IM Jose Rafael Gascon Del Nogal from Venezuela is the winner of the third edition of the Srefidensi Chess Celebration, with an impressive 7 out of 9 score and a 2590 performance. He is always so well prepared that his opponents have trouble getting playable positions against him. In the last round Anna Zozulia tried 3.c3 in the Sicilian, but soon she ended up in a worse position without anything to play for, so she accepted the draw offer.
Katerina Nemcova played a solid line of the French Tarrasch against Gergely Szabo and when after 19 moves the position was completely balanced, a draw was agreed. An interesting alternative for White might be first 16.Rac1 followed by c4, in order to recapture on c4 with the rook. Sipke Ernst played his trademark non-theoretical opening with White against Irine Sukandar, which ended up being a Queen's Indian type of position. Sukandar's 11...Nd7! followed by 12...Bf6! was spot on, solving Black's opening problems. In the final position Black's control of the c-file is typically compensating for White's possession of the d4 square.
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Joining Szabo, Ernst, Sukandar and Nemcova on 6 out of 9 is Trinidad's Ryan Harper (performance 2431), who beat Humberto Pecorelli. Black's 7...gxf6? was a bit too creative and weakened Black's position. Harper found the right squares for his pieces and produced another nice attacking game. Suradj Hanoeman became the best Surinamese player with 4.5 out of 9 and a 2146 performance, by profiting from an early blunder by Viresh Giasi in the final round.