What a start to the 44th National Women Challengers 2017 in Mysore. Right in the first round we had the former Asian Champion and India's top player WGM Bhakti Kulkarni getting checkmated by V. Rindhiya! We have the complete analysis of the game. Our author C. K. Muralidharan not only brings you all the action from round one in Mysore, but he also interviewed former National Champion Mary Ann Gomes. Interview, pictures, analysis, results and much more in our round one report.

Rindhiya V from Tamil Nadu (Rating 1485), played an excellent game on the fifth board with white pieces to shock fifth seeded WGM Bhakti Kulkarni of Air India (Rating 2255) in 39 moves in the lone upset, on the inaugural day of the nine-day 44th National women Challengers chess championship 2017, conducted by the Mysore Chess Centre under the aegis of the UKCA and AICE at Kanteerava Sports Club, Mysuru on Friday.

Rindhiya's win against Bhakti was a clear case of the higher rated player not acquiescing to a draw in a dead equal position and going on to lose

Annotations by IM Sagar Shah

[Event "44th NATIONAL WOMEN CHALLENGERS CHESS CH"]

[Site "Mysore Sports Club, Mysuru, Ka"]

[Date "2017.07.21"]

[Round "1.5"]

[White "Rindhiya, V."]

[Black "Kulkarni, Bhakti"]

[Result "1-0"]

[ECO "A00"]

[WhiteElo "1485"]

[BlackElo "2255"]

[Annotator "Sagar Shah"]

[PlyCount "77"]

[EventDate "2017.07.21"]

[EventRounds "11"]

[EventCountry "IND"]



1. e4 g6 2. d4 c6 3. Bd3 d5 4. c3 (4. e5 {should be preferred.}) 4... dxe4 5.

Bxe4 Nf6 6. Bd3 Bg7 {Black already has a pretty fine postion.} 7. Nf3 Bg4 (7...

O-O {followed by b6 Bb7 and c5 also looked like a plausible option.}) 8. h3

Bxf3 9. Qxf3 O-O 10. Nd2 e5 $5 {Bhakti sees that her opponents king is in the

centre and opens up the position.} 11. dxe5 Nfd7 12. Qe2 Nxe5 13. Bc2 Re8 14.

O-O Na6 15. Nf3 {White is not really afraid of any discovered attacks.} Nc5 16.

Nxe5 Rxe5 17. Be3 {Rindhiya has played simple chess and got a small edge here.

She has the bishop pair.} Qe7 18. Qc4 Ne4 19. Bd4 $6 (19. Rad1 $14) 19... Nd2

20. Qd3 Nxf1 21. Bxe5 Bxe5 22. Qxf1 Bc7 {It is very surprising that Bhakti

lost from such a position.} (22... Re8 $15) 23. Re1 Qd6 24. g3 Bb6 25. Qd3 Qf6

26. Qe2 Qg5 27. Qf3 Kg7 28. Bb3 {Now there are some issues against the f7

point.} f5 $2 {A bad move weakening the king.} (28... Qf6 {It was time to

exchange the queens and call it a day.}) 29. h4 Qf6 $2 (29... Qg4 $14) 30. Re6

$1 Qf8 31. Qe2 {Now its the perfect moment to remember that in opposite

coloured bishop middlegames, the side that is attacking is usually the one

that has the advantage!} Qb8 32. Re7+ Kh8 33. Kg2 Qd6 34. h5 gxh5 35. Re6 Qc5

36. Re8+ Rxe8 37. Qxe8+ Kg7 38. Qf7+ Kh6 39. Qf6# {A brutal defeat for Bhakti,

which shows that sometimes it's just better to accept the draw and fight the

next day!} 1-0

All other seeded players had a smooth passage to the second round with wins. Playing on the top board with black pieces, top-seed WGM Soumya Swaminathan (PSPB-rating 2349) had to come back strongly after making a wrong 28th move to beat Bihar's Garima Gaurav (rating 1535) in 65 moves.

Soumya Swaminathan won her game, but wasn't in her best form

[Event "44th NATIONAL WOMEN CHALLENGERS CHESS CH"]

[Site "Mysore Sports Club, Mysuru, Ka"]

[Date "2017.07.21"]

[Round "1.1"]

[White "Garima, Gaurav"]

[Black "Soumya, Swaminathan"]

[Result "0-1"]

[ECO "A00"]

[WhiteElo "1535"]

[BlackElo "2349"]

[PlyCount "130"]

[EventDate "2017.07.21"]

[EventRounds "11"]

[EventCountry "IND"]



1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. d4 cxd4 4. Nxd4 Nf6 5. Nc3 d6 6. Be2 e5 7. Nb3 Be7 8.

O-O O-O 9. Be3 a5 10. a4 Be6 11. Nd2 d5 12. exd5 Nxd5 13. Nxd5 Bxd5 14. Bc4 Rc8

15. Bxd5 Qxd5 16. Nb3 Qc4 17. c3 Rfd8 18. Qc2 Nb4 19. Qf5 Qxb3 20. cxb4 Qxb4

21. Qxe5 Bf6 22. Qg3 Qxb2 23. Rab1 Qa2 24. Rb6 Bc3 25. Rxb7 Qxa4 26. Qf3 Qc4

27. Rc1 a4 28. Qf4 Qd5 $6 (28... Qxf4 $1 29. Bxf4 a3 {simply finishes off the

game, as the a-pawn queens.} 30. Ra7 Ra8 $19) 29. Qf3 Qa2 30. g3 h6 31. Qg4 Qc4

32. Qxc4 Rxc4 33. Bb6 Rdc8 34. Ra7 Bb2 35. Rd1 Rc1 36. Rxc1 Rxc1+ 37. Kg2 a3

38. Be3 Rc4 39. Kf3 h5 40. h4 Kh7 41. Ra5 Kg6 42. Bg5 f6 43. Be3 Kf7 44. Ra6

Ke7 45. Ke2 Kd7 46. Kd3 Rc3+ 47. Ke2 Kc7 48. Kd1 Kb7 49. Rb6+ Kc7 50. Ra6 Rc6

51. Ra5 Rc4 52. Ra6 Rc3 53. Ke2 Kb7 54. Ra7+ Kc6 55. Ra5 Rb3 56. Rc5+ Kb7 57.

Ra5 Bc3 58. Ra7+ Kb8 59. Bc5 Rb5 60. Be3 Ra5 61. Rxa5 Bxa5 62. Bd4 Kb7 63. Kd3

Bb6 64. Bxb6 Kxb6 65. Kc4 a2 0-1

Second seeded WGM Mary Ann Gomes (PSPB) playing with white pieces on the second board took her time to recover from an interesting position against Pracheta Agarwal of Jharkhand (rating 1526) and post a win in 44 moves. Commonwealth champion WGM Swathi Ghate (LIC), playing with back pieces, registered a easy win over her rival WCM C.Vyshnavi (AP) in 27 moves.

Nimmy George (white) fighting it out against Niti Gupta

Players of various ages have taken part in the contest and it promises to be an exciting event!

Interview with WGM Mary Ann Gomes

By C.K. Muralidharan

My aim is to become a full-fledged grandmaster!

Mary Ann Gomes, 28 years from Kolkata, an employee with PSPB, a three times national champion in 2011, 2012, 2013, Asian junior girls champion in 2006, 2007, 2008 and Asian U-16 junior girls title winner, is one of the top women chess players in the country and she was interviewed by ChessBase India correspondent on the side lines of the 44th National women's Challengers chess tournament 2017 at Mysuru. She spoke about her preparations for the tournament and about her future plans. Below are the excerpts:

After all the above said achievements, what's next in store?

Mary: Only after tasting success at such a high level, I realized that there is still much more to go ahead. I want to achieve and get the Grand Master title which is the dream of every chess player. I have still a lot of ground to cover. I am moving in the right direction and hope to attain the same in future days.

Your preparations for this championships?

Mary: Basically I have been playing continuously and competing in tournaments. I took part in the Commonwealth Championships recently and had a decent run in the tournament. i am working on a daily basis to improve my overall game. I have started with a win and hope to continue faring well in this championships.

How did it feel winning the National championships three-times in a row and after that do you think that you have some-what lost your appetite for winning titles?

Mary: I think that I felt satisfied after winning the National championships three times in a row in 2011, 2012 & 2013. The hunger for winning and achieving some-what dimmed and my performance came down after that as my focus was not up to the mark.. Now I am trying to catch up with the others who are performing well. I intend to work hard and perform well in the days to come and achieve success.

When was your first Olympiad and tell us about your performance there?

Mary: I first represented India in the Olympiad in 2006 at Italy, 2008 in Germany, 2012 in turkey and 2014 in Norway. In 2008, I won a silver medal in the 4th board.

Your best performance so far?

Mary: My best performance was in the world team championships in 2013 at Kazakhstan where I won a bronze medal in board four and India finished fifth.

About the support from PSPB?

Mary: They are very supportive and help us in giving us the the needed facilities to play the game of chess with the required time-off to practice and play tournaments.

About your chess future?

Mary: I want to achieve the Grand Master title in the future. I have a present rating of 2331 and I aim to reach a rating of 2400 by next year.

About your coaches?

Mary: I train with Neeraj Kumar Mishra and also with GM Deepan Chakravarthy.

Results of round 1

Complete results

Ranking after round one

Complete list of ranking

Pairing for round 2

Complete pairing list

Earlier the tournament was inaugurated by Sri. Dhruva Kumar, Chairman, Mysore Urban Delvelopment Authority who made 1st move along with IM Mohota Nisha, PSPB, here at Kanteerava Narasimaraja Sports Club (Mysore Sports Club),Mysuru on 21st July 2017, in the presence of Sri. Hanumantha, Jt.Secretary of AICF, Sri D P Anantha, President of

UKCA, Sri Anantha Raje Urs Secretary of MRC, Sri Uday Shankar, and Sri Vishwanath, President and Secretary of Sports Club respectively.

About the author

C.K.Muralidharan is a 55-year-old Free-lance Sports Journalist based in Mysore. He has 20 years of experience in sports journalism. He contributes to the Hindu National daily and Daily Star of Mysore on all sports in Mysore for the last 15 years. He has been covering sports in Mysore on his website - www.mysoresport.com. He is the promoter of Mysore Professional Chess Academy. IM M.S.Thejkumar is the Vice-President of the Academy and supervises the coaching programme. He works with the Mysore District Chess Association in order to spread the game of chess through the chess in schools program.

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