Toukley U2000

21/22 Feb 2004

The Toukley U2000 tournament took place 21/22 Feb at the Toukley RSL on the NSW Central Coast. The tournament was limited to players with an ACF rating under 2000. There were 38 entries. The time limit was FIDE Rapid 1 hour with a 10 second increment thereafter.

The first round saw a few upsets with local Gary Losh drawing with top seed Brian Jones. In fact, Gary had a winning rook ending but Brian managed to hang in to scrape a draw during the 10 second increment period. Alex Mendes da Costa played an excellent game in round 2 to beat David Castor. David’s day was not due to get better finishing the day with 1/4. Justin Huang was also very sick so had to withdraw after round 2.

Blind player Alex Momot, under-rated at 901, had an excellent start to the tournament beating locals Barry Mann and Gary Losh in round 1 and 3. His 4th game also featured an attacking game against Norm Greenwood but Norm rebuffed the attack to win. However, Alex’s second day was less successful with 0/3. Peter Hannagan beat Duncan Peters in round 3 although Duncan had lost on time for around 10 minutes prior to the finish. After day 1 the sole leader was Newcastle player Neil Wright with 4/4.

However, Round 5 saw Neil become unstuck playing White against junior Junta Ikeda from the ACT. Neil left a rook en prise in a tense position and lost. The round 6 clash between leader Junta Ikeda and Jason Chan from Sydney saw Jason overpower Junta on the queenside eventually winning a queen in the time scramble. This proved to be a deciding game. The round 6 game between Kerry Stead (White) and Neil Wright saw the position below.

Here, Neil Wright took the draw with 1…Qa1+ 2.Kd2 Qa5+ 3.Kc1 Qa1 and so forth. The line 1…Qa1 2.Kd2 Qd4+ 3. Kc1 Qe3+ 4.Qxe3 fxe4 5.Rd5 a5 was interesting with Black having 2 dangerous passed pawns.

Onto the last game or the ‘business end of the tournament’. The final round saw Jason Chan with 5/6 playing Michael Yu with 4.5/6 on board 1. A win by Michael would have resulted in a 3 way tie. It was looking the most likely result until the following position occurred.

Here Jason had just 10 seconds on the clock whereas Michael had 30 seconds with both players in the 10 second increment period. It’s a little unfair looking at a position where the players have only seconds to analyse but anyway…Here Michael played

1...Qh1 2.Be2 Rh2+ 3.Ke3 Qc1+

3…Qg1+ is better forcing the King back into the firing line on d2. (4.Ke4 Qd4+ 5.Kf5 e4 and Black wins with multiple threats) After 3…Qg1 4.Kd2 Qf1 proves winning).

4.Kf3 g4+

Fritz suggest 4…f5! with the subtle threat 5…g4 mate.

5.Ke4 Rxe2+ 6.Kf5 Rf2+?

Where Black unfortunately lost on time handing Jason the tournament. After 7.Ke6 the position now favours White having escaped the mating net! So, the final results were 1^st Jason Chan with 6/7 with Junta Ikeda and Michael Lip 2nd= with 5.5/7.

FM Lee Jones

Arbiter