Eight-time na­tion­al women's cham­pi­on Adi­ti Soon­dars­ingh and reign­ing men's cham­pi­on FIDE mas­ter Frank Yee will be among those in ac­tion when the Pan Amer­i­can Life In­sur­ance Open Chess Cham­pi­onship gets un­der­way at the Pan Amer­i­can Life Plaza on St Vin­cent St, Port-of-Spain, to­mor­row.

Yee, who has been knock­ing at the door for over a decade, fi­nal­ly won the na­tion­al ti­tle last Oc­to­ber.

Since then, Yee has not been in ac­tion be­cause, as na­tion­al cham­pi­on, he has au­to­mat­i­cal­ly qual­i­fied to de­fend his ti­tle this year and does not have to play in any of the four qual­i­fy­ing tour­na­ments.

He will come up against for­mer na­tion­al cham­pi­on (FM) Ryan Harp­er, who he de­throned.

Two for­mer na­tion­al mas­ters (NM) Ce­cil Lee and Rav­ishen Singh to­geth­er with the likes of FM Mario Mer­ritt, Kevin Cu­pid, Dev Soon­dars­ingh, Esan Wilt­shire, Sean Per­ry­man, Keevin James and Leonard Dun­can all in­tend on up­set­ting the favourites.

Soon­dars­ingh, the fe­male play­er of the year 2012, leads the fe­males. She led the na­tion­al fe­male team (five play­ers) at the World Olympiad last year in Is­tan­bul, Turkey, and led by ex­am­ple as T&T's best per­former as she set a record as the first fe­male na­tion­al to de­feat a women's in­ter­na­tion­al mas­ter from Iraq. Her clos­est ri­val will be Jane Kennedy who has been im­prov­ing since her re­turn over two years ago.

Good com­pe­ti­tion is ex­pect­ed from Gabriel­la John­son, Na­jarah Ra­haman, Tyler-Marie Mun­gal, Danielle Cado­gan and na­tion­al girls un­der-10 cham­pi­on Shemi­lah James. James, the ju­nior girls play­er of the year, at­tends St Ur­su­la An­gli­can Pri­ma­ry School. The Laven­tille res­i­dent was the on­ly T&T play­er to win a gold medal at the CAC Cham­pi­onship in Puer­to Ri­co, last De­cem­ber.

Si­mul­ta­ne­ous­ly with the se­nior tour­na­ment will be an Open Ju­nior Tour­na­ment with prizes in cat­e­gories from U-10 to U-16 for both boys and girls.

The two Pan Amer­i­can Life Open Chess tour­na­ments are or­gan­ised by Pal­adins Chess Club. Along with cash prizes for the win­ners, there will be a keen con­test for the four North/South tro­phies. The sev­en-round Swiss for­mat tour­na­ment will be played over two week­ends. In­ter­est­ed play­ers can con­tact Bhisham Soon­dars­ingh (761-7091) or An­drew Bowles (741-3982).

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