Aravindh Chithambaram victorious at 50th La Roda Open

by Shahid Ahmed
4/3/2024 – GM Aravindh Chithambaram (India), IM Siddharth Jagadeesh (Singapore) and GM Carlos Albornoz (Cuba) scored an unbeaten 7/9 each at the 50th La Roda Open. Aravindh won the tournament thanks to his better tiebreak score. Albornoz drew against Aravindh in the final round in an exciting game. This was the first rating tournament that Aravindh played this year in any format, and he won it emphatically. | Photo: Official website

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Aravindh’s first rated tournament of 2024

Playing a tournament which has four consecutive double rounds is not an easy task. Winning it definitely makes things that much more difficult.

GM Aravindh Chithambaram made a blazing start by scoring a double hat-trick of wins. His 6/6 start put him in the sole lead position. It allowed him to draw the last three games to become the champion.

In the final round, Cuban GM Carlos Albornoz had an interesting draw against Aravindh. It is evident from his games that Aravindh made the most out of the last three months. He did not show any vulnerability in any of his nine games.

Aravindh made a nice positional exchange sacrifice with 15.Nxb4 to momentarily trap the queen after 15...Qxa1 16.Na2. White obviously cannot attempt to capture the queen without avoiding his second rook being taken.

Soon, Black managed to free the queen up, but not under ideal conditions

20...c4 21.Bxa4 Qxa2 liberated the queen from the corner.

Iturrizaga eventually returned the exchange and made things worse for himself. Aravindh showed fine positional skills to seize his opportunity and win the game.

Aravindh Chithambaram, Eduardo Iturrizaga

Aravindh Chithambaram defeated Eduardo Iturrizaga in round 6 | Photo: Official site

Aravindh Chithambaram

Aravindh Chithambaram in deep thought | Photo: Official site

La Roda Chess Open

Players in action | Photo: Official site

A total of 209 players including 8 GMs, 9 IMs and a WIM took part from 22 countries across the world. The tournament was organized by Club Ajedrez La Roda from 27th to 31st March 2024 at La Caja Blanca in La Roda, Albacete, Spain. The nine-round Swiss tournament had a time control of 90 minutes + 30-second increments.

Final standings

Rk. SNo Name RtgI Pts.  TB1   TB2   TB3   TB4 
1 Aravindh, Chithambaram Vr. 7,5 54
2 Siddharth, Jagadeesh 7,5 52,5
3 Albornoz Cabrera, Carlos Daniel 7,5 49,5
4 Sonis, Francesco 7 53
5 Karthik, Venkataraman 7 53
6 Xu, Xiangyu 7 51,5
7 Iturrizaga Bonelli, Eduardo 7 49,5
8 Martinez Ramirez, Lennis 7 49,5
9 Iglesias Ferreira, Andres 7 47
10 Peralta, Fernando 7 45,5
11 Ha, Yihan 6,5 45
12 Pranav, V 6,5 44,5
13 Jimenez Martinez, Jose Vicente 6,5 42
14 Vehi Bach, Victor Manuel 6,5 41,5
15 Liu, Zexu 6 50

...210 players

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Shahid Ahmed is the senior coordinator and editor of ChessBase India. He enjoys covering chess tournaments and also likes to play in chess events from time to time.