Le Quang Liem Wins SPICE Cup
By Zachary Haskin
October 26, 2011
Texas Tech University and the Susan Polgar Foundation hosted the 5th Annual SPICE Cup from October 15-25. This year’s festival had three Invitational sections, a FIDE Open, a Scholastic Championship, and an Invitational Blitz, with some exciting matches. The A group was a 6 player double round robin event with an average rating of 2656 FIDE, making the Category 17 tournament the highest rated International Invitational round robin in United States history. With no draw offers before move 30 and the increasingly popular scoring system of three points for a win, one for a draw, and none for a loss, spectators were guaranteed to see some fighting chess. Fourteen of the 30 games in the A group ended with decisive results, and no competitor was able to escape the tournament without a loss.
The top grandmasters came from all over the world to compete. Le Quang Liem of Vietnam and Leinier Dominguez of Cuba came in as the first and second seeds respectively, both with FIDE ratings above 2700. Both are well known and respected players. Liem has twice won the very strong Aeroflot Open (in 2010 and 2011), while Dominguez reached the quarterfinals in the 2004 FIDE World Chess Championships and has been a member of the 2700+ club for quite some time. Sebastien Feller of France and Georg Meier of Germany (who is a freshman at Texas Tech) boast mid to high 2600 ratings that put them in the top 100 in the world, and they both play on their respective Olympic teams. Well-known American talents Yury Shulman and Ray Robson, who need no introduction to our readers, rounded out the field.
Full article here.
Great job Zach!