Alberta Chess Association

July 10: Regina-Veronicka Kalaydina/IM Porper win in Fort McMurray

The first ever Fort McMurray Open and AB Women's Championship in Fort-McMurray has been a great success!  Organizer Jina burn has done a tremendous job of securing sponsorship (over $7000 in prizes and a lot of extra stuff for the tournament), a great place to play and creating a friendly atmosphere for everyone.  The event attracted a total of 40 participants including an unprecedent 15 in the AB Women's Championship.  The winner of the Women's was the pre-tournament favourite Regina-Veronicka (Nicka) Kalaydina from Calgary, who went perfect 5/5.  Second was quite a big upset as Carla Robitu from Edmonton snuck in to win the prize with 4/5.  Third was shared by the organizer-Jina Burn  and Armine Arzumanyan from Edmonton 3.5/5 each.  In the Open section, IM Edward Porper won the event with 4.5/5 ahead of IM Richard Wang, NM Vlad Rekhson and Oleksandr Kalaydin (AKA Nicka's father) who came back to competitive chess after 30 years. 

Final standings and prize winners list