Candidate Master Taffin Khan, Women’s FIDE Master Maria Varona-Thomas, and Candidate Master Anthony Drayton were among those who ended in the top spots when round two of the Guyana Chess Federation (GCF) Senior National Qualifiers chess tournament concluded last Sunday at the National Resource Centre, Woolford Avenue.
Khan, Thomas and Drayton all ended with the maximum two points, as did Davion Mars, Calvin Giddings, and Chino Chung.Shazeeda Rahim, Aravinda Singh, Robert Neto, David Khan, and Frankie Farley all ended with one point each.
Players like Joshua Gopaul, Joshua Ferdinand and Kristoff Persaud were unable to get off the mark.
Taffin earned his two points after defeating Singh and national junior second place winner, Robert Neto. This left Neto to gain his only win in his next game against Persaud.
Thomas took her two points after receiving a bye in the first round and then winning her match against Farley in the second. Earlier,Farley won his first game against Andre Jagnandan.
Drayton gained his victories against former junior chess champion, Joshua Gopaul of Saint’s and veteran player, David Khan.
Gopaul ended with zero after taking another beating from Giddings, who also carved out a win against Ferdinand. Chung’s first victim was Akili Theophil while he also won against Rashad Hussain.
Singh’s lone point came when she won against Persaud, while David Khan repaired the damage of his loss to Drayton with a win over Nellisha Johnson,while Rahim won from Jessica Callender.
Still to play in the tournament is bigwig Wendell Meusa. Meusa, who recently secured his transfer from Barbados Chess Federation to the local entity, will aspire to retain the crown for the third time. He has chalked up a FIDE rating of 1967 and is the highest local FIDE rated player.
The tournament is being run on a round-robin format and will resume sometime during the week. The organisers said that the current venue will be unavailable and they are scouting a replacement before ascertaining the next playing days.