International Master Tomas Krnan emerged winner of the Canadian Closed Chess Championship 2015 – FIDE Zonal 2.2 after edging the opposition on tie-break to qualify for the 2015 World Chess Cup in Baku.
In the last 9th round Krnan defeated the earlier leader IM Leonid Gerzhoy with black pieces to catch him on the shared first place. They were joined by GM Eric Hansen, but Krnan had the best additional criteria.
44 players competed in the Championship which was held from 10-16th July at the Peter Clark Hall, Guelph University Centre, in Guelph, Ontario, Canada.
Final standings:
1-3. IM Tomas Krnan 2557 ON, GM Eric Hansen 2630 AB and IM Leonid Gerzhoy 2538 ON – 6,5
4-7. IM Razvan Preotu 2636 ON, IM Nikolay Noritsyn 2586 ON, IM Richard Wang 2426 AB and GM Bator Sambuev2642 QC – 6,0
8-11. Nicholas Vettese 2316 ON, FM Andrew Peredun 2406 ON, FM Michael Humphreys 2348 ON and Hong Rui Zhu 2304 QC – 5,5 etc
Photos by Victoria Jung-Doknjas