International master Orlando Husbands continues to add to his recent accolades when he captured the Blitz chess championship in dramatic fashion over the last weekend.

Blitz chess is a fast form of chess played where each player has three minutes with a 30 second increment from move one for each player and is akin to T20 cricket.

Husbands had to hold off a stiff challenge from Justin Parsons and had to go to a tie-break 3 game playoff to defend his title as both players had finished the initial tournament with 8 points from 9 games.

Eventually after two competitive games Husbands won the play-off two games to nil and begun the year as he finished last year with a coveted tournament victory

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Both Husbands and Parsons had showed their recent good form by topping the event, Parsons had one lost to Husbands and Husbands suffered a massive upset against the top female junior player Hannah Wilson in round 8. This result is what led to the playoff.

Finishing in third position was Adam Roachford who scored 6 ½ points. He suffered losses against the two top players but again gave the eventual winner of the event a run for his money.

Louis Wilson took the 1600 – 1400 Rating prize with 5 points from 9 but struggled in some of his games due to the faster time control.

Dr. Carlos Chase and Samuel Greenidge shared the Under 1400/ Unrated prize, both scoring 5 points also. Dr. Chase would have garnered bragging rights in the event when he defeated fellow physician Dr. Alfred Sparman in the penultimate round.

Hannah Wilson wins female championship

Again, the female championship was played with the open as it was undersubscribed. Hannah Wilson proved her prowess by winning the title with 7 ½ points from 9. Chanon Reifer-Belle finished in second with 5 ½ points, while Kiarra Eversley finished third with 4 points. The winner of the Under 1400/ Unrated prize was Erika Alkins with 3 points.

Twenty players partook in the event, with a mixture of youth and experience to make it an exciting start to the chess year.

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Barbados’s top chess player international master Orlando Husbands represented the Caribbean team in an online match with a Chinese team recently.

Husbands was part of a four-member team which also included grand master Jimenez Luis Lazaro Aguero of Cuba, women’s FIDE master Catherine Kaslan of Suriname and Jessica Callendar of Guyana.

They played against a team of similar sex composition (2 males and 2 females) from China which included Renjie HUANG, Chenxi ZHAO, women international masters Tianqi YAN and Ruotong CHU.

The match would be a Scheveningen, where each player would get to play each player on the opposing team twice with both the black and white colors.

On the men’s side of the equation, the average combined ratings of the two players were similar, however the females of the Chinese team were much higher rated than the Caribbean girls. This clear advantage to the Chinese team would be the deciding factor in the match.

Husbands represents

On the first day of the match Husbands faced the two Chinese male players. He was able to score half point from his two games against Chenxi Zhoa, but could not get off the mark against Renjie Huang.

However, on the next day Husbands fortunes turned around as he had to battle the two Chinese female players. Husbands was resounding as he defeated both Tianqi Yan and Ruotong Chu 1 ½ – ½ points in their 2 game match ups.

Grandmaster Aguero of Cuba was the highest point scorer on the Caribbean team with 5 ½ points from his 8 games. He lost none of his mini matches, drawing against the two male Chinese players and defeating both the females.

The Chinese team duly won the match by 23 to 9 points winning 7 of 8 matches and drawing one.

International Arbiter from Barbados, Kelvin Daniel, who was the Caribbean representative on the arbiters’ team expressed his satisfaction with the high standard of organization of the event and with the media coverage in China and the governmental support from the Asian powerhouse in organizing the event. Kudos must also go to the Surinam federation who organized the initial event from which the Caribbean team was selected from.

This match allowed Caribbean players to be exposed to a high standard of chess as China is a chess superpower. It is hoped that such an event can be repeated and maybe in an over the board format.

Chanon Reifer-Belle has won the Under 1400 rating section of the Michael Forde Memorial chess tournament held from Independence Day to the preceding weekend at the Coles Building on Bay Street, Bridgetown.

The event was played as a 10 player round robin, that is where all players will play the others and was held in honor of Forde who was an educator and pioneer in school chess development.

The field included fellow chess Olympiad female representative Kiarra Eversley who was the top-rated player, some aspiring juniors, as well as some newcomers to the chess scene.

Reifer-Belle recently returning from the Central American and Caribbean championship, dominated the field and by rounds 5 in which she defeated the then co – leader Jacob Layson, it was clear that she would be the one looking to top the field. Her toughest game would have come in round 3, where she had to use her greater experience to defeat Alesha Lovell in a long endgame.

Reifer-Belle had already won the event when she went into the last round against Eversley, but quickly overpowered her older opponent to win and amass a perfect score.

Finishing in second was Jacob Layson, with 7 ½ points. Layson played solidly throughout the event and could be well pleased with his effort in only his second tournament. His victory against the top rated Eversley was no doubt a moment to savor. With his direct and pragmatic approach, he will no doubt be one to look out for in the future.

There was a tie between Eversley and Lovell in third position with both players finishing on 6 points. Lovell finishing ahead on the tie-break which was the mutual result between the two players. Lovell having won the encounter between the two.

The next placed players finished on four points and these were Alex Sargeant and Eden Gibson.