Playing in only his second rated tournament, 12-year-old Yi Yang of Shrewsbury swept the Age 14 & Under section of the 1st Spiegel Cup Qualifier, going 4- 0 against a field which included Charlie Fauman, rated 1938, Evan Meyer, rated 1719, both of Newton, and Andy Li of Acton, rated 1650. Besides winning 1st place and qualifying for the Spiegel Cup finals, Yi earned a post-tournament rating of 2366! This may be over-stating his playing strength (until he loses a game, who can tell?), but this is clearly a player to watch in future tournaments. Andy, Charlie and Evan tied for second along with Anton Barash of Brighton.
The Age 11 & Under section also featured a 4-0 sweep, with Sandeep Vadlamudi of Lexington beating top-rated Tal Puhov of Shrewsbury in the last round to win the section. Tal tied with six other players for second place: Ari Xuan of Boxborough, Eric Feng of Sudbury, Sathwik Karnik of Plainville, Alan Sikarov of Newton, Andrew The of Lexington, and Isabella Shih of Andover.
There was a three way tie for 1st place in the Age and Under section between Eddie Wang of Acton, Lucy Cai of Lexington and Tyler Saklad of Sudbury. Eddie won an exciting blitz playoff to win the 1st place trophy and qualify for the finals.
Jacob Brockman of Newton won the Novice Under 800 section with a 4-0 score. Marc Bacharach of Wayland was second with 3-1, and five players tied for third with 2-2 scores: Aurash Vatan of Lexington, Rohan Sheth of Boston, Audrey Gaines of Shrewsbury, Siddharth Simon of Newton, and Graham Macklin of Wayland. Giorgio Roscini of West Newton won the Novice Under 400 section with a score of 3½-½. Nicholas Bart and Adrian Seeger, both of Newton, and Philip Melki of Brookline tied for second with 3-1.
The MACA Scholastic Committee has decided on two rules changes for this scholastic season: winners of qualifiers will be allowed to play in later qualifiers, and there will be no High School sections in the qualifiers; instead, there will be a High School championship which will be open to all players in grades 9-12.
Brian Mottershead was the chief director of this 80 player tournament, assisted by George Mirijanian, Steve Frymer and Bob Messenger. The tournament was held on October 2nd at the Holiday Inn Select in Woburn. |