Team Herald
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PANJIM: Goan IM Nitish Belurkar was crowned champion at the 20th Shri Maheshwaranand Sarswati Memorial Open Rapid Rating Chess tournament held in Pune, recently.
Nitish defeated IM Sammed Shete and FM Nikhil Dixit amongst others to remain undefeated and was sole leader with a score of 8.5 points out of 9 and a rating gain of 28 points.
FM Akash Dalvi and FM Suyog Wagh with 8 points were placed second and third respectively. Top seed GM Abhimanyu Puranik finished fifth with 7.5 points. Other Goans, IM Ameya Audi was placed ninth with 6.5 points and Anish Naik defeated two IMs to score 6.5 points and was placed 33rd.
Prior to this tournament, Nitish had a 14th place podium finish in the 3rd Presidents Cup International Tournament in Uzbekistan scoring 6 points with a rating gain of 7 points , wherein amongst others, he defeated GM Madaminov Mukhiddin (2501) of Uzbekistan and drew with GM Abhimanyu Puranik (2652) of India.
A total of 446 players representing five federations, India, Israel, Germany, USA and Netherlands participated.
