And the winner is…who?!

An exciting and somewhat surprising finish to the tournament, with the Vietnamese grandmaster Cao Sang taking the title on tie-break.  Cao never led at any stage and in fact was only on 2.5 after four rounds, but certainly “maketh”d the man by winning his last three games. 

Cao shared the title with Indian IM Sethuraman (who played some fantastically exciting chess) and Chinese GM Zhou Weiqi, aptly symbolising the dominance that these three nations had throughout the chess festival.  In particular, the Chinese women and the much-underrated juniors from all three countries really stood out, picking up a swag of norms along the way.

Personally, I slimed a draw in round 8 and snatched a last-round win to propel me to equal fourth in the final standings.  Unfortunately, the organisers decided not to split the prizemoney and instead allocate all prizes based on tiebreaks, which saw me finish nineth overall.  Not a bad result, and I kept to my aim of not losing a game, but certainly nothing special either.

Gary Lane recovered after a bad start to finish on six points, the pick of the Australasians who otherwise struggled to match the Asian chess styles.  However, we did manage to squeeze in a soccer game before the closing ceremony, although the humidity and heat scored more casualties than we did goals.

So, thus ends my first Malaysian chess festival and indeed first trip to Kuala Lumpur, and I can thoroughly recommend the experience to all chess-lovers (and shopaholics).  Friendly people, good food and cheap retail therapy abounds in this bustling chess-loving city.  I’ll be back next year, and will be setting my sights on the oversized, ‘silver king’ champion’s trophy.

I’m actually writing this from Cambodia, but I’ll fill you in on this trip in the next post.  Fi and I caught a 6am flight from KL to Phnom Penh the day after the final round, in what was by far and away the scariest part of the tournament.  In a city known for its potholed roads and dubious traffic conditions, our taxi driver hit speeds of over 160 kilometres per hour, weaving through the other airport traffic – in the rain.  The good news was we made our flight with plenty of time to spare (and alive).

Next up: Cambodia!