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Asian school chess: City’s Akshay checkmates international rivals to win gold, silver
Akshay Borgaonkar, a Class 6 student of Vikhe Patil memorial school, at the 14th Asia school chess championship held in Kaluthara, Sri Lanka, on Saturday.
Akshay Borgaonkar, a Class 6 student of Vikhe Patil memorial school, grabbed a gold medal and a silver medal at the 14th Asia school chess championship held in Kaluthara, Sri Lanka, on Saturday.
Third seeded in the under-9 age group, Akshay won a silver medal in the classic format and later on, clinched the gold medal in the blitz format. In the classic format, each player can play for 90 minutes, while in blitz, the quickest format of chess, each player only gets three minutes and two seconds (extra time) for each move. In all, 48 players from 10 countries competed in the age group.
In the classic format, Akshay started well by beating Hong Kong’s King Oliver Baekho in the first round, and kept his momentum by beating his slightly lower-ranked opponents one by one. The only tough opponent he faced was Uzbekistan’s candidate master Begmuratov Khumoyun, with a rating of 1,683. The Indian lad, with a rating of 1,460, displayed a good positional play and drew the game with black pieces.
Akshay got black pieces in the last match against Vedant Mistry of India. In the middle game, Akshay was one pawn down, but without losing hope, showed tremendous fighting spirit and eventually gained a good position and then scored a classic win.
“I knew that winning the last game was important. I had to win it at any cost, and losing or drawing the game was never an option for me. So I kept on trying. I recollected all the training I received from my coaches and warned myself that I must win the game. I guess that thought process helped me,” said Akshay.
The Kunte chess academy student believes that all the training from his coaches and their continuous motivation and faith in his abilities, was the driving force for his win.
With a boosted morale, Akshay continued his fine run in the blitz format too. However, he saw a major hindrance in Uzbekistan’s Begmuratov Khumoyun, who was a high-ranked player.
Akshay had beaten all his opponents convincingly, but was required to not lose to Khumoyun in order to stay in fray for the gold medal.
“My plan was to get him out of his comfort zone and after discussing with my coach, I decided to start with Trompowsky attack (D4 move). This was a very unusual opening and that worked as he failed to find a solid solution to cruise over the initial jolt, and the match ended in a draw,” said Akshay.
“Winning medals in both classic and blitz is very commendable as these both formats need different types of preparations and study. Akshay has mastered both and we are hoping for a similar performance from him in the future as well,” said his coach Akshay Kelkar, who accompanied Akshay in Sri Lanka.
