The Raphael Yelluas Memorial Blitz event held last night at the Kolty Chess Club was a great success, with a very large turnout split into two sections, 1600+ and U1600. The Menlo Park club was well represented and saw excellent results from the likes of Cesar, Adam, Kunal, Marshall, Nicholas, Samuel, Ashwin, Alex Chin, Shahin Aghevli, Josen Kalra, Michael Ho and certainly others I’m forgetting at present.
I don’t have the official results but I believe IM Grisha Kotlyar and CM Badamkhand Norovsambuu tied for first in the 1600+ section, while Menlo Park Chess Club stalwarts Nicholas Tan and Samuel Agdamag shared first in the U1600 section, after an exciting final-round draw between the two (both undefeated to that point!).
The photos below are from the first round, with Cesar and Badamkhand squaring off on board two while I had the pleasure of playing Grisha on board one. We began an interesting Dutch game of a dozen or so moves until I may have been on the verge of losing a pawn or some positional concession but instead opted to boldly hang my queen, from which auspicious start I never left the bottom boards for the rest of the night. Grisha was gracious in victory, however, and may visit our club at some point to play blitz with members and/or give a lecture of some kind.
A big thank you to Wolfgang Behm, George Jeffers, Carl Lumma, Grisha Kotlyar and all the other Kolty Chess Club Players who made this happen—it was a great event!
