When the “dust settled” on the 35th Snowstorm Special on Sunday, FM Andrey Chumachenko and SM Klaus Pohl shared the top prize with a final score of 4 1/2 points out of 5.  They drew each other in a long battle on Saturday night and dispatched all other opponents to achieve their respective victories.

Other prizes won were by Donny Gray (GA) and Wayne Christensen(SC), who shared the Expert prize with a score of 3 1/2-1 1/2. James MacDougall(SC) won the Top “A” prize outright with 3 1/2 points while 2nd place “A” prize was shared among fellow “A” players, Doug Holmes(SC), John Vonderlieth(SC),Stephen Welt(SC), and Yuval Shemesh(NC), each with 3 points.

Top “B” was shared by Ian Morton(SC) and Bill Taylor(SC), both with 3 points.  The Top “C” prize came down to one of the last games, when Wayne Hedger(GA) survived against Chad Moody(NC) to tie Miki Yasuoka(NC) at 2 1/2 points after having lost to Miki earlier.  The only question concerning the “D” prize was how it would be shared since there were only two entrants in the class.  In the end, it was shared equally between Erik Mullah(SC) and Devin Duque(NC), both ending with 2 1/2 points.  The largest group was in the Class “E” and under, where Justin Gonzalez(NC) and William McCorkle(GA) tallied 2 points to share the prize equally.

With a total of thirty eight entrants, 95% of the advertised prize fund of $1,500 was paid out.  Thanks to all who attended and be sure to put the 36th Snowstorm Special on your calendar for next year where we hope to increase the number of entrants and prizes, so that all can enjoy a competitve open tournament in a nice setting.

Check out the final crosstables here.

Past Snowstorm Special Champions

Click on their name for a link to their whereabouts.

1973 – William Patterson(as the S.C. Junior Ch.)
1974 - Stephen Cabaniss /James Hughey
1975 – William McClain
1976 – Charles Lawton, Jr.
1977 – Patrick Hart/Edward McCauley
1978 – Edward McCauley(2)
1979 – Jeffrey Smeltzer
1980 - Paul Tinkler / Lindsay Blanks
1981 – Paul Tinkler(2)
1982 – Patrick Hart(2)/Dale Mountford
1983 – Patrick Hart(3)
1984 – Klaus Pohl/Pat Hart(4)/Wayne Williams/Paul Tinkler(3)/Lindsay Blanks(2)
1985 – Neal Harris
1986 – Edward McCauley(3)
1987 – Edward McCauley(4)
1988 – Klaus Pohl(2)
1989 – Paul Tinkler(4)/Irving Rosenfeld/ Douglas Holmes /Ed McCauley(5)
1990 – Klaus Pohl(3)
1991 – Patrick Hart(5)
1992 – Klaus Pohl(4)
1993 – Jonathan Schroer/Matthew Morris/Lindsay Blanks(3)
1994 – Klaus Pohl(5)/Mark Hoshor
1995 – Mike Williams
1996 – Matthew Morris(2)/Douglas Holmes(2)
1997 – Wayne Williams(2)/Michael Sheaf
1998 – Paul Tinkler(5)/Douglas Holmes(3)
1999 – Paul Tinkler(6)/Douglas Holmes(4)/John Vonderlieth/Justin Daniel
2000 – Klaus Pohl(6)
2001 – Klaus Pohl(7)
2002 – No tournament held.
2003 – No tournament held.
2004 – Klaus Pohl(8)
2005 – Emory Tate/Daniel Tapia/ Leland Fuerstman
2006 – Keith Eubanks
2007 – Andrey Chumachenko
2008 – Timur Aliyev/ Chris Mabe
2009 – Andrey Chumachenko(2)/Klaus Pohl(9)

Amount in parentheses represents number of times placed or tied for first (greater than once).

The 4th Patrick D. Hart Memorial Scholastic was held on Saturday, January 17, 2009, and had a superb turnout of young players.  Though only two high school players and three middle school players attended, the elementary section had thirty-three eager chess players.  The CCC’s on Qiamli Sun (Wando HS) won his four game match with Alex Thibodeau (Thurmond HS) by an impressive score of 4-0!  In the middle school section, Chris Labrecque held off South Carolina’s 2008 Polgar representative, Hannah Whatley, to take the first place trophy, leaving Hannah with second place and Joey Scalf (Christian Academy) with third place.  As mentioned, the elementary section was the busiest, by far, and when the smoke cleared, Simeon Radev, of Bamberg, won the first place trophy on tiebreaks over Kyle McSheehy (Pinckney Elem.), both with perfect 4-0 scores.  Kean Balentine (Pinckney Elem.) took third place on tie-breaks over five others tied at 3-1.  Many thanks to Asst. TD Stephen Welt who encouraged over twenty of his chess students at Pinckney Elementary to sign up and play.  Also, thanks to our local scholastic coordinator, John Crompton, for another helping hand with the annual event.

Check out the final crosstables

The Folloween Open II had a good turnout. We had 14 participants. We had a 10-man open section and a 4 player round robin.

The open section was won by Philipp Lamby with 2.5 pts, with a fortunate draw from David Causey in a very exciting round 2 contest. David had a great position on the black side of an Accelerated Dragon/Marcozy Bind. When David offered the draw, Philipp had 1 second left on his clock against David’s 10 minutes in a dynamic position. There was a 5 way tie for second place between David Causey, Dan Quiqley, Bill Taylor, Erik Walker and Stephen Welt.

The Round Robin was won by Michael Meekins.

Congratulations to everyone who played some good games!

After taking a 1st round 1/2 point bye, Ian Morton reeled off four straight wins to overtake Columbia’s Daniel Dodds and win first prize in the Under 1800 section at the 2008 S.C. Open.  Ian’s performance raised his rating to 1760, where he is still a force to be reckoned with in his next Under 1800 section that he plays.  Congratulations, Ian, for another brilliant tournament!

Ian Morton (left) in the process of winning his final round game against Daniel Dodds.

Read on to see more images of the 2008 S.C. Open…

The 2008 CCC Championship finished on May 7 with Jim Addison winning first place with 3-0 score.  Defeating last year’s champion, David Causey, in the final round, Jim won his first CCC Championship on his first try.  Causey and top-rated Kirk McMullan tied for 2nd-3rd place with a score of 2-1.  Thanks to all seven participants for finishing with only one makeup game required during the tournament schedule.  To see the final crosstable, read on… 

NM Timur Aliyev(SC) and NM Chris Mabe(NC) shared 1st-2nd at the 34th Annual Snowstorm Special, scoring 4.5 – .5 in the five round event.  Stephen Welt also went undefeated with a score of 4-1 to capture the third place prize.  Check out the crosstable to see the overall results of all 31 participants.

See Games.  

See crosstable. 

34th Snowstorm Special — Open                   Charleston, SC

February 8-10, 2008

  No.    Name                                St  Rate     1         2        3        4       5        Score

   1. Mabe, Chris J (1)………….  NC 2294  W10   W9    W15   D2    W4      4.5
   2. Aliyev, Timur (2)………….    SC  2285  W27   W18   W5    D1    W8      4.5

   3. Welt, Stephen (5)………….  NC 1865  W12   W13   D6    -H-   W11     4.0

   4. Eubanks, Keith (3)………… SC 2074    -H-   W22   W24   W6    L1      3.5
   5. Shemesh, Yuval-RE (7)….CT 1815   W19   W16   L2    W10   D7      3.5
   6. Ramachandran, Lintu (9).SC 1814   W31   W23   D3    L4    W12     3.5
   7. Nissenboim, Josh (13)…. SC 1645   W32   -H-    W9    -H-     D5      3.5

   8. Quigley, Daniel J (4)……… GA 1913    W11   D24   -H-   W15   L2      3.0
   9. Callahan, Robert C (10)…NC 1790    W25   L1    L7    W17   W19     3.0
  10. Schwetke, Douglas (15). NJ 1599    L1    W27   W25   L5    W20     3.0
  11. Skelcher, Mark T (16)…….SC 1588    L8    W19   W26   W24   L3      3.0
  12. Hedger, Wayne L (17)……GA 1576    L3    W31   W23   W18   L6      3.0
  13. Morton, Ian G (20)………… SC 1496    W29   L3    -H-   W16   D15     3.0
  14. Battaglia, Gerald (21)…….GA 1491  L23   W32   L18   W27   W22     3.0

  15. Vonderlieth, John (6)……..SC 1828    W30   W17   L1    L8    D13     2.5
  16. Taylor, William L (14)…….SC 1641   W28   L5    D17   L13   W25     2.5
  17. Flynn, J.P. (19)…………..     NC 1513   W21   L15   D16   L9    W26     2.5

  18. Ivens, Ken L (11)………….  NC 1755    W20   L2    W14   L12   -U-     2.0
  19. Henderson, Alex (24)…..  SC 1238     L5    L11   W32   W23   L9      2.0
  20. Reed, Susan E (28)……..  SC  917       L18   -H-   W22   -H-   L10     2.0
  21. Taylor, Christian (29)……..SC  568     L17   L25   L27   -B-   W32     2.0
  22. Berg, Teigh Lee (30)………SC  540     -B-   L4    L20   W32   L14     2.0
  23. Crawford, Russell T (31)..SC nnnn    W14   L6    L12   L19   -X-     2.0

  24. Musulin, Rade Robe (12).SC 1713    W26   D8    L4    L11   -U-     1.5
  25. Lowry, Paul (22)…………..   SC 1396   L9    W21   L10   D26   L16     1.5
  26. Grimaud, Geoff J (26)……  SC 1117  L24   W30   L11   D25   L17     1.5

  27. Benjamin, Jason    (23)…  SC 1354    L2    L10   W21   L14   -F-     1.0
  28. Miller, Paul D (27)………..    SC 1044       L16   -H-   -H-   -U-   -U-     1.0

  29. Shemesh, Yuval (8)……….. CT 1815       L13   -U-   -U-   -U-   -U-     0.0
  30. Mayntz, Fred G (18)………..  SC 1565      L15   L26   -U-   -U-   -U-     0.0
  31. Robinson, Lendel (25)…… SC 1207       L6    L12   -U-   -U-   -U-     0.0
  32. Wingard, Jacob (32)……….. SC nnnn   L7    L14   L19   L22   L21     0.0

For the third year straight, the Patrick D. Hart Memorial Scholastic was held in conjunction with the Snowstorm Special.  The tournament was created in memory of one of our stalwarts of chess in Charleston and is intended as a beginners tournament to bring more players into the game.  This year’s edition had nine young players, with seven joining the SCCA and three joining the USCF for the first time.  When the last round was finished, Charlez Luczaj from Hanahan won first prize outright with four wins.  Hannah Whatley of North Augusta took 2nd prize on tiebreak over Vikram Krishnamurthy of Lexington, both with three points.  Congratulations to the trophy winners and all the participants who gave their best effort towards claiming a prize.

3rd Pat Hart Memorial Scholastic — Open Section

February 9, 2008  Charleston, SC

No.    Name                               St  Rate   1       2       3       4          Score

1. Luczaj, Charlez (5)………..  SC nnnn W7   W2   W4    W5         4.0
2. Whatley, Hannah Vi (1)…..SC   667  W9   L1    W3    W7         3.0
3. Krishnamurthy, Vik (4)……SC   160   -B-   W9    L2    W4         3.0
4. Williams, Samuel (2)……..MS   544  W8   W5    L1    L3           2.0
5. Williams, Robert (3)……… MS   460  W6    L4    W8   L1           2.0
6. Mishra, Vijay (6)……………. SC  nnnn   L5    L7    -B-   W8          2.0
7. Withers, Taylor (9)………..  SC  nnnn   L1   W6    W9   L2          2.0
8. Scalf, Joey (7)……………….  SC  nnnn  L4    -B-     L5    L6          1.0
9. Vong, Oddom (8)……………SC  nnnn   L2    L3    L7     -B-          1.0

The first Folloween Open was what I consider to be a great success. We had 20 participants! Stephen Welt, with a 1712 rating won the top section upsetting David Causey and James MacDougall in the final 2 rounds.

See the Games here.

See the crosstables here.

On June 13, GM Ftacnik visited the club for a lecture and a 15 board simul. He went undefeated, scoring 14 wins and 1 draw. His draw was against Josh Nissenboim who, after a single game against a GM, can brag about his 50% lifetime performance rating against GMs.

To see the game.

GM Ftacnik will be defending his championship in the South Carolina Open tournament June 15-17 at the Carolina First Center in Greenville.  Contact your local club or SC Chess for more information.

Sponsored by: Precision Tune Auto Care

1. GM Ftacnik showing the club one of his interesting games.

2. Club President David Causey getting a lesson in the King’s Indian Defense.

3. Our top junior player, Paul Miller, ready to give the GM ” a run for his money”.

4. The GM in action while John Vonderlieth, in the background, thinks about his next move.

5. Josh Nissenboim was the only player to draw GM Ftacnik.

Congratulations to David Causey on a perfect 4-0 score to win his first CCC championship!! Jacob Al-Sarraf won 2nd place with a 3-1 score, losing only to the champion. In the battle for third between Josh Nissenboim and Clark Rivers, saw the first draw in the tournament.  Both finished with 2.5 pts. with the trophy going to Josh on the second tiebreak.  Thanks to all who participated.

Click here to view all the CCC Championship 2007 Games

The final crosstable