kd5 83.Kxh4 ½-½ 

Up next  

Merdeka rapid events

Here is a reminder to all local chess players that the Merdeka individual rapid open tournament will be played on Aug 28, the Merdeka team rapid open tournament on Aug 29-31, and the Merdeka individual national age-group rapid open tournament will be on Sep 5. Venue for all three events is the Cititel hotel ballroom at the MidValley Megamall in Kuala Lumpur. 

For the individual rapid event, entry fees are RM20 for players below 16 years old and RM30 for others. For the team rapid event, entry fees are RM300 for four-player teams and RM375 for five-player teams. Junior teams (all players to be below 16 years old) will be charged at RM150 for four-player teams and RM175 for five-player teams. For the age-group event, the entry fee is RM25. More details from Hamid Majid (019.3158098, fax 03.40244337, aham@pc.jaring.my or aham4you@gmail.com).

 

Tough choice

Right after my column appeared with this picture last week, I received a short message from one of Malaysia’s international masters. 

By all accounts, it can be safely assumed that Wong Zijing is no longer actively playing in chess competions. As far as I can determine, he hasn’t been playing much at all since August 2006. In fact, even social chess may have taken a back seat with him as his last known attempt at a serious chess game must gave been at last year’s time-hallowed annual chess match between the teams of Cambridge and Oxford universities.

His friends and fellow chess players in the country may want to know that he is now a graduate student pursuing his Doctorate degree at the University of California Berkeley in the United States. He asked me to say “hi” to them. 

Before going over to the States, Wong was at University of Cambridge in England and before that, he was at the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology. He is now doing research on a specialist area of science called metamaterials. Want to know what it is? Just look it up on the Internet.

Anyway, after taking a look at the picture in last week’s column, Wong dropped me a short note to say that it was about time that 12-year-old Yeoh Li Tian, pictured playing a blitz game with former world chess champion Anatoly Karpov, decide whether he wanted to be like “Le Quang Liem” or “one of us”.

He didn’t mince his words. The “one of us” refers explicitly to himself and his chess peers, local players like Mas Hafizulhelmi, Lim Yee Weng, Marcus Chan, Nicholas Chan and Lim Chuin Hoong. 

The “Le Quang Liem” he mentioned happens to be Vietnam’s top chess player. Liem joined the world’s grandmaster club four years ago. Today, while only 19 years old but with an international rating of 2681 points, he is already knocking on the doors of that even more elite club of chess grandmasters who are rated at 2700 points or above. There are not many of them, certainly not more than 40 players currently in this category of super-grandmasters.

I knew fairly well what Wong was trying to say but his note made such a fascinating impression that I wanted to know slightly more from him. 

Well, he told me, everyone knows that to become a grandmaster like Liem, you need to be a professional chess player and the financial support to train abroad. Recently, the Vietnam Chess Federation came out to say that Liem would require an annual fund of USD100,000. Then there is the player’s own commitment and sacrifices, especially academic sacrifice. Is our society ready for that, he questioned.

“I have a good friend in China who told me that many of the Chinese grandmasters had quit school at the early stage of their lives to take up a professional career in chess. Many of them had not even completed their primary education. 

“Are our chess players prepared to make such personal sacrifices,” he continued. “My peers and I had to balance chess with our studies because at the end of the day, we have to think about our own livelihood and our direction in life.” 

Livelihood. Indeed, if we look at some of our national champions, I can say that they have ended up very well in life. Mas Hafizulhelmi is today a chemical engineer, both Lim Chuin Hoong and Nicholas Chan are medical doctors, Lim Yee Weng is a lawyer while Marcus Chan is an electronics engineer. Even Ooi Chern Ee, arguably our highest ranked player not to have become a national champion, is an actuarist. But to get where they are today, they recognize that they have had to sacrifice their chess.

According to Wong, only geniuses are able to continue with this fine balance in their lives, He believed that Gata Kamsky, a chess prodigy, was one of them. 

(Kamsky was born in the old Soviet Union in 1974 and his family emigrated to the United States in 1989. At 16 years old, he took his first steps towards the pinnacle of world chess and ultimately challenged Viswanathan Anand for the Professional Chess Association version of the chess crown in 1995. One year later, he challenged Anatoly Karpov for the World Chess Federation version of the chess title. After he lost both matches, he disappeared completely from the chess world for nine years to earn his law degree and then returned to top-level chess in 2004 with great success.)

Unless you are like Kamsky, Wong said, it is almost impossible to find that balance between chess and work. Where Li Tian is concerned, he suggested that the boy would have to make up his mind soon. 

No doubt, his one-month stint in Beijing last year and his present chess tutelage under Bangladeshi grandmaster Ziaur Rahman would help his chess grow in the short to medium term but he must either have the courage to make chess his profession or concentrate on his studies and eventually “be like one of us.” 

“It’s a tough decision, very tough indeed,” Wong acknowledged, “but there are no two ways about it.”

Up next  

Cerdik Catur

The Cerdik Catur chess challenge will be played at the Kompleks Belia dan Kebudayaan Negeri Selangor in Section 7, Shah Alam this Sunday. For Shah Alam residents, the entry fees are RM20 for adults and RM15 for under-18 players. Non-Shah Alam residents are required to pay RM5 more. For inquiries, contact Mohd Fadli Zakaria (014.2312370, seme_event@yahoo.com). 

Merdeka rapid events

The Merdeka individual rapid open tournament will be played on Aug 28, the Merdeka team rapid open tournament on Aug 29-31, and the Merdeka individual national age-group rapid open tournament will be on Sep 5. Venue for all three events is the Cititel hotel ballroom at the MidValley Megamall in Kuala Lumpur. Entries close on Aug 10 for the first two events and Aug 29 for the third event.

For the individual rapid event, entry fees are RM20 for players below 16 years old and RM30 for others. For the team rapid event, entry fees are RM300 for four-player teams and RM375 for five-player teams. Junior teams (all players to be below 16 years old) will be charged at RM150 for four-player teams and RM175 for five-player teams. For the age-group event, the entry fee is RM25. More details from Hamid Majid (019.3158098, fax 03.40244337, aham@pc.jaring.my or aham4you@gmail.com).

 

On the campaign trail

The message was clear enough. The World Chess Federation (Fide) must change or else it will continue to lose influence and significance in the world at large, said Anatoly Karpov, the 12th world chess champion, who was in Kuala Lumpur last week.

Karpov, 59 years of age, was in the country for three days as part of a whirl-wind visit through several south-eastern and east Asian countries to raise support from national chess federations in his campaign to be elected as the next Fide president. 

According to the Fide presidential candidate, the leadership in Fide has not had much achievement in the past 15 years and the federation has also neglected the interests of many of the chess federations in its fold.

One of the sore points that Karpov raised was that the incumbent Fide president, Kirsan Ilyumzhinov, had alienated international sponsors from playing their roles in the world body.

“Chess is one of the most active sports in the world and Fide has 158 member countries. In terms of members, we are among the biggest international sports federations in the world and yet we don’t see long-term ties with sponsors that should benefit us,” Karpov charged.

“For example, world chess championship matches used to offer big prize moneys by the millions of dollars but ever since the present Fide president came on board, we have seen lower prize moneys. In fact, the many changes in the formats for the world championship cycles have caused a lot of confusion in the chess world and is it any wonder that international sponsors have shied away from this mess since 1995?” he asked.

If his team gets elected at the Fide congress this September, one priority would be to bring dignity back into chess. According to him, short 10-game or 12-game matches were hardly reflective of chess struggles at the highest levels. “World championship matches should not be less than 16 or 18 games but Fide presently finds difficulty to bring in quality sponsors who can support matches of this length. Why should this be so?” he said.

Karpov gave another example of the decreasing visibility, saying that significant activities like world championship matches used to be played in the big cities of the world – New York, London, Seville, Paris – but he claimed that since 1995, these events were being moved to lesser cities. 

“Also, it doesn’t say much for chess that this year’s chess Olympiad, which is the traditional biennial gathering for the world-wide chess family of close to 160 countries, is being held in Siberia, a place called Khanty-Mansiysk,” he claimed. 

And in truth, that is correct because I’ve written about Khanty-Mansiysk before. Even getting there is going to be problematic enough, as most connecting flights are only available from Moscow and it’s a journey of several days.

But the chord that struck home was that in recent years, national chess federations have been feeling the pinch of paying increasingly higher fees to Fide for all sorts of activities. The smaller chess federations such as the Malaysian Chess Federation find that annual fees have been growing significantly. 

Getting new players onto the Fide rating list, no matter their rating levels, means getting billed for them. Federations need to pay significant amounts for players to have their chess titles formalized. Then there are the high registration fees for registering even Fide-rated events. All these fees add up and it is not surprising that there are countries that find themselves temporarily out-of-benefit from Fide because fees are in arrears. The MCF, for example, found out painfully that our players were temporarily removed from the Fide rating list because of unsettled fees.

According to Karpov, countries should not be forced to fund Fide. It should be the other way around, that Fide should instead be helping the countries raise their own funds for their internal activities.

“It should make sense,” he argued, “that a happy national chess federation will contribute more towards the progress of chess.”

Apart from Malaysia, Karpov and his small entourage that included his candidate for deputy president, Richard Conn Jr, had moved through China, Japan, Singapore, Indonesia, Vietnam and Thailand.

While in Kuala Lumpur, Karpov paid a courtesy call on Olympic Council of Malaysia president Tunku Imran ibni Almarhum Tuanku Ja'afar at the OCM office in Kuala Lumpur and was guest of honour at a function hosted by the Malaysian Chess Federation’s honorary life president, Datuk Tan Chin Nam, who incidentally also sits in Karpov’s Advisory Team.

The former world champion also played two exhibition blitz games with Malaysian international master Mas Hafizulhelmi and up-and-coming youngster Yeoh Li Tian, winning both of them.

Up next  

Tebrau open

The Johor Chess Academy, the Rukun Tetangga Sri Tebrau, Rakan Muda Johor Bahru and the Johor Bahru Chess Association are jointly organizing the 21st Tebrau open chess tournament at the Plaza Pelangi in Johor Bahru on Sunday. 

Entry fees are RM10 for players below 10 years old, RM12 for players below 16 years old and RM30 for all other participants. Closing date is today. For more information, contact Narayanan Krishnan (013.7717525 or jb_chess_association@yahoo.com).

DATCC razzmatazz

The Datuk Arthur Tan Chess Centre (DATCC) will organize their third DATCC razzmatazz rapidchess weekender at their premises in the Wilayah Complex, Jalan Munshi Abdullah, Kuala Lumpur on Sunday. 

Entry fees are RM30 for adults and RM15 for children below 12 years old. For inquiries, contact Najib Wahab (016.3382542, najib.wahab@chess-malaysia.com) or Justin Kumar (018.3960781, kjustin09@yahoo.com). 

Cerdik Catur

The Cerdik Catur chess challenge will be played at the Kompleks Belia dan Kebudayaan Negeri Selangor in Section 7, Shah Alam on Aug 8. For Shah Alam residents, the entry fees are RM20 for adults and RM15 for under-18 players. Non-Shah Alam residents are required to pay RM5 more. For inquiries, contact Mohd Fadli Zakaria (014.2312370, seme_event@yahoo.com). 

Merdeka rapid events

The Merdeka individual rapid open tournament will be played on Aug 28 and the Merdeka team rapid open tournament on Aug 29-31. Venues for both events is the Cititel hotel ballroom at the MidValley Megamall in Kuala Lumpur. Closing date for entries is Aug 10.

For the individual rapid event, entry fees are RM20 for players below 16 years old and RM30 for others. For the team rapid event, entry fees are RM300 for four-player teams and RM375 for five-player teams. Junior teams (all players to be below 16 years old) will be charged at RM150 for four-player teams and RM175 for five-player teams. More details from Hamid Majid (019.3158098, fax 03.40244337, aham@pc.jaring.my or aham4you@gmail.com).

 

Mating season

I’ve this particular friend, you see, who calls me up once in a long while to enquire about forthcoming big tournaments in the country. He’s always like that. He very keen on chess but he seldom plays. A few times I’d bump into him at tournaments but more often, I don’t see him anywhere.

Lately, I haven’t heard a word from him. I thought his interest in chess tournaments was waning but out of the blue, he gave me a tinkle again two weeks ago.

“Hey,” he asked me, “mid-August is coming up soon. That’s school holidays time, isn’t it? Haven’t you heard anything yet about this year’s Malaysia open?” 

Yes and no, I told him. Yes, I have been informed about the Malaysia open. Or maybe I should say more correctly, the Malaysia Chess Festival. But no, mid-August is not school holidays time any more. Not this year any way, because the schools’ mid-term break has been shifted to Sep 3-12.

Because of the shift in the school holidays, the organizers of the Malaysia Chess Festival have also shifted the chess festival to accommodate more locals to play in some of the programmes.

This year’s festival dates run from Aug 29 to Sep 7. All the traditional features are there: from typical one-day local rapidchess events to full-fledged international Fide-rated tournaments. 

If you need to warm up your nimble mind and fingers before the big events start, the first item on the Malaysia Chess Festival calendar is the new one-day Merdeka individual rapid open tournament at the ballroom of the CitiTel Midvalley hotel in Kuala Lumpur on Aug 28.

After that, you can then proceed to the traditional Merdeka team rapid open tournament. This event has a history going back some 30 years. It had its humble beginnings at the Wisma Belia before progressing to larger venues like the Putra World Trade Centre before finally finding its present home at the CitiTel Midvalley.  

Like in previous editions, this annual event brings out the teams from all over the country. Although not billed as such, it is often acknowledged as the unofficial national team open championship. As such, it is not unusual to find several state teams from both ends of the country converging in Kuala Lumpur over the Merdeka weekend and mingling with a mish-mash of other teams and players.

This Merdeka team event is a great crowd-puller not least because many foreigners who take part in the Fide-rated Malaysia open tournament that comes later are often roped in to play.

Naturally, the local players take this into their stride. In recent years, I have seen that our local teams have become more adept at challenging the foreign player-led ones for the main prizes. No more are they satisfied for the special prizes that have been created for the best performing local teams. 

It’s now the big prizes – RM5,000 for the champion team, RM4,000 for the runners-up, RM3,000 for third place, and many more – or none at all, which is good because we are shedding the old mentality that had been our glass ceiling for decades.

So for this year, the 30th ASTRO Merdeka team rapid open tournament will be played at the same CitiTel Midvalley hotel ballroom from Aug 29 to Aug 31. 

Although entries for both the Merdeka individual rapid open and the Merdeka team rapid open will close on Aug 10, do register early for this event because the organizers are capping the entries at 100 players for the individual event and 50 teams for the team event due to constraints of space. 

The biggest three events in the chess festival will commence immediately after the conclusion of the Merdeka tournaments from Sep 1 to Sep 7. 

The top billing is, of course, the Datuk Arthur Tan Malaysia open chess tournament which is already in its seventh year. There is a USD4,000 first prize which should see a host of foreign grandmasters and international masters turning up. Even the prize for the top Malaysian player is worth USD800.

With this incredible foreign talent pool here, there will be lots of opportunities for all players to work on their own title norms. Anyone serious enough about their chess should not miss the chance to participate.

Apart from this, there’s also the AmBank Malaysia chess challenge, also another Fide-rated event but limited to players whose international ratings are below 2200 points. I know that there will be some comparisons with the main event in terms of prestige but believe you me, the challenge of playing in this lesser tournament cannot be any easier. Just ask any of the previous participants and they will tell you that this AmBank chess challenge can be equally mind draining.

This year, the organizers are introducing a new event into the chess festival: a tournament for senior chess players. This idea had been under discussion for at least a year and at long last, it is time to take the wrappings off the first Tan Sri Lee Loy Seng international seniors open chess tournament.

It’s not any ordinary social tournament for senior citizens, mind you. This is as serious as any international chess event can be, except that no player can be younger than 55 years old.

Maybe as a comparison, I should mention that the World Chess Federation have their world senior and world women’s senior chess championships organized since 1991. Illustrious names Vasily Smyslov, Efim Geller, Mark Taimanov, Alexey Suetin, Viktor Korchnoi and Nona Gaprindashvili have appeared in the world senior’s roster as worthy winners.

So this seniors tournament is going to be a new event in the Malaysia Chess Festival. Of course, anything new will require some time to gain a degree of acceptance but there is no reason why this inaugural tournament cannot take a short-cut and attain the same prominence as the other events.

Need more information and details about the Malaysia Chess Festival? Just contact Abdul Hamid at the Datuk Arthur Tan Chess Centre (019.3158098, fax 03.40244337, aham@pc.jaring.my or aham4you@gmail.com) and he’ll send you the entry forms. 

Up next  

Perlis team open

The Perlis Chess Academy, the Majlis Sukan Sekolah-sekolah Perlis and the Persatuan Catur Prestij Perlis will jointly hold the Perlis team open tournament at the Dewan Sek. Men. Putra in Kangar, Perlis tomorrow. For more details, contact Syaifulzamani bin Ismail (013.3939838) or visit http://chessperlis.blogspot.com. 

MBS chess

The Methodist Boys’ Secondary School in Jalan Hang Jebat, Kuala Lumpur will hold the fifth MBSSKL chess open tournament at the school premises tomorrow. For enquiries, contact teachers NK Chin or (Mdm) LY Yong at the school (03.20782293).

Perak grand prix

The sixth leg of the Tan Sri Lee Loy Seng Perak grand prix chess tournament will be played at the Sekolah Menengah Kebangsaan St Anthony in Teluk Intan, Perak this Sunday. For more information, contact Yunus (013.3908129), Hamisah (012.5008723) or Andrew (016.6295352) or visit http://perakchess.blogspot.com 

Tebrau open

The Johor Chess Academy, the Rukun Tetangga Sri Tebrau, Rakan Muda Johor Bahru and the Johor Bahru Chess Association are jointly organizing the 21st Tebrau open chess tournament at the Plaza Pelangi in Johor Bahru on Aug 1.

Entry fees are RM10 for players below 10 years old, RM12 for players below 16 years old and RM30 for all other participants. Closing date is July 30. For more information, contact Narayanan Krishnan (013.7717525 or jb_chess_association@yahoo.com).

DATCC razzmatazz

The Datuk Arthur Tan Chess Centre (DATCC) will organize their third DATCC razzmatazz rapidchess weekender at their premises in the Wilayah Complex, Jalan Munshi Abdullah, Kuala Lumpur on Aug 1. 

Entry fees are RM30 for adults and RM15 for children below 12 years old. For inquiries, contact Najib Wahab (016.3382542, najib.wahab@chess-malaysia.com) or Justin Kumar (018.3960781, kjustin09@yahoo.com). 

 

Battle lines drawn

Come this September, we shall see what will possibly be the most acrimonious presidential contest for the World Chess Federation (Fide) for a long while. 

Lining up on one side of the contest is the incumbent president of the world body, Kirsan Ilyumzhinov, who is seeking re-election since first getting elected to the top post in 1995. On the other side is his very worthy opponent, former world chess champion Anatoly Karpov.

When nominations closed at the end of last month for the submission of electoral tickets, the only two teams that met the deadline were that of Ilyumzhinov and Karpov. This means that they will go head-to-head in a direct clash of wills and personality that will see no compromise from either party.

Lined up on Ilyumzhinov’s team are Georgios Makropoulos, Ignatius Leong, Nigel Freeman, Beatriz Marinello and Lewis Ncube. 

Makropoulos is the president of the Greek Chess Federation but he is also the Fide deputy president since 1996. Leong is the president of the Singapore Chess Federation and also the Fide general secretary since 2005. Freeman, the president of the Bermuda Chess Federation, is the current Fide treasurer, a position held since 2006. Marinello is a former president of the United States Chess. NCube is a former president of the Zambia Chess Federation and presently a Fide vice-president since 2006. 

All of them, except for Marinello, are seeking to be returned to the same positions they are currently holding in the federation while Marinello is seeking to fill a Fide vice-president’s slot.

Karpov’s ticket consists of Richard A Conn Jr of the United States who is the candidate for deputy president, Ukrainian Chess Federation president Viktor Kapustin who is the candidate for treasurer, Malaysia’s own Abdul Hamid Majid who is the candidate for secretary general, and the two candidates for vice-presidents, Angolan Chess Federation president Dr Aguinaldo Jaime and woman grandmaster Alisa Maric who is also the vice-president of the Belgrade Chess Federation.

I did mention at the start that this Fide election may be the most acrimonious in recent years. For the first time in many years, Ilyumzhinov faces a very serious opponent. The credentials of Anatoly Karpov speak for itself. People know him as the 12th world chess champion, having succeeded Bobby Fischer in 1974 and only giving up his world title to Garry Kasparov in 1985. Truly, he is one of the greatest chess players of all time.

However, Karpov’s very attempt at becoming the next Fide president has been full of obstacles, not least from within Russia itself. This is because Fide regulations require all candidates to be nominated by their own chess federations, and only one candidate at any one time. 

And therein lies the problem because both Ilyumzhinov and Karpov are from Russia. The problem became even more complicated after both of them claimed to have their federation’s nod. 

According to reports, the Russian Chess Federation had narrowly nominated Karpov as its candidate at a meeting in May. A few days later at another meeting which was purportedly just shy of a quorum, Ilyumzhinov was nominated. A sticky situation that became more absurd when the Russian government sacked the president of the Russian Chess Federation and installed someone else to look after the federation’s affairs.

Lawsuits have also been flying around from both parties. Earlier, Ilyumzhinov had sued Karpov for libel. The former world champion fought back with a suit to force Fide to disclose the nomination forms of Ilyumzhinov’s team. At the heart of the matter was the status of Marinello because it was claimed that she was not a member of either the Chilean or Brazilian chess federations.

If the Court of Arbitration for Sport in Lausanne, Switzerland rules in Karpov’s favour, it could mean the automatic disqualification of the whole of the Ilyumzhinov ticket because there’s also another Fide regulation that stipulates that at least one member of a ticket must be a woman candidate. It would be impossible for Ilyumzhinov to replace Marinello at the last minute.

In the meantime, both candidates are continuing to circle the globe to visit national chess federations and drum up support for their teams at the Fide election in Khanty Mansiysk, Russia. Yes, it’s going to be an intense but interesting fight indeed.

Up next  

Perlis team open

The Perlis Chess Academy, the Majlis Sukan Sekolah-sekolah Perlis and the Persatuan Catur Prestij Perlis will jointly hold the Perlis team open tournament at the Dewan Sek. Men. Putra in Kangar, Perlis on July 24. Entry is limited to the first 70 teams.

Entry fees are RM30 for teams representing schools and institutions of higher learning, RM50 for teams from Perlis and RM70 for all other teams. For more details, contact Syaifulzamani bin Ismail (013.3939838) or visit http://chessperlis.blogspot.com. 

MBS chess

The Methodist Boys’ Secondary School in Jalan Hang Jebat, Kuala Lumpur will hold the fifth MBSSKL chess open tournament at the school premises on July 24. Entry fees are RM5 for MBS students and RM15 for non-MBS students. For enquiries, contact teachers NK Chin or (Mdm) LY Yong at the school (03.20782293).

Perak grand prix

The sixth leg of the Tan Sri Lee Loy Seng Perak grand prix chess tournament will be played at the Sekolah Menengah Kebangsaan St Anthony in Teluk Intan, Perak on July 25. 

Entry fees are RM25 for the open section, RM15 for under-16 players and RM10 for under-12 players. Members of the Perak International Chess Association (PICA) and players born in Perak pay RM5 less. Closing date for entries is July 22. To register, contact Yunus (013.3908129), Hamisah (012.5008723) or Andrew (016.6295352). More details are available from http://perakchess.blogspot.com 

Tebrau open

The Johor Chess Academy, the Rukun Tetangga Sri Tebrau, Rakan Muda Johor Bahru and the Johor Bahru Chess Association are jointly organizing the 21st Tebrau open chess tournament at the Plaza Pelangi in Johor Bahru on Aug 1.

Entry fees are RM10 for players below 10 years old, RM12 for players below 16 years old and RM30 for all other participants. Closing date is July 30. For more information, contact Narayanan Krishnan (013.7717525 or jb_chess_association@yahoo.com).

 

Serious business

Bangladeshi grandmaster Ziaur Rahman, who is based in Malaysia for the next year or so, will soon be getting down to the serious business of training young chess talents in the country.

The Malaysian Chess Federation (MCF), working with the training provider and sponsors, have finalised a 15-month development programme stretching over six standalone terms, each aimed at growing the potential talent amidst our youngsters.

Each term of the MCF Young Talent chess development programme is self-contained and will last 30 days. In each programme, all aspects of chess training will be covered and these include constant assessment of a player's capability and understanding of the game, an intensive study into the chess middlegame and endgame and of course, focusing on the important chess opening theory.

Ziaur Rahman will take the students through all stages of chess preparation, identify their playing styles, their strengths and weaknesses, and look into areas of improving them. To achieve this, he will have a small group of local international masters to assist him during each term. 

According to the MCF, the focus of the programme will be unearthing and developing junior chess talents in the country who are between eight and 14 years old as they represent the future of our chess achievements. Nevertheless, older youths are more than welcomed to participate. 

The 15-month programme will run from this month until September next year. The first term is scheduled from July 24 until Aug 22 so that the first set of students who pass out from the programme can also plan to take part in this year’s Malaysia Chess Festival that’s already planned for September. 

There will be fresh intake of new students every term. The second term starts in September, the third term in November, the fourth in February next year, the fifth term in April 2011 and the sixth term in July 2011. Therefore, there are ample opportunities for readers to send their children to attend these intensive MCF development programmes.

The approach to each term’s programme is simple: group training for all students to learn the common fundamentals and basics of chess, and a personalized session where the students are paired with either the grandmaster or an international master and participate in a more detailed study mode. The latter session will help the trainer fine-tune the student to take best advantage of his or her playing style and preferences.

At the end of the term, each student would have undergone a maximum of 68 hours of end-to-end chess improvement experience and learning. 

The MCF says the fee of RM500 has been made attractive because of sponsorship. Normally, such training programmes with grandmasters can easily cost between RM4,000 and RM6,000. Students interested to attend the first term should contact the MCF before July 19. However, due to initial space constraints, only 10 students will be accepted.

The MCF also stressed that the development programme is not meant for beginners in the game. The students are required to possess certain playing strength and skills, and the training provider may request for additional information to substantiate a student’s playing strength before accepting him into the programme.

For enquiries or to request for the programme prospectus, contact Najib Wahab (016.3382542, najib.wahab@chess-malaysia.com) or the MCF secretary Gregory Lau (012.9020123).

Fischer’ body exhumed

The body of former world chess champion Bobby Fischer was exhumed from his grave at an Icelandic church last Monday. This came weeks after the Supreme Court in Iceland gave the final go-ahead to authorities there to extract Fischer’s tissue sample in order to prove a paternity case.

According to reports, the process was completed smoothly and Fischer’s coffin was not unearthed from the ground. Instead, the earth at the side of the grave was dug and a hole then drilled into the coffin to extract the tissue sample. Present were a specialist doctor, a priest, the local sheriff and several lawyers.

The chess legend died intestate and his estate, worth at least USD2 million, is being claimed by various parties, including the United States government. Nine-year-old Jinky Young from the Philippines is set to inherit the bulk of Fischer’s estate if DNA tests prove conclusively that she is Fischer’s daughter. Other claimants include Fischer’s Japanese wife and his two nephews.

Up next  

Perlis team open

The Perlis Chess Academy, the Majlis Sukan Sekolah-sekolah Perlis and the Persatuan Catur Prestij Perlis will jointly hold the Perlis team open tournament at the Dewan Sek. Men. Putra in Kangar, Perlis on July 24. Entry is limited to the first 70 teams.

Entry fees are RM30 for teams representing schools and institutions of higher learning, RM50 for teams from Perlis and RM70 for all other teams. For more details, contact Syaifulzamani bin Ismail (013.3939838) or visit http://chessperlis.blogspot.com. 

MBS chess

The Methodist Boys’ Secondary School in Jalan Hang Jebat, Kuala Lumpur will hold the fifth MBSSKL chess open tournament at the school premises on July 24. Entry fees are RM5 for MBS students and RM15 for non-MBS students. For enquiries, contact teachers NK Chin or (Mdm) LY Yong at the school (03.20782293).

Perak grand prix

The sixth leg of the Tan Sri Lee Loy Seng Perak grand prix chess tournament will be played at the Sekolah Menengah Kebangsaan St Anthony in Teluk Intan, Perak on July 25. 

Entry fees are RM25 for the open section, RM15 for under-16 players and RM10 for under-12 players. Members of the Perak International Chess Association (PICA) and players born in Perak pay RM5 less. Closing date for entries is July 22. To register, contact Yunus (013.3908129), Hamisah (012.5008723) or Andrew (016.6295352). More details are available from http://perakchess.blogspot.com 

Tebrau open

The Johor Chess Academy, the Rukun Tetangga Sri Tebrau, Rakan Muda Johor Bahru and the Johor Bahru Chess Association are jointly organizing the 21st Tebrau open chess tournament at the Plaza Pelangi in Johor Bahru on Aug 2.

Entry fees are RM10 for players below 10 years old, RM12 for players below 16 years old and RM30 for all other participants. Closing date is July 30. For more information, contact Narayanan Krishnan (013.7717525 or jb_chess_association@yahoo.com).

 

New winners

The first thing that I’ve got to do this week is to admit that I was wrong with my prediction two weeks ago. Yes, I was wrong because this year, a teenager did not run away with the title of national chess champion.

Instead, the honour this year went to Tan Khai Boon. Although he’s 28 years old, not in the same age group as our national chess champions of the past few years, but he certainly is still young enough to prove to be the equal of any of them.

He is known well enough in local chess circles but if you don’t know him, let me tell you that when he is in his best form, he can be a very tough nut to crack. At the national championship, he has shown that this was indeed very true. 

Now before I say anything more, I must mention here that both of this year’s national championship and national women’s championship met with an unprecedented number of entries: 94 for the national and 44 for the national women’s. These numbers brought wide smiles to the Malaysian Chess Federation as well as to the Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia which co-hosted the events at their campus.

The only possible setback when a field is too large is that even with nine rounds, it can be possible for a tournament to finish with some of the top seeds playing with one another much later in the event. Sometimes, they may not even get to meet. This is a recognized trait of the Swiss pairing system. Because of this and under the right conditions, a large-player field can sometimes mean a sprint towards the finish line for some players. 

Anyway, Tan entered the national championship not as the top-seeded player. He was only ranked fourth in the tournament and he lost the very first game that he played. Losing in the first round is not a very good omen for any player because for the rest of the tournament, he will have to play “catch up” with the tournament leaders. 

This was precisely what happened to Tan. He picked himself up after the loss and gave chase to the leaders. For the next five rounds, he was always one step behind them. He kept pace with them but somehow because everyone was sprinting forward at the same time, he never seemed able to over-haul them. Not until the sixth round, anyway.

He was lucky. In the fifth round, the leaders began to falter as the pressure set in. Mohd Nabil Ahmad Hisham, one of them, had breezed through his first four games to lead the standings but now, he couldn’t keep up with his own blistering pace. With a draw in the fifth round, he suddenly found himself tied on equal points with Yeoh Li Tian and Mohd Tariq Amru.

In the sixth round, all these three players could do no better than to draw their games. In the meantime after Tan got over his first-round loss, he kept his cool and began winning one game after another. By the end of the sixth round, he now found himself tied with Mohd Nabil, Yeoh and Mohd Tariq as the joint tournament leaders.

It was at this point in the championship that Tan realized that maybe, just maybe, he did have a realistic chance to pull ahead of them and go on to win the tournament. But there were still three more rounds to go. 

Regardless, he pushed on. Mohd Nabil kept up with him, but both Yeoh and Mohd Tariq lost their games. So by the end of the seventh round, it was down to a two-horse race. 

By now, the pressure on the players had crept a notch higher. Who would be the first to capitulate? In the eighth round, the two top contenders finally played one another. Imagine, it took eight rounds of this 94-player tournament before the top two front-runners could face off. How would they fare in this game?

Unfortunately, Mohd Nabil’s form imploded and left Tan as the sole leader of the tournament. So, before the start of the final round, Tan already held a one-point lead over the rest of the field. A draw would be enough for him to clinch the title but he cruised through with his last victory. Eight straight wins in nine games had landed him with the Tun Hussein Onn challenge trophy and the title of Malaysia’s newest national master. 

Over in the national women’s championship, the race to the finish was just as tense once Alia Anin Bakri faltered in the defence of her title. She got off to a breezy start but she then gave away a draw in the third round. A fifth-round loss meant that her effort to retain her title was effectively over. 

So all eyes now turned to both Fong Mi Yen and Tan Li Ting who were both seeded just below Alia in this tournament. 

In the fourth round, both of them met. That’s the other trait of a Swiss pairing system. When the number of participants is smaller, the chances of the leaders meeting early would increase almost proportionately. Here with only 44 players, it wasn’t a surprise that this had happened in the fourth round and there were still five more rounds to go.

Anyway in the fourth round, Mi Yen got the better of Li Ting to take sole lead of the national women’s championship. It was a lead that she held on tightly to until the end of the tournament despite losing in the sixth round to Amira Shahmina Zulkafli. 

That sixth-round loss actually allowed Amira Shahmina to level up with Mi Yen as co-leaders but Amira Shahmina could not keep up the momentum and promptly dropped half a point behind by the end of the next round. 

By contrast, Mi Yen kept her cool to collect two more points in the seventh and eighth rounds, and a draw in the ninth round was enough for her to be declared as the new national women’s champion. With it went the title of national woman master and the opportunity to hold the Tan Sri Sabbaruddin Chik trophy for one year.

Top six players in the national championship: Tan Khai Boon 8 points; Edward Lee and Kamal Ariffin Wahiduddin 7 points each; Yeoh Li Tian, Mohd Saprin Sabri and Nik Ahmad Farouqi 6½ points each.

Top seven players in the national women’s championship: Fong Mi Yen 7½ points; Tan Li Ting, Amira Shahmina Zulkafli and Nithyalakshmi Sivanesan 6½ points each; Alia Anin Bakri, Puteri Rifqah Fahada and Camila Johari 6 points each.

Up next  

MBS chess

The Methodist Boys’ Secondary School in Jalan Hang Jebat, Kuala Lumpur will hold the fifth MBSSKL chess open tournament at the school premises on July 24. Entry fees are RM5 for MBS students and RM15 for non-MBS students. For enquiries, contact teachers Mr NK Chin or Mdm LY Yong at the school (03.20782293).

 

Your move, Fischer

The great Bobby Fischer may have died more than two years ago but even from his grave in Iceland, he continues to command a lot of attention.

The latest news to surface is the decision by the Supreme Court in Iceland to have his body exhumed to prove a paternity case. It seemed that when Fischer died in Jan 2008, nobody thought of preserving any blood sample for DNA analysis. But then at that time, nobody expected that he would be at the centre of an inheritance battle.

Yes, there is an on-going court battle for Fischer’s estate. He was said to have left an estate that was worth about USD2 million (about RM6.4 million). This estate is now being claimed by various parties from far-flung reaches of the earth. And all this is because he died without a will.

One of the parties is Fischer’s two nephews, Alexander and Nicholas Targ, who being the sons of his sister would seem to be the closest living blood relatives of the deceased former world chess champion in the absence of other claimants.

However, there are other claimants to Fischer’s estate. In the last years of his life, dating even before his sensational detention at Tokyo’s Narita international airport in 2004 for travelling on a revoked American passport, he had developed a close relationship with Miyoko Watai.

Watai herself is a chess player and holds the title of woman international master. At one time she was the acting president of the Japan Chess Federation. It’s known that Fischer and Watai had been living together in Tokyo. Even after he had been granted Icelandic citizenship in 2005, Watai continued to travel to Iceland to be with him.

Of course, the validity of Fischer’s marriage to Watai loomed large in the battle for the chess grandmaster’s estate, it being disputed by the two nephews. It is believed that an Iceland lower court had accepted that their marriage was registered legally and had been certified in Japan but there are now even conflicting reports about this.

In any case, there now emerges a fresh twist to the inheritance joustings. From the Philippines came word that about 10 years ago, Fischer had a Filipino girlfriend, Marilyn Young, and he could have fathered a young girl named Jinky. That young girl is nine years old today. 

According to Jinky’s mother and their lawyers in Manila, they have proof that Jinky is related to Fischer and he had accepted the girl as his daughter. 

They said that he had been sending Jinky money and toys regularly, and signing off on his letters and postcards to her as “daddy”. Images of the postcards floating on the Internet showed Fischer’s purportedly famous handwriting.

However, the court could not consider them as conclusive or indisputable proof of the blood ties between Fischer and Jinky. To prove a link, Jinky’s lawyers demanded for DNA tests on Fischer. Jinky had already given her blood to a hospital in Iceland but it was then learnt that the hospital where Fischer was last warded before his death did not keep any of his blood samples. 

In the absence of Fischer’s DNA specimens, Jinky’s lawyers then petitioned the court for exhumation, a move opposed quite naturally by the other claimants. When the District Court of Reykjavik turned down the petition, the lawyers turned to the Iceland Supreme Court and won.

It’s now expected that the exhumation process may be carried out soon, maybe within the fortnight. But if anyone thinks that the battle for Fischer’s estate could soon be over, there is yet another twist in the tale. 

The last claimant to Fischer’s estate is, believe it or not, the United States government itself. While he was alive, the United States were already hunting him down as a fugitive from their law.

All because in 1992, Fischer had thumbed his nose at an American-sponsored United Nations embargo on dealings with the former Yugoslavia Republic to play a highly publicized 24-game chess match with his old adversary, Boris Spassky. 

He won millions from this match and now in his death, the US government is claiming for unpaid taxes from the estate. Why the US is doing this is because Fischer, despite dying as an Iceland citizen, was a United States citizen for almost all of his life.

I said “almost” because until 2004, he was still an American citizen. But his detention at the Narita international airport changed all that. During the months that he was detained and fighting deportation to the United States, he gave up his American citizenship and was stateless until the Iceland government voted to give him their citizenship.

I don’t know what other surprises the late great Bobby Fischer can toss up from his grave but in the meantime, the world is closely watching the outcome of the exhumation. It’s still your move, Bobby Fischer.

Up next  

Telok Gong pro-am

The Persatuan Penduduk Telok Gong will hold their pro-am tournament at the Dewan Kampung Hamid Tuah in Telok Gong, Port Klang on July 4. For a one-day event, the total cash prizes on offer is more than RM5,000.

Entry fees are RM30 (for players in the Pro category, that is, with national ratings above 1701), RM25 (for payers in the Am category, rated below 1700) and RM20 (for Telok Gong residents and players below 12 years old). Entries close on Jun 26. To register, contact Zamri Sajari (016.2775005) or Azhar Mohd Said (012.6796193).

MBS chess

The Methodist Boys’ Secondary School in Jalan Hang Jebat, Kuala Lumpur will hold the fifth MBSSKL chess open tournament at the school premises on July 24. Entry fees are RM5 for MBS students and RM15 for non-MBS students. For enquiries, contact teachers Mr NK Chin or Mdm LY Yong at the school (03.20782293).

 

Will history repeat itself?

I’ve got a feeling in my bones that we may see a youngster as national chess champion this year. I know, I know, some of you will say that we have always had young national champions before, and you are not wrong.

For instance, in the last three national championships alone, the titles had gone to youngsters like Evan Capel (2009), Edward Lee (2008) and Zarul Shazwan (2007) and indeed, the list of national champions is peppered with names of other players who were till in their teenaged years when they won their titles.

I’ve this feeling that the trend will continue. I may be wrong but when I look at the list of participants in this year’s national championship, I believe the future of Malaysian chess rests with the likes of Edward Lee (good, that’s a former champion coming back to play), Sumant Subramaniam, Lim Zhuo Ren and of course, Yeoh Li Tian.

In the women’s national championship, Alia Anin Bakri is the current torch-bearer among the youngsters but two names to look out for are Fong Mi Yen and Tan Li Ting.

Interestingly, this year’s events are remarkably strong and there is a rather long list of players. Maybe it’s because of the prize moneys which have been increased from previous years. 

I still remember how the national champions were “rewarded” with a RM300 first prize that came from toiling hard for five or six days at the chess board. In my opinion, a rather bad return on investments (the entry fees).

This year though, the first prize is a more reasonable RM1,000 for the open championship and RM600 for the women’s championship, and these have certainly attracted more players to the event. Never mind that the national championships are being held at the more remote Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia campus in Bangi, the numbers are there and this should make the Malaysian Chess Federation (MCF) a happier organisation. 

Now, the next big task for the federation next year is to convince more of the top players to take part. Nevertheless for this year, there are many experienced names to count on: players like Loo Swee Leong, Tan Khai Boon, Kamal Ariffin Wahiduddin, Kamaluddin Yusof, Nik Ahmad Farouqi, Ismail Ahmad and Lim Kian Hwa. On their good days they are quite capable of upsetting the form books. 

We shall see how they prevail in this year’s tournament. Today is already the third day of the event and with four rounds have already been played since Wednesday, there are five more rounds to go.

All are very critical rounds because I know that as the championship progresses, the tension takes a great toll on the players. And the surprising revelation is that tension strikes hardest during a national championship than in any other tournament.

I’ve seen players almost collapsing from exhaustion towards the end of a national championship. Once, for example, I noticed a player close his eyes to snatch forty winks in between moves and he kept nodding off thereafter until the time limit. 

Many times, I’ve seen winning games ending up lost because the players could no longer think straight. Thoughts get muddled up or they become too tired to think. Either way, their games collapse. What matters is how well they can pace themselves and at the same time out-pace their rivals. 

If you want to follow the progress of national chess championships, visit the MCF national championship blog at http://nc-2010.blogspot.com/

Up next  

Perak grand prix

The Slim River leg of the Tan Sri Lee Loy Seng Perak grand prix chess tournament will be played at the Sekolah Menengah Kebangsaan Agama Slim River on Jun 27.

Entry fees are RM25 for the open section, RM15 for under-16 players and RM10 for under-12 players. Members of the Perak International Chess Association and players born in Perak pay RM5 less. Closing date for entries is this Jun 23. To register, contact Yunus (013.3908129), Hamisah (012.5008723) or Ustaz Ismail (019.5520391). More details are available from http://perakchess.blogspot.com

Stonemaster chess

The third Stonemaster amateur chess tournament, organized by Cerdik Catur Enterprise, will be played at the Datuk Arthur Tan Chess Centre, Wilayah Complex in Jalan Munshi Abdullah, Kuala Lumpur on Jun 27.

Entry fees are RM30 for adults and RM20 for students. For enquiries, contact Mohd Fadli Zakaria (014.2312370, email: seme_event@yahoo.com). 

Telok Gong pro-am

The Persatuan Penduduk Telok Gong will hold their pro-am tournament at the Dewan Kampung Hamid Tuah in Telok Gong, Port Klang on July 4. For a one-day event, the total cash prizes on offer is more than RM5,000.

Entry fees are RM30 (for players in the Pro category, that is, with national ratings above 1701), RM25 (for payers in the Am category, rated below 1700) and RM20 (for Telok Gong residents and players below 12 years old). Entries close on Jun 26. To register, contact Zamri Sajari (016.2775005) or Azhar Mohd Said (012.6796193).

MBS chess

The Methodist Boys’ Secondary School in Jalan Hang Jebat, Kuala Lumpur will hold the fifth MBSSKL chess open tournament at the school premises on July 24. Entry fees are RM5 for MBS students and RM15 for non-MBS students. For enquiries, contact teachers Mr NK Chin or Mdm LY Yong at the school (03.20782293).