The 2010 Boxing Week Sectional was held on Wednesday, December 29, 2010 at the Grande Prairie Chess Club. We had only 1 section filled and it was filled with the 4 highest players of the club. Wade Caughlin was the highest rated player of the tournament (1971) and is currently the highest rated player in the club!
The tournament was a round robin event with a time control of Game in 60 minutes plus 30 seconds per move increment. Jim Roy was the only person who was scoreless in the tournament and I think he was in time trouble in all 3 of his games. This definitely contributed to his result as his opponents were able to take advantage of their extra time to find good moves. David Miller was in fine form and all 3 of his opponents tried to sacrifice a piece against him. The only person who had luck with this strategy was Tim Pradzinski who managed to catch David in an impulsive mood as he accepted a Queen sacrifice a little too eagerly. After that, Tim took advantage of the fact that David's pieces were not able to get active and won in 31 moves with a forced mate. With that win, Tim Pradzinski won the tournament and the $50 first prize.
Tim and Wade had a very interesting game and another in their long series of Sicilian battles. Tim actually prepared a line against Wade for this tournament and everything went according to plan (except the actual outcome). The game went down to the very end and as hard as Tim tried he could not overcome the fact that he had the wrong color bishop for the queening square.
The results were as follows:
- Tim Pradzinski (1957) - 2.5/3
- David Miller (1869) - 2/3
- Wade Caughlin (1971) - 1.5/3
- Jim Roy (1928) - 0/3
