Booster Section Report
This Sunday tournament the Booster section really put the "I" in ICA. This section was truly international: Leah being from Toronto and Arsyad from Malaysia! The results from this section were interesting: there was a 4 way tie for third place between Arsyad Mohd Ali, Jay Patel, Marcel Forlini, and Roger Zhao, all scoring 3 points. Max Rosenbaum had an amazing 3.5/4 points and received second place! Harika Appalla ended the tournament with a perfect score of 4/4 well done!! Congratulations to all of you; you are now eligible to participate in the next section (Steppingstone 5) in the next tournament. |
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Steppingstone 5 Report
In Stepping Stone 5, this week we had 4 norm makers, Liam, Anna, Raghav, and Nathan, with Liam barely edging everyone out with 3.5/4. All 4 made their 2nd norm and after passing test will be awarded Category 5 title. There were many good games, yet fast games, and here are just a few. In Anna vs Liam, in Round 3, the leaders at the time, Liam played very aggressive and found many tactics. |
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After c4??, Liam swiftly played Bxh2, winning the queen. Another very good game was Kate vs Anna. Both of them were in a must win scenario, and therefore played very exciting chess. In that game, both players castled queenside, but Anna's attack comes out victorious. |
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Congrats to all players, and we thank you for coming. We hope to see you next time.
In Stepping Stone 4, we had a quad with four players and three rounds. Despite this, the relatively experienced competitors in this section took Diana's advice and took their time for each game, resulting in their three rounds taking longer than four rounds in the other two sessions! |
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| Newcomer Ateeq posted a perfect score to win the tournament. He played exciting chess, going for the dangerous and tactical King's Gambit in both of his games as White. He displayed excellent technique in two of his games by winning a piece early and playing solid moves to simplify the position while never giving his opponents any chances to get back in the game. Aviana put up the strongest resistance, and actually had Ateeq on the ropes. After a back-and-forth game and a rook blunder by Ateeq, Aviana had the chance to checkmate in four moves. |
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White played 30. Rxe1?? And Aviana could have delivered nice mate in 4: 30… Qxh3+ 31. Kg1 Qg3+ 32 Kh1 Rxe1+ 33 Qf1 Rxf1#. However, time was tight, and, after she missed this tricky opportunity, Ateeq took advantage, stabilized, and went on to win the game and the tournament. This win clinched his first-place victory and first norm of category 4 title, congratulations! |
TD NOTE *** Thank you all for playing! The next event will be on February 6. If you have any questions about where or what to register for, please email us at chessdirector@icanj.net and we'll get back to you as soon as possible! Thanks***
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