The first ICA West over-the-board tournament commenced on July 17 and 22 players from the West Region competed in four rounds G/30; d5 games at the Nampa Public Library. I drove all the way from Coeur d’ Alene to help future ICA Tournament Director, Jeff Price, learn the ropes of running tournaments. We will be able to host monthly tournaments at the Nampa Public Library every third Saturday.
I thought it was a fun tournament to get everyone back together and the scholastic players were the surprise as John Glenn kept saying throughout the day, “Wow, those kids are really going somewhere. They’re really good.” With chess players relegated to computer chess (or no chess!) during the past year, it is clear that the younger players grew the most. Only half the players were scholastic and the rest were non-scholastic.
Andrea Chimenton was on the road to make a clean sweep of the tournament and only needed to beat Kaustubh Kodihalli, but Kodihalli was able to focus his middlegame and take home the point when Andrea dropped a Bishop.
[Event “Summer Classic”] [Site “Nampa, ID”] [Date “2021.07.17”] [Round “3”] [White “Kodihalli, Kaustubh (1723)”] [Black “Chimenton, Andrea (1769)”] [Result “1-0”]
e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nf6 3. Nxe5 d6 4. Nf3 Nxe4 5. Nc3 Nxc3 6. dxc3 Be7 7. Be3 Nd7 8.Bd3 O-O 9. O-O Ne5 10. Nxe5 dxe5 11. Qe2 Bd6 12. Rad1 Qh4 13. g3 Qh3 14. f3 Be6 15. Bc4 Rae8 16. Bb5 Re7 17. c4 a6 18. c5 axb5 19. cxd6 cxd6 20. Qxb5 Rc8 21. Rxd6 Bc4 22. Qxc4 1-0
James Wei won against Finn Belew which then placed Kodihalli and Wei at 3.5 points each.
[Event “Summer Classic”] [Site “Nampa, ID”] [Date “2021.07.17”] [Round “3”] [White “Belew, Finn”] [Black “Wei, James”] [Result “0-1”]
c4 e5 2. Nc3 Nc6 3. e4 Bc5 4. d3 Nge7 5. g3 h5 6. Nge2 d6 7. Bg2 h4 8. a3 hxg3 9. hxg3 Rxh1+ 10. Bxh1 Nd4 11. Nxd4 Bxd4 12. Qh5 Ng6 13. Qh7 Qf6 14. f3 Be6 15. Qh2 O-O-O 16. Nd5 Bxd5 17. cxd5 Rh8 18. Qg2 Ne7 19. f4 Qh6 20. fxe5 Qxh1+ 21. Qxh1 Rxh1+ 0-1
Rather than use tie-breakers to decide who won the prize donated by chessinart.com (Klára Severová), Kodihalli and Wei decided to engage in a playoff game (G/15;d5) to determine the winner. Each battled until James Wei emerged as victor and eagerly grabbed the book. I don’t know if he was surprised or disappointed that the book did not contain any “instructional games,” as he asked for, but I do know that the book will help James learn about the culture of chess that spans centuries in paintings and other artwork.
The next ICA tournament in the Boise area will be the Hall of Fame, August 21 followed by the Idaho Closed during Labor Day weekend.