Sergey Erenburg Wins Chesapeake Open

This year the Chesapeake Open was held over the MLK weekend for the first time. The date change was successful with the tournament drawing a total of 179 players playing in seven sections. The tournament used score-based prizes and awarded a total of over $15,000 in prizes. GM Sergey Erenburg (2653) was the winner of the Championship section with a score of 6.5/7. The combination of his score plus being in sole first place yielded a payout of $2000. Erenburg was only held to a draw by GM Alexander Fishbein (2572). G

[pgn] [Event "8th Annual Chesapeake Open"] [Site "Rockville, MD"] [Date "2016.01.18"] [White "Erenburg (2653), GM Sergey"] [Black "Privman (2296), FM Boris"] [Result "1-0"] [ECO "C41"] [PlyCount "67"] [EventDate "2016.1.15"] [EventRounds "7"] [EventCountry "USA"] 1. e4 d6 2. d4 Nf6 3. Nc3 e5 4. Nf3 Nbd7 5. Bc4 Be7 6. O-O O-O 7. Re1 c6 8. a4 b6 9. b3 a6 10. Bb2 Bb7 11. Bd3 Re8 12. Ne2 c5 13. dxe5 Nxe5 14. Nxe5 dxe5 15. Nc3 Bf8 16. Qe2 g6 17. Rad1 Qe7 18. Bc4 Bg7 19. Bc1 h6 20. Rd3 Red8 21. Rxd8+ Qxd8 22. Rd1 Qc8 23. f3 Bc6 24. Be3 Be8 25. Qd2 Kh7 26. Qd6 Qb7 27. Nd5 Nd7 28. Nc7 Bf8 29. Qd5 Qxc7 30. Qxa8 Nb8 31. Qd5 Be7 32. Qd3 a5 33. Qd2 h5 34. Bg5 1-0[/pgn]

GM Fishbein finished in third place with a score of 5/7 mainly due to his loss to the second place finisher, Erick Garcia (2308). Garcia had an awesome tournament, only losing to Erenburg and drawing Andrew Samuelson (2295) while defeating Fishbein, FM Nico Checa (2484), and IM Nazi Paikidze (2398). Below is GM Erenburg's last round win against FM Boris Privman. In the Under 2200 section, Trung Nguyen (2084) finished in sole first place with a score of 6/7 and took home $1300. His only loss was to eventual second place finisher Deodato Obregon (2010) in round five. Obregon fell back to second after taking half point byes in the last two rounds but still won $600 for his score. In the Under 2000 section, Richard Tan (1961) was also sole first with a score of 6/7 and earned $1050. He was undefeated, having just two draws. In second with a score of 5.5 was Anil Marthi whose score earned him $500. The Under 1800 section ended in a two-way tie for first between Thomas Erickson (1742) and Daniel Picard (1708) at 5.5. They each earned $450 for their 5.5 score. The only perfect score of 7 was in the Under 1600 section by Nicolas Thomas (1585) who earned $1800. Even though he had sole first locked up going into the last round, he played one of the longest games to earn the larger score-based prize. He finished two points ahead of the two players tied for 2nd place, Jumoke Johnson (1584) and Yasser Mahmoud (1493). The Under 1300 section ended in a five-way tie for first between Eric Green II, Hari Maheswaran, Yanal Al Sabbagh, Travis Seppala, and Parth Jaiswal, all with a score of 5. Each earned $120 for their score. The Under 1000 section had an unusual situation with two unrated players, Kinnar Dattani and Daniel Hernandez, getting 6.5. Normally, that score would have been worth $700, but unrateds were limited to a maximum prize of $100 in the section. Therefore, the two players in the next lower score group received the balance. Thus, Kevin Zimmer and Aeshan Kapil both earned $600 prizes with their 4.5 scores. Tournament Pictures Final Standings and Prizes