Date:02/07/2008 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2008/07/02/stories/2008070251611700.htm

Sport - Chess

Venkatesh, Saimeera start with wins

Manuel Aaron

Philadelphia: International Master M.R. Venkatesh and Woman IM Saimeera Ravi started their campaign in the 36th World Open chess tournament with convincing victories here on Tuesday. The highest ranked player in this event is Artur Yusupov of Germany.

Woman International Master Kiran Manisha Mohanty upset American Grandmaster Sergey Kudrin by holding him to a draw. She played the classical system with Be2 against the Grandmaster’s Sicilian Dragon and even got an advantage in a queen versus rooks ending before drawing the game. While Venkatesh and Saimeera beat Michael Lee and Libardo, Aarthie lost to Louie Jang.

The tournament is held in 11 sections, each a nine-round Swiss. Each section is run in four different schedules like the seven-day, five-day, four-day and three-day, which all merge in the last two days. Each game is of six-hour duration.

After their good performances in the Philadelphia International, which ended here on Monday, the bulk of the Indian contingent here (S.S. Ganguly, Parimarjan Negi, Kunte, Eesha Karavade, G.N. Gopal, Arun Prasad, K. Rathnakaran, Eesha Karavade, Nisha Mohota, R.R. Laxman and Swati Ghate) decided to play the World Open in the five-day schedule.