2nd place at GA Class Championship!!!

I played the GA class championship last weeked. My main goal going into this tournament was just to get to my peak rating and take a long break from chess. My last peak rating (2210) was achieved at the southern congress tourney back in August. I have shed a lot of rating points since that tourney and wanted to make a come back.

I played in the premier section of the tourney, which only players above the rating of 2000 can play. The first round I played Kevin Wang (2109). Even though I was playing with the black pieces, I wanted to play for the win. This is why I chose to play the french. However, my opponet gave me equality by playing the exchange french. I slowly started to outplay him and ended up winning a pawn after which his position to collapsed.

My second round opponent was Preteek Mishra (2076). I lost my last encounter with Preteek and was out for revenge. I played the italian and slowly attacked his king. My oppoent was defending my attack well until he missed Nxg6, after which I either mate him or queen my pawn.

My third round opponent was Vedic Panda (2072). I have had a bad score aganist Vedic in the past, because of his amazing ability to predict what opening I will play and prepare aganist it. However, in this game I decided to play an opening he couldn't predict. The position was roughly equal the whole game, until Vedic blundered a piece.

My fourth round opponent was Deepak Aaron. And Yes, this is the same Deepak I beat last weekend. The opening was also the same until he deviated with Bb6. I miss played the opening and the early middle game, which gave deepak a nice advantage. My opponent slowing attacked my king and his attack could not be stopped. All in all a nice game by Deepak!

Here is me vs. Deepak.

My last round opponent was David Mbonu (2122). I have a pretty good record against David. David played a opening that he never played aganist me before. I did not know any theory in the line he played, but played logical moves. I got a solid position out of the opening and David misplayed the early middle game, which gave me a much better ending. David could not handle the activity of my rooks and had to give up a pawn. The postion collapsed soon after david lost the pawn. My queen side pawn structure was quite funny, but it was the reason I ended up winning this game!

Here is me vs. David!

My final score was 4/5, which placed me in 2nd place. Deepak ended up taking 1st place. I got 291$ for my efforts. This tournament performance put me at an all time high rating of 2219!!!