$1 million for Campo Memorial

Thursday, June 17, 2010
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By Frank 'Boy' Pestaño



ONE of the main reasons Kirsan Ilyumzhinov will be reelected is his legendary generosity in the promotion of chess using his personal funds.

Former world champion Anatoly Karpov is challenging him for the Fide presidency and has gathered the support of most federations in Europe including the USA.

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I estimate that Kirsan has spent $50 million in the past 15 years and this has benefited not only the
top players, but the ordinary players as well. In fact, this month is a prime example of the abundance of Fide Tournaments.

The number of fide-rated tournaments is now more than 2,000 every year.

Kirsan announced during the meeting of the Asean Chess Federation in Subic early this month that he is personally putting up $1 million for a series of 10 tournaments in the region over the next 10 years to honor Florencio Campomanes, his mentor and predecessor as president.

Campomanes died last month at the age of 83 in Baguio City.

The tournaments will be in 10 countries: the Philippines, Vietnam, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia and Brunei.

The tournament will formally kick off in Manila on Aug. 11 to 19, possibly at the Ninoy Aquino Stadium.

“The whole Asian region, especially the Filipinos, are very thankful for Ilyumzhinov for sponsoring these memorial tournaments in honor of Campomanes,” said National Chess Federation President Prospero Pichay during the meeting attended by Fide general secretary Ignatius Leung of Singapore and representatives of the 10 Asean countries.

Here the major tournaments this month.

The 1st Roseto International Festival was held on June 4 to 12 at the Villaggio di Abruzzo in Roseto degli Abruzzi, on the Adriatic coast in central Italy.

After nine rounds, GM Oleg Romanishin took clear first place with 7.0 points. A point behind is Roland Salvador of the Philippines.

The fourth edition of the Ruy Lopez International Festival is being held in Villafranca de los Barros, Spain from June 11 to June 19.

There are also other events are planned, some of for the youth and amateur players. There are also lectures, master tournaments, meetings, and a rapid open.

The main event of the festival is the round robin Master Tournament with eight players: Vladimir Malakhov (Russia, 2722), Fabiano Caruana (Italy, 2675), Ivan Cheparinov (Bulgaria, 2640), Gabriel Sargissian (Armenia, 2677), Pia Cramling (Sweden 2536), WGM Daisy Cori (Peru 2409), GM Ivan Salgado (Spain, 2606) and IM Manuel Pérez Candelario (Spain, 2527).

The 11th Poikovsky Karpov Tournament took place from June 2 to 14. Sergey Karjakin came straight from his ACP Rapid Cup victory to finish first place on a tie-break against Viktor Bologan. Both finished on 7/11.

The 3rd Kings tournament started last June 14 and will end on June 25 in Medias, Romania. Magnus Carlsen, Wang Yue, Boris Gelfand, Teimour Radjabov, Ruslan Ponomariov and Liviu-Dieter Nisipeanu are in the event.

The 45th Casablanca Memorial is being held in Havana, Cuba. The Elite Group is a six-player, double round robin event with Vassily Ivanchuk as top seed. This is Ivanchuk’s fourth participation in Havana after he won the tournament back in 2005, 2006 and 2007.

Russia is represented by Evgeny Alekseev and Ian Nepomniatchi. Top Cuban players Leinier Dominguez and Lazaro Bruzon present the local challenge and Nigel Short of England is also in.

LOCAL. Lapu-Lapu and Talisay Cities will have a friendly chess match on June 20 in Lapu-Lapu.

The event, which will have 10 players playing two rounds, is organized by Councilor Django Roma, Alwin Dacalan and Manny Manzañares.

(boypestano@gmail.com,www.chessmoso.blogspot.com)


Published in the Sun.Star Cebu newspaper on June 18, 2010.