Singapore Chess Festival 2009 Final Ranking

The Singapore Chess Festival 2009 is over. The main event, Commonwealth Championship has gone to a local Singapore, Enrique Paciencia with seven and half points, one full point ahead of the top seed, India's IM Ashwin Jayaram. Australian Max Illingworth is third and with an original seeding of sixteen he performed at 2418, he must certainly be happy with his results. Not sure if he had a IM norm from this.

It's a lot of bad news for Malaysians though. Lim Yee Weng drew with Paciencia, probably a quick one as Paciencia already had the tourament in his pocket, after a tough fight. Unfortunately he still loses a bunch of ELO as does Mas who surprisingly drew his 2214 rated opponent. Maybe Mas wanted to get it over with and forget this tournament. He finished in eleventh place from an original seeding of fourth.

Edward lost to Timothy Chan and finishes with four and half points and finished twelve position just behind Mas. Not bad considering he was seeded 22nd but he did not gain any ELO points (according to Edward he did gain 29 points, a very good result! You have to wondor how many more points he would get if he had won).

Lim Yee Weng 5 points 7th place
Mas 4.5 11th place
Edward Lee 4.5 12 place

Singapore Chess Festival 2009 Round 9

The ninth and final round has started at 9:00 AM in Singapore. Singapore's Enrique Paciencia has already won the championship as he has an unassailable lead of seven points. His nearest rival only has five and half points.

The surprise for the round is that Lim Yee Weng with four and half points is playing on first board against Paciencia as Paciencia has already met all his rivals. This is due to the less than impressive number of participants, twenty-five in total.

Mas has dropped down to seventh board with four points, half a point less than Yee Weng or Edward. His play has been steadily deteriorating and he managed to lose to players rated much much lower than himself.

Edward Lee also have four and half points and should be able to finish as the highest placed Malaysian if he wins against Singaporean, Timothy Chan.

Lim Yee Weng 4.5
Edward Lee 4.5
Mas 4

Singapore Chess Festival 2009 Round 6

Good news is all three Malaysians in the Commonwealth Open won their games. Mas beat Singapore, Jarred Neubronner and Yee Weng won against Australia's Dusan Stojic. Edward Lee beat untitled Anant Dole.

Mas now is half point away from the leaders, Enrique Paciencia and India's Ashwin Jayaram both with four points. Mas plays the Indian and have to win to be in contention for the championship.

Mas 3.5
Yee Weng 2.5
Edward Lee 2.5

Singapore Chess Festival 2009 Round 5

Malaysians at the Commonwealth Chess Championship now going on in Singapore have not been doing well. Mas has two and half points, with three draws and one win. The trouble is , except for a draw against the third seed Singaporean IM Enrique Paciencia, he has played some weak opposition. There are four players tied for the lead with three points. My guess is Mas will have to beat two of them to contend for the top place.

Lim Yee Weng and Edward Lee are not doing well, both of them have one and half points. In the third round, Yee Weng lost to Australian Max Illingworth, rated at over a hundred points below him. Max is a regular fixture in the DATMO series.

In the fourth round they were paired with each other and the game was draw which leaves both with one win and one draw.

In the Challengers section,the highest place Malaysian is Ismail Ahmad with a two and half out of four games and sitting in ninth position. Olivia Madhavan playing her first international, with one win and a draw has a respectable one and half points.

The fifth round starts tomorrow at 9:00 AM.

Singapore Chess Festival 2009

The 2009 Singapore Chess Festival officially starts today. The festival comprises the Commonwealth Open, Commonwealth Age Groups and the Challengers tournament. Each tournament is nine rounds with two games starting at 9:00 AM and 4:00 PM daily from today till Sunday, 13th December. The last round begins on 14th December at 9:00 AM.

The main event is the Commonwealth Open and surprisingly for a major tournamnet, there are only twenty-five players taking part. Most of the participants are from Singapore and India. Malaysia have three representatives, Mas Hafizul, Lim Yee Weng and Edward Lee. There are only five male international masters taking part, no grandmasters. The lack of strong participation may be attributed to the entry fees charged.

Mas is seeded fourth and judging from the opposition, this year may be the best chance for a Malaysian to actually win this event.

The Challengers event had a larger number of players, ninety-two. I spotted one familiar Malaysian, Ismail Ahmad. The other is Olivia Madhavan, daughter of our chess coach, Collin Madhavan.

In the Under 20/16, I can see Yeap Eng Chiam, Justin Ong, Tan Jun Feng and a few other unknown Malaysians.