At 13, Ivana is Asian junior chess champ
TNN | Jun 8, 2012, 03.55AM IST
PANAJI: You can now say that Ivana Furtado has truly come of age.
Goa's chess prodigy is just 13 years old but the "silent assassin" did the
unthinkable as she won the Asian Junior Chess Championship at Tashkent in
Uzbekistan to, quite remarkably, help Goa produce back-to-back Asian
champions.
Already a two-time world champion in the under-8 and under-10 category, and
a Commonwealth champion in the under-12 category, Ivana's triumph in
Tashkent is memorable simply because she was competing against some of the
best players in the continent, and that too with double her experience.
"For someone as young as Ivana, winning the Asian junior championship is an
incredible feat. You must remember that the championship is for under-20
players and there were several players with plenty of experience at the
highest level," Goa chess association secretary Arvind Mhamal said.
Interestingly, Ivana snatched the Asian title from another Goan, Bhakti
Kulkarni, who finished 14th from a field of 23 hugely-talented players.
Bhakti had won the title last year when she was 18.
Ivana, on the other hand, has six more years in the junior category.
On Thursday, she went for the kill in the final game against R Bharathi
(2088) and collected 7.5 points to finish a point ahead of Rucha Pujari,
also from India.
WIM Vo Thi Kim Phung of Vietnam picked the silver while WFM Rucha had to
settle for the bronze.
"With (defending champion) Bhakti out of form, Ivana stepped in ably and won
the championship for Goa. It was a great performance and probably
unprecedented by any other state producing back-to-back Asian champions in
the recent past," said Dronacharya awardeee and Fide trainer Raghunandan
Gokhale.
The title-triumph helped Ivana now become a Women's International Master
(WIM). As per Fide title regulations, a player who wins the Asian Junior
Chess Championship qualifies for the Women International Master title and
also gets her first Women Grand Master norm. Ivana is now the second WIM and
the youngest Goan after Bhakti to achieve that landmark.
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/goa/At-13-Ivana-is-Asian-junior-chess-champ/articleshow/13912789.cms
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