Sibling Rudr Ravi Prasad and Tanvi Radha Prasad will be top favourites to take out the Under-20 National Chess Championship which starts tomorrow at The University of the South Pacific.
Hosted by the Fiji Chess Federation and Vodafone Fiji the three-day championship will feature some of the country’s best and upcoming chess players.
The tournament will feature a total of nine rounds under 30 minutes, plus 30 seconds per move format. Rudr of USP and Tanvi of Jai Narayan College are seeded number one for the National Under-20 Open and National Under-20 Women Championship titles respectively.
Both players represented Fiji during the 44th World Chess Olympiad in Chennai, India in 2022, while the former also featured in the 2023 Under-20 Oceania Youth Chess Championship in Melbourne, Australia.
“The Under-20 National Chess Championship has become massive with the inclusion of Vodafone Fiji who are taking chess to the next level,” said Fiji Chess general secretary Goru Arvind.
“Primary and secondary school students from all over Fiji will be competing for trophies and lucrative prizes in several categories against a handful of tertiary chess players who are under-20 on the tournament date.”
Young and upcoming chess players such as Yifan Xing of Swami Vivekananda College, Luis Corpuz of Gurukul Primary School, Latileta Masau of Dudley Intermediate School, Useli Herath of Mahatma Gandhi Memorial Primary School, Michael Samuela of Marist Brother’s High School, Yajas Sharma of Mahatma Gandhi Memorial Primary School, Kaelan Sharma of Yat Sen Primary School, Yash Prasad of Deenbandhoo Memorial Primary School, Lewis Koroi of Gospel High School, Makayla Sukhu of Suva Grammar School, Zayne Elmond Keshwan of Jai Narayan College, Kartik Chand of Vunimono High School, and Lionel Vaurasi of Yat Sen Primary School are expected to give the tournament favourites a strong challenge as some of them have played for Fiji during the 2023 Oceania Youth Zonal Chess Championship in Australia as well.
“It will be three days of intense chess and we are expecting our young generation to showcase their talent in various chess openings,” adds Arvind.
“The beauty of chess is that every player has a unique way of handling openings, middle game and the final endgame. The winner will be a matter of who makes the most accurate moves across the nine rounds.”
The tournament is a prequel to the 2023 National Chess Championship which is scheduled from December 16-20 at 019-104 (H104) in USP under the helm of Vodafone Fiji.
