Sixteen players showed up to the Fall Open, including one master (Lucas Davies) and three experts (former BC Champion Dragoljub Milicevic, Stephen Wright and Mehrdad Yousefzedah). The tournament was four rounds which, ideally, is perfect for a 16-player Swiss. The tournament took place at SFU, which was a very nice location for the first day! More on that later...

Round one featured only one upset, when Aviv Milner (who is greatly underrated) beat the #5 player, Noam Davies. When Yousefzedah and Wright took byes in rounds two and three, respectively, and Lucas Davies conceded a draw to Ben Daswani in round two, Milicevic rose to the top of the pack. In round three, with white, he drew Lucas Davies and in round four he easily disposed of Daswani to clinch first with a score of 3.5/4. In second was Lucas with 3.0/4 and in third were a multiplicity of players. In the end, the prizes broke down like this:

First: Dragoljub Milicevic
Second: Lucas Davies
Third, 1st U2000, 2nd U2000, 1st U1600, 2nd U1600: Merhdad Yousefzedah, Noam Davies, Ben Daswani, Vlad Gaciu, Richard Huang
1st U1300: Aviv Milner
2nd U1300: Valery Milner

As I said before, SFU was a very nice site on the first day. On the second day, however, shockingly, the room was locked. After inquiring to the security officers, we were informed that, as we had no proof that we were really chessplayers (as opposed to thieving pirates out to pilfer laminated paper chessboards) we would not be allowed to go into the room. After an hour of negotiating, we were able to acquire the sets but, unfortunately, we were not allowed to play in the room (even after offering to pay double rent). Eventually, we found a functionable study area on campus and set up shop there.

Winter Open

Twenty-one players attended the Winter Open, the second stage of the Vancouver Seasonal Grand Prix. Last tournament's top two finishers, Dragoljub Milicevic (2124) and Lucas Davies (2128) were by far the top two players, as all the other participants were rated below 2000.

The first two rounds were pretty standard, with not many upsets and the favorites remaining on top. Going into the penultimate round, there were four players with 2.0/2 (the aforementioned Milicevic and L. Davies, as well as Ben Daswani and Glen Lee) and two players with 1.5/2 (Noam Davies and James Chan). In round three, Milicevic defeated Lee, Chan defeated N. Davies and L. Davies and Daswani drew. This left Milicevic as the only player with a perfect score and L. Davies, Chan and Daswani all a half-point behind. In the final round, Milicevic and L. Davies drew and Daswani defeated Chan. This left Milicevic and Daswani tied for first with 3.5/4. L. Davies and Tiffany Tang, who won her final three games after losing her first, tied for third with 3.0/4. Tang was also the top U2000, while the top U1600 was newcomer Steve Kelso, who played very well and finished with 2.5/4.

All in all, the tournament went fairly smoothly, even though the tournament director's first attempt at Accelerated Pairings was executed fairly poorly. The 21 participants was a welcome improvement over the 16 last time, which I believe was due in part to the Winter Open's more central location.

Spring Open

A surprisingly low seven players showed up for the Spring Open, the penultimate tournament in the Vancouver Seasonal Grand Prix. Among the many players missing from the tournament, then-leader of the Grand Prix, Dragoljub Milicevic did not attend. However, Alberta's Vicente Lee (2325), as well as a few others, made this tournament relatively strong.

The first round, which only had four players participating, ended in two hard-fought draws. The next round featured late joiners Louie Jiang and Michael Yip, who played against each other, with the former winning. This was only the beginning for eleven-year-old Louie Jiang. In round three, he knocked off expert Richard Ingram and in the final round he beat James Chan to finish clear first with 3.5/4. Chan placed second with 2.5/4, just ahead of Ingram and Ben Daswani with 2.0/4.

Hopefully, the attendence will be better for the final stage of the Vancouver Seasonal Grand Prix - the Summer Open, which will be taking place on June 25 and 26.