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Galicia Chess Festival, 25-27 September 2009, Orense, Spain

In the 1970s, Galicia was one of the main areas of Spanish chess activity, hosting many strong international events. More recently, the area has been overshadowed by Linares, Dos Hermanas and Bilbao, but the 2009 Galicia Chess Festival marks the return of major chess events to Galicia. This year the festival was held in the beautiful city of Orense, which hosted some of the strongest Spanish chess tournaments of the 1970s.

The main event consisted of the Fernando Marcote Memorial Rapidplay Open -
7 rounds at 25 minutes plus ten seconds per move increment, followed by splitting into two sections, the top 16 and the rest; ten rounds in all, over three days. The event is named in memory of one of the greatest workers and organizers for chess in Galicia, and the founder of the club that bears his name and which trained such strong players as Paco Vallejo and the up and coming Ivan Salgado. Señor Marcote’s widow and son were present to give their support to the event, as were the President of Galicia, Señor Alberto Núñez Feijóo, and the President and Vice-President of Orense County Council, Señor José Luis Baltar and Señor Moisés Blanco.

The very generous prize fund of 54,000 euros attracted a good entry, including 16 GMs. After three days of combat, the winner of the top prize in the Rapidplay of 5000 euros was the well known GM Julio Granda from Peru. The women’s champion was Spain’s Graciela Redondo, who pipped the favourite Elena Sedina from Italy for the 3,000 euros prize; Ms Sedina will not have gone away too unhappy however, since she received the second prize of 1,500 euros, to add to the 1,000 she won in the Blitz event!

Your modestly rated reporter managed to win the Veteran’s prize in the Rapidplay of 120 euros, with a score of 6/10. I gave the Blitz a miss, opting to give my blood pressure the benefit of a relaxing (and free!) catamaran cruise down the beautiful river Miño instead!

The weather was scorching, but the venue, the large Paco Paz sports complex, was fairly cool.

Fernando Marcote Memorial Rapidplay Open
1. GM Granda Zuniga, Julio E 2644 PER
2. GM Aleksandrov, Aleksej 2639 BLR
3. GM Hamdouchi, Hicham 2590 FRA
4. GM Korneev, Oleg 2554 RUS
5. GM Gashimov, Vugar 2740 AZE
6. GM Milov, Vadim 2659 SUI
7. GM Cifuentes Parada, Roberto 2532 ESP
8. IM Ortiz Suarez Isan, Reynaldo 2517 CUB
9. GM Drozdovskij, Yuri 2627 UKR
10. GM Van Wely, Loek 2650 NED
11. GM Bauer, Christian
12. GM Salgado Lopez, Ivan
13. GM Agrest, Evgenij
14. IM Rodriguez Lopez, Rafael
15. IM Pena Gomez, Manuel
16. GM Epishin, Vladimir
17. GM Hernandez Carmenates, Holden
18. Fernandez Borrego, Pablo
19. IM Guerra Bastida, Diego
20. IM Martinez Martin, David
21. FM Taboas Rodriguez, Daniel
22. GM Hoffman, Alejandro
23. GM Strikovic, Aleksa
24. WFM Redondo Arguelles, Graciela
25. IM Sedina, Elena
etc. 116 players.

The “Xacobeo 2010” Blitz Championship, played on the Saturday evening, attracted an entry of 115 players, competing over ten rounds at 3 minutes + 2 seconds increment per move. GM Vugar Gashimov from Azerbaijan won the overall first prize of 2,000 euros.

“Xacobeo 2010” Blitz Championship
1 Gashimov, Vugar 9,5
2 Drozdovskij, Yuri 7,5
3 Van Wely, Loek 7,5
4 Bauer, Christian 7,5
5 Agrest, Evgenij 7,5
6 Hamdouchi, Hicham 7,5
7 Hernandez, Holden 7,5
8 Taboas, Daniel 7,5
9 Epishin, Vladimir 7,5
10 Korneev, Oleg 7,5
etc.115 players.

A curious incident occurred in one of the games in the final top 16 section of the Rapidplay between GM Hamdouchi and IM Ortiz. The game began as normal, then after a few moves Hamdouchi pointed out to his opponent that Ortiz’s king and queen were misplaced. Since this was a rapid game, and more than three moves had been made, Ortiz had to continue the game with his king and queen the wrong way round and his king unable to castle; he lost.

Official website:
http://www.galiciachessfestival.com
Also:
http://chess-results.com/tnr25660.aspx?lan=2

A brutal struggle between two of the strongest players in the Rapidplay:

Drozdovskij,Yuri (2627) - Van Wely,Loek (2650) [A57]
Fernando Marcote Open Orense, 27.09.2009
1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 c5 3.d5 b5 4.Qc2 bxc4 5.e4 d6 6.Bxc4 g6 7.b3 Bg7 8.Bb2 0-0 9.Nf3 Na6 10.0-0 Rb8 11.Nc3 Nb4 12.Qe2 Qb6 13.h3 Ba6 14.Rab1 Nd7 15.a3 Bxc4 16.bxc4 Na6 17.Nb5 Bxb2 18.Rxb2 Nc7 19.Rfb1 a6 20.Nbd4 Qa5 21.Nc6 Rxb2 22.Nxe7+ Kg7 23.Qxb2+ Nf6 24.e5 dxe5 25.Nxe5 Qa4 26.N7c6 Nce8 27.Re1 Kh6 28.g4 Nd6 29.f4 Nfe4 30.g5+ Kg7 31.Nd7+ Kg8 32.Ne7# 1-0

Next year’s event, for which funding has already been assured, will be in the historic pilgrimage city of Santiago de Compostela, in connection with the celebration of the “Xacobeo 2010”. The main mover behind the Festival, IM Roberto Páramos, said: “Next year’s event will be even bigger – come and join us in Santiago!”

Philip Adams wrote: A curious incident occurred in one of the games in the final top 16 section of the Rapidplay between GM Hamdouchi and IM Ortiz. The game began as normal, then after a few moves Hamdouchi pointed out to his opponent that Ortiz’s king and queen were misplaced. Since this was a rapid game, and more than three moves had been made, Ortiz had to continue the game with his king and queen the wrong way round and his king unable to castle; he lost.

You just can't get the International Masters these days...

Was there anything to stop him castling? He had actually moved neither King nor rook from their original squares, and according to the rules he could still argue that castling was permissable, 0-0 on the queenside and 0-0-0 on the kingside!

Castling is a move of the king and either rook, counting as a single move of the king and executed as follows: the king is transferred from its original square two squares toward either rook on the same rank; then that rook is transferred over the king to the square the king has just crossed.
(c)
If a player touches a rook and then his king, he may not castle with that rook and the situation will by governed by Articles 7.2 and 7.3 [Touched Piece rules].
(d)
If a player, intending to castle, touches the king first, or king and rook at the same time, and it then appears that castling is illegal, the player may choose either to move his king or to castle on the other side, provided that castling on that side is legal. If the king has no legal move, the player is free to make any legal move.
(e)
Castling is [permanently] illegal:

(i)
if the king has already been moved; or
(ii)
with a rook that has already been moved.

Adam,

It is illegal by reference to the rapidplay laws, specifically A.4/1, viz:

FIDE Handbook wrote: 1. Once each player has completed three moves, no claim can be made regarding incorrect piece placement, orientation of the chessboard or clock setting.
In case of reverse king and queen placement castling with this king is not allowed.

Regards,
Paul McKeown

This of course depends on whether there are sufficient arbiters or not.

FIDE Handbook wrote:A.3

Where there is adequate supervision of play, (for example one arbiter for at most three games) the Competition Rules shall apply.

A.4
Where supervision is inadequate the Competition Rules shall apply, except where they are overridden by the following Laws of Rapidplay:

In case of reverse king and queen placement castling with this king is not allowed.

Spoilsports!

Just for amusing digression from this council stuff :-

The written Rapidplay Rules do not prevent castling if the king and a bishop are interchanged and 3 moves played !

Rapidplay rules state :-

….. In case of reverse king and queen placement castling with this king is not allowed. …..

but no restriction on other piece interchange combinations is mentioned.

So with a Kf1 and a Ra1 the K and R would find themselves on d1 and e1 respectively after castling Q-side or would that be white squared bishop side if it’s a B on d1.

Article 3.8 in the main section defines castling as :-

This is a move of the king and either rook of the same colour along the player’s first rank, counting as a single move of the king and executed as follows: the king is transferred from its original square two squares towards the rook on its original square, then that rook is transferred to the square the king has just crossed.

I don’t think the rules intend this, they are just a bit carelessly worded.

Also with 3 kings and 3 rooks a side could castle three times I guess.