Chess tournament at Colby a 3-way tie
BY COLIN HICKEY
Staff Writer
06/29/2009
WATERVILLE — Three players tied for top honors at Saturday’s ChessMaine.net Championships at Colby College.
Adam Schaff, Roger Morin and Phil Lowell Jr. each finished with three wins and one draw in the four-round tournament, which drew 54 players, a record for the tournament, according to event director Dan DeLuca.
“I think it is one of the largest non-scholastic tournaments we’ve had for many, many years in Maine,” DeLuca said.
Schaff, a New Gloucester resident, was the event’s only expert rated player, a designation given to those with a U.S. Chess Federation rating between 2,000 and 2,199. Schaff holds a rating of 2,008.
DeLuca said tournament rules called for the three men to divide the $150 first place prize and $75 in Class A winnings. But DeLuca said Schaff, who received free entry into the tournament on the basis of his expert rating, declined to take any prize money.
Morin, a Houlton resident, and South Portland’s Lowell, president of the Maine Chess Association, split the $225 as a result.
Prize money also was awarded in five other classes ($75 in each category). Classes are based on chess ratings, ranging from 1,800 to 1,999 for Class A players to 1,000 to 1,199 for Class E participants.
The tournament also had a category for players rated under 1,000 points.
Class B had the following four players tie for first: Tom Sanford of Veazie, Nathaniel Bryans of Portland, Jon Buxton and Kevin Townsend, a student at Purdue University who grew up in Holden.
Matthew Fishbein, 11, of Cape Elizabeth captured first in Class C.
Ethan DiNinno was the Class D winner, and Brett Parker prevailed in Class E. Both are from Cape Elizabeth.
Daniel Honeycutt, a senior at John Bapst High School in Bangor, won the under-1,000 division.
Source: http://morningsentinel.mainetoday.com
That’s nice of him. Very noble.