Kenya to host five-day chess regional championships
What you need to know:
- The Open winner will also be awarded the prestigious International Masters title, the second highest title in chess after the Grand Master and cash award of Sh100,000.
- The Ladies winner will walk away with Sh50,000.
- The Open and Ladies categories will be played over seven rounds, 2 games a day with a time control of 90 minutes plus 30 seconds increment from move one.
Kenya is set to host the Zone 4.2 Africa Individual Chess Championship next month, the local federation revealed on Wednesday.
The five-day event will run from May 5 to 10 at the Shaza Beach Hotel in Mombasa. The winner of the prestigious competition will get a ticket to this year’s World Cup set for October in Russia.
According to Chess Kenya chairman Benard Wanjala, 40 players from nine federations had registered for the event as of Wednesday. Among them are three Grandmasters from Egypt, as well as highly celebrated International master (IM) Arthur Ssengwanyi from neighbouring Uganda.
The top seed for the event is Egyptian Grand Master (GM) Adly Ahmed with a towering rating of 2603.
Kenya will be represented by several top players among them the country’s number one ranked player, Joseph Methu, who recently won the Kenya Open on Easter Monday, the country’s experienced player Peter Gilruth, former national championship and winner of final phase of Africa Games qualifier, Mehul Gohil and Vasanth Ramesh.
Wanjala revealed that the deadline for registering had been extended to May 1 to allow more players come in.
“We expect 100 players from 13 African countries and it will be honour for us to have this competition here and I am sure our players will benefit a lot from interacting with their peers,” Wanjala said.
In the Ladies section, reigning national champion Gloria Jumba and Kenya Open winner Joyce Nyaruai will fly the country’s flag.
The two will have a tough task to overcome the strong opposition from dominant Egyptian, who will be participating in this section.
The Open winner will also be awarded the prestigious International Masters title, the second highest title in chess after the Grand Master and cash award of Sh100,000.
The Ladies winner will walk away with Sh50,000.
The Open and Ladies categories will be played over seven rounds, 2 games a day with a time control of 90 minutes plus 30 seconds increment from move one.
