Some easy listening

 From the most recent episode of BBC's 'Not by the Playbook' - Chess Mates

2025 Asian Individual Championship

 The 2025 Asian Individual Championship (Open and Women's) has attracted large fields. The Open has 156 players, with around half the Asian federations sending representatives. This includes players from Australia, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea and Guam. The Women's event has 100 players, with Australia and New Zealand being represented.

As the entry requirement for this event was quite tough (except for official representatives), the 1st round saw a number of upsets. In the open, the ANZAC representatives all drew their games against higher rated opponents, while a number of GM's lost against their lower rated challengers.

Apart from the large prize pool, the leading players are also playing for qualification spots at this years World Cup. Live games are being broadcast from 9:15pm (Canberra time) and can be followed at https://lichess.org/broadcast/asian-individual-chess-championships-2025--open/GOUSblMI 

2025 O2C Doeberl Cup Minor and Mini

 Like the Major, the Minor event (Under 1800 ACF) was also very popular. The 98 player field even had a few titles players drift down from the Major, making it another tough event. Daniei Yelkhovsky finished in 1st place on 6.5/7, half a point ahead of top seed, CM Jeff Cabilin. Yelkhovsky and Cabilin drew in round 6, but an earlier draw left Cabilin half a point behind. There was a 4 way tie for third, including local (ACT) junior Larry Cheng, Cheng was on 5.5/6 going into the final round, but his top board clash against Yelkhovsky was essentially the tournament 'final', with the win to Yelkhovsky deciding 1st place.   

The Mini event (Under 1500) had a smaller field of 63 players. In the end Masaon Tay and Padma Gyalpo tied for 1st on 6/7, with tay taking home the trophy on countback. Tay concede 2 draws on his way to 1st, while Gyalpo's only loss was in round 3, against Tay.

Fit for chess

 Inspired by memories of 'Round the House' chess, and a recent discovery (via IA Alana Chibnall), that you can play chess while working out on gym equipment, a kind if cross-fit chess.

Set up against another gym buddy, or an bot, you gain extra time by running extra distances. eg For every 100 metres, you get 10s added to you clock. So a 5 minute game between 2 very fit players may see an extra 120s added if both players cover 1200m (NB you can run when both you and your opponent are on the move). The challenge is to maintain a fast enough pace to gain time, while not exhausting yourself, and losing the ability to think. As an extra incentive/challenge the result of the game determines the level of resistance/gradient on the treadmill for the next time around.

2025 O2C Doeberl Cup Major

 One of the big surprises from this years Doeberl was the large number of players playing in the Major. The 100 player limit was reached about a month in advance of the tournament, and I was constantly dealing with requests to become the 101st player in the field. One of the reasons was that the cutoff for the premier was raised to 2000 ACF or FIDE (up from 1900 last year), which meant more players had to play the Major. The 1st prize of $1600 was also attractive, although only 1 player with an ACF rating above 2000 chose to play the Major.

The large field also left the top seeds with somewhat of a problem, in how to win the event. One loss was almost fatal to outright winning changes, while even a good score of 5.5 may leave them out of the prize list. 

As it turned out, this was how the tournament played out. DM Daniel Ding started with 5 wins, as did overseas visitor Balanandan Ayyappan. Their 6th round game was drawn, leaving them tied for 1st going into the last round. Wang defeated WFM Alaina Vincent to go to 6.5, while Ayyappan drew with Ethan Retnaraja to take a share of 2nd. He was joined by Vincent Qiang, whose only loss in the event was to the tournament winner.

With such big numbers, and a desire to make the tournament numbers a little more even, the rating limits for the Major (and Minor) are going to be squeezed, like for the Premier. The bottom floor will 1700 ACF or a FIDE rating to be decided later. So you have 12 months to get to work if you want to play this very popular event!

 

So ends a big 3 weeks of chess in Australia

 The Sydney International Open finished today, with a win for GM Mitrabha Guha. This follows on from his win in last weeks O2C Doeberl Cup. and an equal 2nd in the Melbourne International Open. He takes home almost $10,000 in prizes from the 3 events, which is a pretty handy return.

Of course he, and a lot of other players, had to work hard. Three 9 round events, over the course of 21 days is not easy, especially if you factor in the travel. Quite a few other players did the 3 tournament circuit, as did at least one arbiter. All 3 events were successful in terms of numbers, and hopefully the format will continue next year. 

Now that the 'circuit' has been established, the next challenge is to get more OS players to take part. One of the goals for each of the events is to provide title opportunities for local players, and increasing the number of visitors will help do that. At least for the Doeberl Cup, the feedback was very positive, and I expect that the other events were similarly well recieved.

So watch this space later in the year, and hopefully the 2026 Australian Circuit will have some exciting announcements.

Tragedy in the Endgame

 Each year (for the past 3 years), the Hobsons Bay Chess Club has organised a junior challenge match involving clubs across Australia and New Zealand. Played as a hybrid event (online play supervised by an arbiter at a local venue), the event consists of a RR of 6 teams across 6 boards. 

This years event was won by the ACT Junior Chess League team, finishing just ahead of a much improved Hobson Bay A team (who beat the ACT team 4-2 in their individual match). The quality of play has improved over the last 3 years, although one game saw a very tragic ending.

Around move 65 Black is completely winning. However White keeps playing, and Black misses 69 ... f6! which keeps the win in hand. After the exchange of pawns, the position is now drawn, as the White King is close enough to assist the pawn to the end of the board. However, Black thinks their might be one last trick in the position with 76 ... Kf6?? While the idea of threatening mate, or skewering the King and Queen might look tempting, White has a few moves to avoid this, and keep the Queen. Even then it is still a tough ending to win, until White forces the rook away from the king on move 115, when it is picked off by the Queen.

Annapureddy,Dhru (1543) - Nguyen,Kiet Anh (1516)
ANZAC Day Inter Club Hybrid Rapid 2025 Tornelo INT (4.3), 25.04.2025