Sabarish Kailasam – Champion of the Week

This week began with our Weekly Open Tournament held on Saturday, where we had 97 students participate.

The champion here was Adharsh Rajeshkumar, with a perfect score of 9 out of 9. Our second runner up Vivaan Bhatt, played an engaging game against Adharsh. The game opened with the Ponziani Opening, and Adharsh brought his queen out early into the game. Adharsh then castled queenside and had his rook on the ‘d’ file controlling a central file. On the 12th move, Vivaan blundered his queen, who gave Adharsh a major advantage.

Adharsh opened up Vivaan’s king with this advantage and checkmated Vivaan on the 22nd move. Vivaan completed the tournament with a score of 7 out of 9. 

On Sunday, we began the day with our Beginner Level Tournament, where we had Eshan Kadri with a great score of 6.5 out of 8 rounds.

Eshan and our runner up Sidharth Chanchlani, who had a great score of 5.5, played an interesting game against each other. Eshan began the game with the Four Knights Opening and became a pawn up in the middle game. On the 22nd move, Sidharth missed a back rank checkmate that Eshan was threatening and lost the game.

In third place, we had Johan Chavara with a score of 4 out of 5. 

In the Intermediate Tournament, we had 47 students with Vivaan Bhatt as the runner up with an admirable 6 out of 9.

Vivaan played an aggressive game against our second runner up Aarav Patel. The game began with the Italian Game Opening, and Aarav became an exchange up in the middle game. On the 26th move, Aarav blundered his queen, giving Vivaan a massive advantage. Vivian used this advantage to gain one of Aarav’s rooks and checkmated Aarav with his queen on the 34th move.

Aarav concluded the event with a great score or 6 out of 9. 

On Sunday, the final event was the Advanced Tournament, where we had Saket Reddy as our champion with a perfect score of 6 out of 6.

Our runner up for the day was Sriranga Narapuram, with a score of 4.5 out of 6, who played a brilliant game against Saket in the 3rd round. Sriranga brought his queen and rook out early into the game. On the 15th move, Saket posed a discovered attack on Sriranga’s queen by giving Sriranga’s king a check, making Saket a queen up. This gave Saket a massive advantage to gain a bishop more and exchange all the other pieces. On the 35th move, Sriranga resigned, making Saket the winner.

Joshith Vurimi was our second runner up with a score of 3.5. 

Yajat Biyani was the Beginner Battle Champion held on Wednesday with a record-breaking win rate of 100%.

Yajat played a brilliant game against Eshan Kadri, our runner up. The game was equal throughout the opening till Eshan missed a knight fork on his queen and rook on the 17th move. Eshan then missed another queen and rook knight fork, causing him to have a massive disadvantage. This caused Eshan to resign from the game, making Yajat the winner.

Eshan completed the tournament with a win rate of 60%, followed by Sean Siculiano in third place with a win rate of 50%. 

In the Intermediate Battle Arena, we had Sabarish Kailasam at the top of our winner list with a win rate of 67%.

Our winner and our second runner up Aarav Patel, had a draw against each other. The game began with the Italian Game Opening, and the two exchanged their queens early into the game. Aarav gained two pawns in the middle game, and the end game was between the two kings, with Sabarish having one pawn and Aarav had three pawns.

While trying to promote one of the pawns into a queen, Aarav lead the game into a stalemate. In the second place, we had Adharsh Rajeshkumar with a perfect win rate of 100% and Aarav in third place with a win rate of 50%. 

Finally, we had the Advanced Battle with Sanjey Ramachandran with an incredible win rate of 90%.

In the second match, Sanjey and Devansh Pamecha played an interesting game against each other. The game opened with the Italian Game: Classical Variation, and Sanjey became a knight up in the middle game. The two then exchanged their queens and moved to the end game. Sanjey gained multiple pawns in the end game, and he converted one of these pawns into a passed pawn that later advanced into a queen.

Sanjey checkmated Devansh on the 45th move. Devansh stood second at this event with a win rate of 56%, followed by Vishnu Kannan in third place with a win rate of 38%. 

This week saw some fantastic matches and had an impressive winner list, and we hope to see the same every week.

Congratulations to all the winners.