ALEXANDRIA, VA - AUGUST 17, 1996 - Grandmaster Gabriel Schwartzman has won the United States Open Chess Championship with a score of 10 1/2 - 1 1/2. Schwartzman, aged 19, won the $5000 first prize plus the right to play in the next US Closed Championship.
Tied for second and third were grandmasters Gregory Serper and Alex Yermolinsky with 10 - 2. Tied for fourth through seventh were grandmasters Wojkiewicz of Poland and Alexander Ivanov of Massachusetts along with Angelo Young of the Philippines and International Master Jonathan Schroer of North Carolina, all with 9 1/2 - 2 1/2.
Following them were Grandmaster Shabalov, Ron Burnett, Larry Kaufman, Alexander Reprintsev, Gregory Shahade, Michael Wierzbicki, Federico Garcia and Irina Krush with 9-3.
With 8 1/2 - 3 1/2 were Vladislov Federov, Emory Tate, Art Bisguier, Walter Shipman, John C. Meyer, Miles Ardaman, John Curdo, George Kramer, James Wheat, Macon Shibut, Steve Szpisjak, Bill Mason, Elliott Neff, Harold Mouzon Jr., Howard Wachtel, Andrew Whatley, Ben Johnson, Stanislav Ritvin and Jennie Frenklakh.
Those with 8-4 were Oscar Tan, Charles Gelman, Geoff Gelman, Mark Pinto, Rigel Cappallo, David Sherman, Tom Brownscombe, John Kirby, Denis Strenzwilk, David Brummer, Mark Kurtzman, Vinay Bhat, Eric Schiller, Michael Klein, Upma Sharma, Santos Lazzeri, Jim Dean, Shearwood Mc Clelland, Tom Beckman, Steve Winer, Richard Aiken, David Hulvey, Matthew Traldi and Mike Neitman.
Among those with 7 1/2 - 4 1/2 were Danny Shapiro, Sunil Weeramantry, Friedman, Pappu Murthy, Ilia Serpik, Larry Heinen, Jerry Hanken, Anna Khan, Floyd Boudreaux, Andre Sergeon, Philip Collier, Henry Terrie and Sam Sloan.
Grandmaster Alex Yermolinsky zipped off to a lead of 8-0. Everyone seemed to assume that he would repeat his first place finish in the recently concluded US Championship, which had followed his first place finish in the World Open. It was envisioned that Yermolinsky would establish and complete an unprecedented "grand slam" of US chess.
However, Yermolinsky had started the event in the "early first half" section, thereby avoiding the strongest opponents, who are notoriously late sleepers. By contrast, grandmasters Serper and Schwartzman had opted for the 8-day schedule and had played a draw with each other, winning their remaining games.
Thus, when Serper faced Yermolinsky in round nine, everyone was astonished when, after only a few minutes play, Serper knocked off Yermolinsky with a miniature masterpiece. Things got even worse for Yermolinsky when he lost again in round ten. This time, his loss came in 33 moves against Grandmaster Schwartzman.
This put Schwartzman in the lead, as Serper, who faced by far the strongest field in the tournament, had drawn with grandmasters Shabalov and Alexander Ivanov. In round 11, Schwartzman was beaten by Grandmaster Wojkiewicz of Poland. However, Schwartzman was so far ahead of the field that this loss still left him in a tie for first place with Serper.
In the last round, Schwartzman quickly defeated Alexander Reprintsev and then had to wait agonizing hours while Serper fought a long duel with Wojkiewicz. Serper was a pawn down and his only real chance to win the game would have been for Wojkiewicz to lose on time. The endgame ground down to a rook and four pawns against a rook in three, but the extra pawn was backward, so the game ended in a draw.
The sensations of the tournament were young women and girls who mopped up some of the big money class prizes. Irina Krush, age 12, had a sensational tournament, winning the expert prize of $1000 with a score of 9-3. Irina had a clear advantage against Grandmaster Yermolinsky in round two, but misplayed it and lost. Irina won the expert prize by beating several masters including Denis Strenzwilk in the last round. Tied for second expert were Jennie Frenklakh, age 16, and Stanislav Ritvin, another promising junior, who won $600 each. Ritvin had a fantastic tournament and was on the top boards, ahead of all the masters, until he lost to International Master Larry Kaufman in the last round. Simone Sobel, age 15, won the second class C prize of $600. David Sloan, age 11, son of Kenneth Sloan, won the second Class E prize.
Perhaps the greatest sensation of all was 9-year-old Arianne Bo Caoili, who won $200 for second unrated. Arianne had been brought by her mother from the Philippines for this tournament. Her mother tried to enter her as an 1800 player in the "busy player special", having arrived late because of the North Bay International in Canada. However, the tournament organizers, upon seeing this diminutive 9 year old girl, were having none of that, and insisted on entering her as an unrated player with only a 1/2 point for the first six rounds. Arianne proceeded to prove her disbelievers wrong and ran off a string of victories to overtake the leaders in the unrated category, while also defeating two 1900 players in the side events. Perhaps her mother should have explained to the tournament organizers that her trip to this tournament had been sponsored by the Far East Bank in the Philippines, and that bank is not known for giving away its money without good reason. Arianne played in this US Open in preparation for the World Under-10 Championships, which will be held in Spain in October. Arianne will represent the Philippines. First unrated was Mohammed Salman, a recent arrival from the Kingdom of Jordan.
Twelve year old Vinay Bhat, who two years ago became the youngest American rated master in history at age 10, was among the leaders until the end, but blundered in a last round winning position against Michael Wierzbicki and finished with only 8-4. Bhat had defeated master Boris Zisman in round 11. Wierzbicki, Gregory Shahade and Federico Garcia tied for best master, winning $733.33 each.
As White, Garcia played 1. h4 followed by 2. h5 and 3. h6. Garcia (2213) used this opening successfully but lost with it in the final round against Alexander Reprintsev (2461) in the blitz tournament. It only gave him a draw against Charles Gelman (2332) in the main tournament.
Angelo Young of the Philippines continued his streak of excellent results, drawing grandmasters Wojkiewicz and Shabalov and defeating Senior Master Emory Tate, to tie for fourth place.
There were a total of 557 players, including 8 grandmasters, 24 senior masters, and 57 masters.
The tournament was played initially in five sections. There was the traditional schedule, with one game per day in the evenings and a one day break in the middle, the "early first half" (which proved to be the weakest) and the "busy-persons schedule", where players were assigned points for the first six rounds based upon their ratings. These three sections all merged together in round 7. There was also the 8-day option, where the first nine rounds were played in five days, and the 5-day option, which proved to be the strongest, where the first nine rounds were played in just two days. All of these schedules were merged into one big tournament in round 9.
The tournament was organized by Helen Hinshaw and the Virginia Chess Federation and was directed by Harold Sabine, Woodrow Harris and Jim Meyer.
Here are some chess games which have not appeared in the tournament bulletins:
[Event "US Open"]
[Site "Alexandria (USA)]
[Date "1996.08.16"]
[Round "12"]
[White "Young, Angelo"]
[Black "Tate, Emory"]
[Result "0-1"]
1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. d4 cxd4 4. Nxd4 g6 5. c4 Bg7 6. Nc2 Nf6 7. Nc3 O-O 8. Be2 d6 9. O-O a6 10. Bg5 Rb8 11. a4 Be6 12. Kh1 Rc8 13. b3 Nd7 14. Nd5 Nc5 15. f3 Nb3 16. Ra3 Nc5 17. Nce3 Re8 18. Qb1 Rb8 19. f4 Nd4 20. Bd1 b5 21. axb5 axb5 22. f5 Bxd5 23. Nxd5 bxc4 24. Qc1 Ne4 25. fxg6 hxg6 26. Ba4 Nxg5 27. Be8 e6 28. Ra7 exd5 29. Bxf7+ Nxf7 30. Rfxf7 Nf5 31. Qe1 Qh4 32. g3 Qg4 33. Qd2 {White resigns} 0-1
[Event "US Open"]
[Site "Alexandria (USA)]
[Date "1996.08.16"]
[Round "12"]
[White "Curdo, John"]
[Black "Schroer, Jonathan"]
[Result "0-1"]
1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 d6 3. Bb5 Nd7 4. O-O Ngf6 5. Re1 a6 6. Bf1 b6 7. d4 cxd4 8. Nxd4 Bb7 9. Nc3 e6 10. f4 Qc7 11. Kh1 Nc5 12. Bd3 g6 13. f5 gxf5 14. Nd5 Nxd5 15. exd5 Bxd5 16. Nxf5 O-O-O 17. Ne3 Bb7 18. b4 Nxd3 19. cxd3 Bg7 20. Rb1 Kb8 21. b5 axb5 22. Re2 Rhg8 23. Rxb5 Qc6 24. Rb4 Bh6 25. Rc2 Bxe3 26. Rxc6 Bxc6 27. Re4 Bc5 28. Rg4 e5 29. Bb2 h5 30. Rg3 h4 31. Rf3 h3 32. d4 hxg2+ 33. Kg1 Bxf3 34. Qxf3 exd4 35. Qd5 Rde8 {White resigns} 0-1
[Event "US Open - Side Event"]
[Site "Alexandria (USA)]
[Date "1996.08.16"]
[Round "1"]
[White "Kavalec, Joe"]
[Black "Caoili, Arianne Bo"]
[Result "0-1"]
1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 d6 3. Bb5+ Nd7 4. O-O Ngf6 5. Re1 a6 6. Bxd7 Nxd7 7. d4 cxd4 8. Qxd4 Qc7 9. Nc3 b5 10. Nd5 Qb8 11. e5 dxe5 12. Nxe5 Nxe5 13. Rxe5 Bb7 14. Nf6+ gxf6 15. Re1 Rg8 16. g3 Qc8 17. Re3 Qc6 18. f3 Rd8 19. Qc3 Qb6 20. Kg2 Rg4 21. b3 Qd4 22. Bb2 Qxc3 23. Bxc3 Bg7 24. Rae1 e6 25. Kf2 Rg5 26. f4 Rf5 27. R1e2 Kf8 28. g4 Rc5 29. Bb4 R8c8 30. Rc3 f5 31. Rxc5 Bd4+ 32. Kg3 Bxc5 33. Bxc5 Rxc5 34. Rd2 Be5 35. gxf5 exf5 36. c4 bxc4 37. bxc4 Rxc4 38. Rb2 Rc3+ 39. Kh4 Rc2 40. Rb6 Rxh2+ 41. Kg5 Rg2+ 42. Kf6 Rg6+ {White resigns} 0-1
[Event "US Open"]
[Site "Alexandria (USA)]
[Date "1996.08.16"]
[Round "12"]
[White "Rusyniak, G"]
[Black "Salman, Mohammed"]
[Result "1-0"]
1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 d6 3. d4 cxd4 4. Nxd4 Nf6 5. Nc3 a6 6. Be2 e5 7. Nb3 Be6 8. Be3 Be7 9. O-O Nbd7 10. a4 Nb6 11. Nd2 d5 12. Bxb6 Qxb6 13. exd5 Nxd5 14. Nc4 Qc5 15. Nxd5 Bxd5 16. Nxe5 Bxg2 17. Qd7+ Kf8 18. Qf5 Qd5 19. Bc4 Be4 20. Qh5 Qxc4 21. Nxc4 Bf6 22. c3 Bg6 23. Qf3 Rg8 24. Nb6 Re1 25. Nd7+ 1-0
[Event "US Open"]
[Site "Alexandria (USA)]
[Date "1996.08.13"]
[Round "9"]
[White "Sloan, Sam"]
[Black "Kramer, George M"]
[Result "0-1"]
1. g4 d5 2. Bg2 c6 3. h3 e5 4. e4 Bc5 5. Nc3 Ne7 6. d3 O-O 7. Nf3 Ng6 8. O-O f6 9. exd5 cxd5 10. d4 Bb4 11. dxe5 Bxc3 12. bxc3 fxe5 13. Bg5 Qd6 14. c4 d4 15. c3 Nc6 16. cxd4 exd4 17. Re1 Nf4 18. Bxf4 Qxf4 19. Qd3 h6 20. Re4 Qf6 21. Rf1 {21. Nxd4!} Rd8 22. Rfe1 Bd7 23. Nxd4? Be8 24. Rxe8+ Rxe8 25. Bd5+ Kh8 26. Rxe8+ Rxe8 27. Ne6 Rxe6 28. Bxe6 Qxe6 29. Qb3 b6 30. Qf3 a5 31. Qf8+ Kh7 32. c5 b5 33. Qf3 b4 34. h4 a4 35. g5 b3 36. axb3 axb3 37. Qd3+ g6 38. Qb5 Qg4+ 39. Kf1 Qd1+ 40. Kg2 Qd5+ 41. Kg1 hxg5 42. hxg5 Qxg5 43. Kf1 Qc1+ 44. Kg2 b2 45. Qxc6 Qg5+ 46. Kf3 b1=Q 47. Qc7+ Kh6 {White resigns} 0-1