No stopping for Dhopade

By Gopakumar

Ahmedabad (19 Aug 17) :- Grandmaster Swapnil Dhopade maintained his sole lead after beating Gujarat youngster Udit Kamdar in the ninth round of 55th National Challengers Chess Championship at the Karnavati Club on Saturday.

Playing from the black side of exchange variation of Caro-Kan Defence, Dhopade exploited the pawn structure weakness of his opponent in the middle game to register his eighth victory of the championship. His railway teammate Himanshu Sharma moved to the sole second spot with seven and half point after defeating another Gujarati youngster Fenil Shah. Playing under extreme time pressure towards the end of first time control, Shah made crucial mistakes to allow his Grandmaster rival to have a firm grip on the match to secure full point.

Lalith Babu, Mary Ann Gomes, S Satyapragyan and defending champion Ravi Teja were at joint third spot with seven points. Lalith signed the peace treaty with counterpart Debashis Das while Mary demolished the defenses of Swayams Mishra with dark colour pieces. Satyapragyan made short work of Akash PC Iyer and Ravi Teja moved to seven points with a 33 move victory of Nikhil Dixit of Maharahstra.

Important Results (Round-9) :- Udit Kamdar of GUJ (6.5) lost to GM Swapnil Dhopade of RLYS (8.5); GM Himanshu Sharma of RLYS (7.5) beat Fenil Shah of GUJ (6.5); GM Debashis Das of ODI (6.5) drew with GM Lalith Babu M R of PSPB (7); GM Sriram Jha of LIC (6.5) drew with GM Abhijit Kunte of PSPB (6.5); IM Swayams Mishra of AI (6) lost to Mary Ann Gomes of PSPB (7); IM S Nitin of RLYS (6.5) drew with Koustav Chatterjee of WB (6.5); Erigaisi Arjun of TEL (6.5) drew with IM Arghyadip Das of RLYS (6.5); IM S Satyapragyan of AI (7) beat Akash PC Iyer of TN (6); Nikhil Dixit of MAH (6) lost to IM S Ravi Teja of RLYS (7); Sammed Jaykumar Shete of MAH (6) lost to IM Shyaamnikhil P of RLYS (6.5); GM Aravindh Chithambaram of TN (6.5) beat IM Chakkravarthy Reddy of TEL (5.5); GM SL Narayanan of KER (6) drew with Sankalp Gupta of MAH (6); GM Deepan Chakkravarthy of RLYS (6.5) beat Ram S Krishnan of BSNL (5.5); Kaustuv Kundu of WB (5.5) lost to GM RR Laxman of RLYS (6.5); Suyog Wagh of MAH (6) drew with Hemant Sharma of RLYS (6).