5th Chess Festival di Agrigento Trofeo Vigata, Italy
Hi All,
The last couple of weeks have been a proper autumn here in Edinburgh, Scotland and so today I decided to re-live the happy sunny days I had in end of August in Sicily, Italy. Between 23-24 August I was taking part in 5th Chess Festival di Agrigento Trofeo Vigata, held on the beautiful Sicily island. When the tournament organizer (Emilio) invited me to the tournament I was excited - I had never been to Sicily and what a better way to end a summer than playing a little chess tournament there. To my surprise, I realized it was no easy task to find a way to get down there from Edinburgh. After a couple of days of pondering I found a way (via Malta - another fabulous island!) and I was on my way!
Pre-tournament (aka preparations..)
Before the tournament I spent 1,5 days in Malta, which was great - catching up with a very good friend of mine, enjoying good food and wine, and of course spending hours on the beach! (see below a little Malta-teaser picture - can highly recommend visiting this island if you haven't already!)
Arriving to Sicily
When planning the trip I didn't realize how close Malta was to Sicily and so I could have even taken a ferry between the two islands, however, since the flight was already booked - no ferry for me this time! 
The flight was short and sweet, however, I landed late in the evening and still had a couple of hours of travel by bus and taxi to get to the hotel the tournament was held. So it was just after 2 AM arrived to my hotel bed and needed to sleep fast as the Round 1 game was starting in just 8 hours!
Hope you didn't get bored of the little non-chess related intro, it's just sometimes people (myself including) don't realize what obstacles players need to overcome even to get to the tournament, and so I thought to share these little details with you too!
About the tournament..
The tournament near Aggrigento was a 6-round Swiss tournament with a couple of 2300+ players and several 2100-2200 players. With double rounds in 3 days I knew this wouldn't be a walk in the park. Nevertheless, the tournament organizers really made sure the players felt comfortable and could focus on the games. The hotel had a very nice restaurant and an outdoors swimming pool - what more can one wish for?!
Round 1
A fairly straight-forward game, didn't take too much energy, so after a short walk and some lunch it was time for the next round..
Round 2
I liked the way I played even though after the game I could see that with better defense my opponent could have held the game. Nevertheless - happy with 2 wins in 2 games after day 1.
Round 3
Poor opening knowledge led to a completely equal position, and to be frank, it looked quite shaky at some moments, however, my decision to simplify things paid off as I managed to get to a better endgame. Lack of precision there led to a draw. Not much to say - definitely could have played better, but it was a tough one. Need to prepare a better opening line so next time I see this on the board I'm ready.
Round 4
Round 5
Round 6
Hope you enjoyed the blog-post and let me know if you have any questions/feedback!
Many thanks,
Ritvars
