The King’s Plaza Hotel, the Tower Hotel and the Ocean Spray Hotel are the venues for the 2007 National Chess Championships which begin on Saturday and go until the third week in November.
The Championships will be contested in the Junior and Senior categories and will feature a double round -robin tournament for participants. The tournament is by invitation and only those chess players who qualified from the qualification rounds can participate.
The participants at the senior level are:
1. Kriskal Persaud
2. Ronuel Greenidge
3. Shiv Nandalall
4.Loris Nathoo
5. David Khan
6. Irshad Mohamed
7. Learie Webster
8.Cleveland Hutson
9. Errol Tiwari, and
10. Andrew Griffith
The juniors are as follows:
1. Taffin Khan
2.Saeed Ali
3. Sheriffa Ali
4. Sham Khan
5.Scion Taitt , and
6. Kana Khan
In the qualification tournament for the juniors, four players tied with the same number of points. They will play a double round-robin among themselves to determine which two will proceed to the National Champion-ships. The four are:
1. Cecil Cox
2. Ryan Singh.
3. Ronald Roberts, and
4. Devendra Singh.
Ten senior players and eight juniors will participate in the National Championships. The seniors will play 18 rounds over four weekends and the Juniors, 14 rounds over the same period. The winner of the tournament in each category will be named National Champion and National Junior Champion of Guyana.
The championships begin on Saturday, October 27 at 10 am at the Ocean Spray Hotel, Vlissengen Road. Two games are scheduled per day with the first beginning at 10 am and the next at 4 pm. On Sundays, the games will be played at the King’s Plaza Hotel in Main Street at the times which have been specified.
The time schedule per game is three hours, with each player having 90 minutes on his side of the clock. The first game, therefore, must be completed by 1 pm to give players time for lunch and some rest before the next game begins at 4 pm.
The National Chess Championships have not been conducted in over a decade and players are excited at the prospect of playing in such an important tournament. The championships have been organised by the Interim Steering Committee for the Development of Chess under the auspices of the Ministry of Culture, Youth and Sport.
