The club's AGM took place on Thursday 27th November 2008.
This is the list of prize-winners.
The Third Swiss was decided in the last round when the games on the
top two tables were both drawn. So Ashley Lewis and Jason Subke were
joint winners with 4½ points from 6 games, just ½ point ahead
of the field.
Here are the detailed results.
The annual Darrell Mhlongo memorial took place on 18th September 2008.
Blitz chess was always his favourite! Many chessplayers who knew Darrell
entered, with Ashley Lewis winning in the final.
This open tournament took place over 7 rounds at the Durban Chess
Club on Sunday 14th September. The time limit was 25 minutes per game,
and the surprise winner was Lulama Qobo on 6/7.
Here are the detailed results.
The club's Second Swiss has just finished. In a hard-fought tournament
the winner was decided in the last round, when Sure Mataramvura beat
Bongani Mgaga. Sure's anti-Scotch defence 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.d4 Bd6
proved a hard nut to crack, and Bongani succumbed in time pressure to
leave Sure the sole winner on 5½ points from 7 games. Somebody to
watch in future is Rahul Beekrum, the only player to defeat Sure in this
event.
Here are the detailed results.
The Set Openings tournament in July was won by Bongani Mgaga with
the score of 7 out of 8. In 2nd place was Keith Rust on 6½ points.
This open tournament took place over 7 rounds at 25 minutes per game at the
uShaka Marine World on Sunday 31st August. The sight of 72 chessplayers in
the concourse attracted a lot of public attention. In the end the joint winners
on 6½/7 were Bongani Mgaga and Jason Subke. Thanks to Durban Metro
Chess Academy for organising an enjoyable event.
Here are the detailed results.
Dutch grandmaster Dimitri Reinderman made a brief visit to Durban on Monday
14 July 2008, giving a talk to selected KZN junior players and their coaches.
Instead of the expected pearls of grandmaster wisdom, Dimitri chose to poke fun
at himself and showed us his 8 biggest blunders of the last 16 or so years. Some
of them were pretty horrific. Consider, for example, this game from 1992, when
he was still a junior player:
Afterwards Dimitri showed us a few endgames, and held a brief Question & Answer session.
To the inevitable "How do you become a grandmaster?" his reply was "You must
win lots of games!"
The annual club championships commenced on 27 March and ended on 12 June.
After 7 rounds the newly crowned KZN champion Pratish Ramsurrup was leading
with 5½ points from 6 games completed so far. He was followed closely by
Bongani Mgaga, with 4 points out of 5 games completed. Their game from round 3
was adjourned with Bongani a pawn up, with good winning chances.
Players were divided into 4 sections, and here are the other section winners:
However, round 8 saw both leaders lose, with Pratish losing to Peter Dankelmann,
and Bongani losing to Cyril Danisa. Incredibly both leaders slipped up again in round 9,
with Pratish losing to Ashley Lewis, and Bongani to Jason Subke. The net result was
that no fewer than 5 players could win the tournament, if they reached 6 out of 9!!
In the end we had a triple tie for 1st place between Mgaga, Lewis and Rust - the
first such tie since 1964. With the next 2 players just ½ point behind, this was
the closest race in years. Here are the detailed scores in the
Championships section. Readers who want to know more about the newest champion
should have a look at this page.
Defending champion Peter Dankelmann, who went undefeated last year, had a poor
start to the event, losing in rounds 2 and 4. Here is his game from round 2:
Section B Desmond Rooplal 8/9;
Section C Sandile Xulu 7½/9;
Section D Priyanka Govender 6½/7.
The annual KZN championship Swiss took place over 8 rounds on the
long weekend 26th to 28th April 2008. Over R10,000 of prize money
was on offer, and attracted a strong field from outside KZN! The
winners were Daniel Cawdery and Pratish Ramsurrup with 7 points.
Daniel took home the trophy and title of Natal Open champion,
whilst Pratish was crowned the Natal Closed champion - at 17 years
old he is one of the youngest ever champions.
Here are the results.
Thanks to our photographer Kurt Kin, we have a selection of
photos from the tournament.
This open tournament took place over 7 rounds at the Durban Chess
Club on Sunday 16th March. Time limit was 20 or 25 minutes per game.
Joint winners on 6/7 were Cyril Danisa and Jason Subke.
Here are the detailed results.
This open Swiss tournament took place at Northlands over the weekend
of 29th February to 2nd March. A slightly smaller field than last year's
record competed for the Ethekwini Motors trophy. The surprise leader
was teenager Sayen Naidu, who started with a blistering 5/5, before easing
off with 2 hard fought draws on the Sunday. The final result was a two
way tie for 1st place on 6/7 between Sayen Naidu and Ashley Lewis.
Here are the detailed results.
The first Swiss tournament of the year ended with a two way tie for
1st place on 6œ/8 between Peter Dankelmann and Ashley Lewis. The key
moment of the tournament came in round 6, when Mataramvura and Lewis,
the leaders on 4/5, met each other. After Sure had outplayed his more
fancied opponent, Ashley was forced to sacrifice material for some
checks and an attack. As the spectators watched in disbelief, Sure
blundered back his extra Rook, and Ashley won the game!
Here are the detailed results.