The new year began in lively fashion with the unique and keenly contested Gomez Pestana tournament which had its fourth annual edition at the Chess Centre, Brabant Street, Woodbrook, on Friday 9th and Saturday 10th January.
The Gomez Pestana event was launched by Knights Chess Club's vice president Clayton Gomez in memory of his father Louis Gomez Pestana whose marathon chess career extended from 1920 to the late 50s and included games against two world champions, Alexander Alekhine and Max Euwe who gave simultaneous exhibitions in Port-of-Spain during their visits to T&T in 1920 and the early 30s respectively. A ranking player, Clayton's father was also in the T&T team which won a match against Barbados in the 40s.
Although only four years old, the tournament has become quite popular, This year's action attracted a total of 21 prominent players who filled the Brabant Street facility almost to the limit. Among them, DR was particularly happy to see stalwarts such as David Christopher, winner of the first GP event, and Marcus Cobham back in the competitive fray after a fairly long absence. Hopefully, their participation in this novel event would stimulate them into a regular return to the royal game.The first phase of the tourney consisted of three round-robin contests of seven players each. This action provided the qualifiers for the second stage as the top two winners in each group went forward. The six who qualified for the final showdown were CM Cesar Caldera Ramos, CM Joseph Gill, CM Ravishen Singh, FM Joshua Johnson, CM Kevin Cupid and Esan Wiltshire.
Ramos, a former Venezuelan national player, who has endeared himself to the T&T chess community during his long sojourn here, emerged victorious, finishing on four points after losing one game to Cupid who tied for second place with Johnson and Singh, on three points each. Ramos collected the first prize of $800 while Cupid, Johnson and Singh earned $400 each.
Ramos' chess career is an unusual one, spanning both of the countries he calls home; he served as captain of the 1982 Venezuelan Olympic team in Lucerne, Switzerland, and later of the T&T team to the Instanbul Olympiad, Turkey, in 2002. He was a gold medallist at the 1971 CAC games in Mexico and captained the Venezuelan team to the Pan American Junior Games in 1998. Most notably, Ramos was a prominent finisher in several major competitions in T&T over the years.
A Swiss tournament ran alongside the GP finals, comprising the 15 non-qualifiers together with three players who turned up a day late. "This is one of the advantages of the event," said Gomez.
"Players can still enjoy competition at this late stage."
Hayden Lee and Cobham topped the group scoring four points out of five rounds. Christopher took third place, half a point behind them, while Trevor Flower and Sean Cudjoe finished fourth and fifth with three points each. Next came Rickson Thomas and Simon Ramdath on two and a half.
Reporting on another event, results of the Junior Nationals held last month at Presentation College, Chaguanas, DR observes a continuing growth in skill levels of members of the Grant Memorial Presbyterian School Chess Club. The club entered contestants in ten of the 14 age groups and captured five national championships, two second and three third places. Among them, Rayden Rampersad was given special recognition as the youngest player in T&T to gain a FIDE rating, 1448. Also, Athena Martin was the club's first female member to secure a FIDE rating, 1488. As a result, GMPS Chess Club now has six FIDE rated players after seven years in operation. David Martin, the club's president and only coach, is also moving up, gaining a 1609i rating after competing in only two tournaments.