De Sinco Limited National Junior Chess Qualifiers set for this weekend

THE battle to crown the National Junior Chess Champion for the title begins today at the National Stadium, Providence, with the Junior Qualifying Event.

The tournament, which will be sponsored by De Sinco Trading, will run for four consecutive days at the commencing from today to July 11, 2023.

It is the same venue where current Junior

Champion, Ricardo Narine, earned his title last year by fighting through the qualifiers into a gruelling nine-round championship resulting in a playoff.

As the reigning champion, Narine automatically qualifies for this year’s Championship event.

Any number of Guyanese chess players age 19 and younger on January 1st, 2023, can compete in the 7-round qualifying tournament where the top nine players will advance to the Championship.

From there, Narine will defend his title in a round-robin tournament set to commence from July 14th to July 19th.

Last year’s event showcased intense rivalry amongst the young players when the tournament returned after a two-year hiatus owing to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Guinness Nat Senior Squash C/Ships…

Nicolette Fernandes

By Sean Devers

THE third night of the Guinness National Senior Championships was another night of compelling Squash at the Georgetown (GT) Club as Jonathan Antczak created a major upset.

Playing on Court 2, Antczak, sporting a Blue Bandanna, produced his best Squash to beat the much-touted Ben Mekdeci 3-2 in an exhilarating fivegame match.

Favorite Mekdeci began according to plan and took the first game 11-7 before losing the second 5-11 as both players played some astounding shots.

Long Rallies were many times followed up by well executed drop shots while the pair matched each other with immaculate cross court shots as Antczak won the third game 11-9.

Mekdeci trailed 2-1.

Mekdeci took the fourth game 12-10 to take the match into a deciding fifth stanza.

The pumped up Antczak raced to a big lead and Mek-

This year’s event is expected to be even more exciting, with participation and competitiveness steadily increasing in every youth tournament since.

Registration is $1000 for junior members of the Guyana Chess Federation and $2000 for non-members. Registration will be done only online on guyanachess.gy and closes on July 7th at 20:00hrs.

The 4-day event, spon- sored by DeSinco Ltd, is set to attract chess players from various schools in the regions.

Seven rounds of classical matches will be played on a time control of 90 minutes with 30-second increments after each move from 9:00hrs daily.

Additional information can be found on the GCF's new website, guyanachess. gy.

The Guyana Chess

Federation is thrilled once again to have DeSinco Ltd partnering to provide this opportunity to the young and eager Guyanese chess players who will challenge for the title.

The GCF would also like to express gratitude to the Ministry of Youth, Culture, and Sport for again providing the use of the National Stadium for this annual event.