Novi Sad Turbo Grandmaster Tournaments

Novi Sad Turbo Grandmaster Tournaments
Jure Skoberne and Mert Erdogdu claim GM norms
Article by GM Dragan Solak
Published by Chessdom.com

During the first eighteen days of November, Novi Sad was host of three Turbo Grandmaster Tournaments. Each tournament was a 10-player round-robin event lasting six days, with three single and three double round days.

The most interesting fact about the tournaments was that draw offers were completely forbidden. Similar attempts were made in Sofia and Nanjing, during Olympiad in Dresden last year, and on many other top tournaments, always with positive effects. This rule gave very good results in Novi Sad too, probably because of the fact that only the players who were willing to fight took part in the tournaments. 47% of games (64 out of 135) still ended in draws by repetition, insufficient material, stalemate or 50 moves rule, but mostly after very interesting, well fought contests.

The first Turbo GM Tournament was won by Jure Skoberne from Slovenia, who fulfilled his first GM norm. He is a very talented player and there is no doubt that the remaining norms will come soon.

1st Turbo GM tournament, final standings:

1-2. IM Jure Skoberne (SLO 2498) and GM Dragan Solak (SRB 2579) – 6.0
3-5. IM Mert Erdogdu (TUR 2489), IM Baris Esen (TUR 2493) and FM Sinisa Saric (SRB 2424) – 5.0
6. GM Miroljub Lazic (SRB 2454) – 4.5
7-9. IM Misa Pap (SRB 2501), GM Dragan Kosic (MNE 2538) and Marko Krivokapic (MNE 2426) – 4.0
10. IM Umut Atakisi (TUR 2409) – 1.5

2nd Turbo GM tournament, final standings:

1. IM Mert Erdogdu (TUR 2489) – 6.5
2-3. IM Misa Pap (SRB 2501) and GM Aleksandar Kovacevic (SRB 2558) – 6.0
4. IM Baris Esen (TUR 2493) – 5.5
5-6. GM Dragan Solak (SRB 2579) and FM Uros Petakov (SRB 2327) – 4.5
7. GM Dragan Kosic (MNE 2538) – 4.0
8. IM Umut Atakisi (TUR 2409) – 3.5
9. Marko Krivokapic (MNE 2426) – 3.0
10. Balind Nadj Hedjesi (SRB 2432) – 1.5

The last of the three tournaments was dominated by Grandmasters Aleksandar Kovacevic and Dragan Kosic. International Master Darko Doric from Croatia missed his chance to fight for the norm in the final round after he couldn’t convert an easily winning ending against FM Sinisa Saric in round eight.

3rd Turbo GM tournament, final standings:

1. GM Aleksandar Kovacevic (SRB 2558) – 7.0
2. GM Dragan Kosic (MNE 2538) – 6.0
3. IM Misa Pap (SRB 2501) – 5.5
4. GM Dragan Solak (SRB 2579) – 5.0
5-6. IM Darko Doric (CRO 2470) and FM Sinisa Saric (SRB 2424) – 4.5
7-8. IM Umut Atakisi (TUR 2409) and IM Mert Erdogdu (TUR 2489) – 4.0
9. IM Baris Esen (TUR 2493) – 3.0
10. Stevan Jovic (SRB 2292) – 1.5

Novi Sad has a very long chess tradition. It was a host of 1990 Chess Olympiad and this year’s European Team Championship. It is a very pleasant place to stay in, and we hope that more chess players will visit us in the near future, when we will organize more interesting chess tournaments.

More information on the Perpetual Check website

A lot more pictures and info are available on http://reports.chessdom.com/novi-sad-turbo-gm-tournaments.