At the World Juniors (Yerevan, Armenia, October 2-17), our three
representatives, Mackenzie Molner, Robert Hungaski and Tatev Abrahhayman are playing solidly but with two rounds to go, are not
in the race for medals. Tatev Abrahayman, who was born in Armenia, has 6/11. In the lead with 8.5/11 are girls from India (Dronavalli Harika), Poland (Jolanta Zawadzaka) and Russia (Vera Nebolsina), countries which tend to have strong female delegations. In the eleventh and latest round, Tatev won a complicated Pirc game in which her opponent mistepped to allow Tatev to force a superior endgame with 31. Qxd6.
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In the boys section, GM Ivan Popov of Russia is in clear first with 8.5/11.
As for U.S. players, Mackenzie Molner is currently on minus one but with two rounds to go he has the chance to finish the tourney on a high note. He scored a nice victory in round 4 with an interesting Nxb5 sacrifice. When Black declined the sack, White had a clearly better endgame. The extent of white's dominance became clear after Bb5 when Black's only way to play on is to play Rxb5 as moving the knight would allow Bc5 followed by a6 and black's pieces are frozen by white's bishops.
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Robert Hungaski has an even score, 5.5/11. Hungaski, who lives in Argentina but was born in and spends a lot of time in USA will write a blog for CLO about Armenia after the event. Here is his latest win:
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Check the official website for up to date information, and of course, watch CLO for Robert Hungaski's blog.