Sunday 23 March 2008

2008 Strategem Doeberl Cup Lightning

Separate post for this event.
The 2008 Strategem Doeberl Cup Lightning event was held last night, and attracted 68 players. The prizes for the event were over $1000 in total, with $400 for first, which is a bigger prize pool that many Australian Weekenders!
US GM Vazurahn Akobian was the outright winner with 8/9. He lost to NZ IM Puchen Wang in round 5 but won all his other games to finish half a point ahead of Canberra IM David Smerdon.
One of the highlights of the event was the round 3 game between Akobian and Dragicevic where Akobian was trying to mate with KR v K. Despite pieces being knocked over and reset with every move, the game reached the "correct" conclusion with nary a complaint from either player. It seemed that the "real" position existed inside the head of each of the players, while the actual board was merely there as a guide for the spectators. There should be video of this game on the tournament website at some stage.
As an arbiter this was one of the easiest lightnings of this size I've ever run. Not a single complaint or protest from the players, all results reported correctly, and the whole event was finished in under 2 and a half hours. Many thanks to all participants (and Shun Ikeda, Mirabelle Guo and Jim Flood) for making it such a fun tournament.

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