After a tough time at the Scholastic Nationals, our players - with the aid of several adult members - absolutely excelled at the US Ametaur Individual Tournament!
Our first sections to finish were the Scholastic events. Head and shoulders above the competition was Jayden Ma who won all five matches in the U900 Section! Our other top players in the scholastic sections are Noah Val, who won 4 out of 5 games in the U600 Section, and Emma Shevelenko, who won 3.5 out of 5 games in the U600 Section.
But our most impressive performances came in the main event. Our players dominated the U1800 Section, with Mark Kogan winning the section with 5.5 out of 6 points and David Milstein taking second with 5 out of 6! In addition, by obtaining 4 out of 6 points, Juno Moon won the top U1500 prize!
When asked about their tournament experience, both Mark and David noted how challenging it was to cope with the length of the games. David was able to push through due to “the camaraderie among the ICA players”. But both felt the effects afterwards: especially Mark, who replied “it was very tiring” after being asked about his impression of the tournament. I don’t blame him though, as he had two back to back five hour games! After his fourth match, he struggled to walk and asked his dad for a hotel room because he could not afford to make a 10 minute drive home!
Speaking of that fourth game: it started at 5pm and the English Opening was played. Both players fought well and got to a very imbalanced endgame. Mark’s opponent had a rook and four pawns while Mark had a rook and two pieces. For 90 minutes, Mark had to defend his position as his opponent was pushing the pawns down the board. However, Mark weakened the pawn structure, put the opponent in zugzwang, and won the game!
Lastly, in the U2200 Section, Oleg Shevelenko took 5th place with 4.5 out of 6 points! In addition, Claire Cheng (a student of ), who also obtained 4.5 points, won the top U2000 prize. ’s student Rouven Essig also did well, obtaining 3.5 points. In addition, Rouven wanted to share his most memorable game of the tournament. This game was analyzed and reported on by .
This was a fantastic game by Rouven (black) as he found many critical moves and some very nice tactics in this game. 21. ... b3 was the start of a nice combination which was very tricky for white to play as many of his pieces were being attacked. White blundered with Qc2 and black found a nice tactic which ended up winning material. After that exchange black ended up cleanly converting the into a win playing at 95% accuracy!
Congratulations to all our players!
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