World Top 100 Players

Chennai's Indian Airlines star Aarthie Ramesh stormed into sole lead with an attacking fifth round victory over Mary Ann Gomes of Bengal in the National Women A Championship being played at Hotel Goldfinch in Bangalore on Thursday.

Woman grandmaster Aarthie who had been in joint lead all along established a half point sole lead in the 14-player tournament by taking her score to four points from five games.

Five time champion and the second oldest player in the meet, Anupama Gokhale of Petroleum Sports Promotion Board scored over Tamil Nadu's Sivasankari with the black pieces to reach the second place with 3.5 points.

The third place is shared by four players, namely, P.Priya, M.R.Sangeetha (both TN), Mary Ann Gomes and WGM Nisha Mohota (both Ben). All of them have three points each.

Mary Ann Gomes had to curse herself for letting Aarthie have the vital breakthrough on the queenside. Later, Aarthie, who played black developed that break into a mating threat and a victory in 43 moves. "We had five minutes at the end and there was no real big time pressure," said Aarthie. The opening was a double fianchetto with Mary calling most of the shots. "Had white played Rc2 instead of b4, she would have had a very big advantage," said Aarthie. So, the run has been lucky for the pregnant Aarthie who bounced back from Wednesday's defeat to an attacking win.

Sangeetha tried to surprise her room-mate Priya by playing the Larsen opening starting 1.b3 with white. Soon she blundered a pawn. There was some counterplay for white. Priya however defended well and used the pawn cushion to win in 32 moves to reach three points. The event has shown good fighting spirit with 24 of the 35 games ending decisively. 

The upset of the round was Anuprita Patil's shocking victory over the experienced IWM Bhagyashree Thipsay. Eight rounds remain in this 14-player round robin event which concludes on May 6.

The results of the fifth round:

Pairings for Friday's sixth round: 

C o n t a c t