Kyle Sandiford edged Harrison College schoolmate Nitin Mahtani to emerge the national Under-18 chess champion.
Both players scored five wins and draw when the championships concluded recently at The St Michael School to finish with five and a half out of a maximum six points.
Having played to a draw against each other when they met in the fourth round, the title was decided on the second tiebreaker, which favoured Sandiford on account of playing against higher placed opposition.
Azaria Johnson, the 2015 CARIFTA Under-12 girls champion, finished third with four points, the same as Sandiford’s younger brother, Leigh, to ensure that Harrison College completed a sweep of the first four places.
The elder Sandiford defeated his younger brother and Johnson in his final two games and had earlier won against Nathaniel Hagos, Joshua Burke and former national women’s champion Gabriela Cumberbatch.
Mahtani also scored wins against the younger Sandiford, Johnson and Cumberbatch, along with victories over Gaybrianna Moore and Dondre Husbands.
Elsewhere, Barbadian international masters Orlando Husbands and Terry Farley finished in tenth and 15th places, respectively, at a tournament in Suriname to mark that country’s Independence.
Husbands registered three wins and three draws over the nine rounds of competition to finish with four and a half points, while Farley scored one win and three draws to end with three and a half points.
The two Barbadians played to a draw when they faced each other in the final round of competition in the tournament that featured four Grandmasters and two Women Grandmasters among the 18 entrants.
Husbands had the satisfaction of beating Woman Grandmaster Altan-Ulzii Enkhtuul of Mongolia in the second round.
Both Husbands and Farley are expected to compete in the inaugural Caribbean Chess Cup, which starts today at Divi Southwinds Hotel.
The tournament will form part of the Barbados Independence Invitational Games and will be staged in collaboration with the Continental Chess Association and the organisers of the 43rd World Chess Olympiad in Batumi, Georgia. (HG)
