Laxman Earns Maiden GM Norm

By Arvind Aaron

Chennai's International Master Rajaram Laxman of Integral Coach Factory obtained his first grand master norm when he scored 6.5/9 in the 10th Dubai Open in the United Arab Emirates on April 15.

Laxman, 25, achieved a 2600 rating performance to tie for the fifth place. Laxman who started on 2488 is on his way up to 2495 according to his mother, a medical doctor.

The first place was shared by not three but four players after GM Ghaem Maghami of Iran joined the trio of GM So Wesley (Phi), GM Merab Gagunashvili (Geo) and GM Li Chao (Chn) on 7/9.

GM Abhijeet Gupta of BPCL and Laxman shared the fifth to twelfth places with 6.5 points. The ten day show was organised by the Dubai Chess and Culture Club at Dubai.

Other Indian placings: 18 IM Tania Sachdev 6, 21 IM Ashwin Jayaram 6, 22 GM P. Negi, 27 GM R.B. Ramesh 5.5, 34 Shiven Khosla 5.5, 38 C. Praveen Kumar 5.5, 41 Bhuvanesh Ramnath 5, 47 IM D.K. Sharma 5, 49 FM C.J. Arvind 5, 50 Tejas Ravichandran 5, 52 IM Lanka Ravi 5, 53 FM N. Srinath 5, 54 FM Sahaj Grover 5, 55 Sohan Phadke 5, 56 WGM Nisha Mohota 5, 62 Antonio D'Cunha 4.5, 65 Aarthie Ramaswamy 4.5, 67 T.J. Suresh Kumar 4.5, 71 Debashis Das 4.5, 72 WIM Sai Meera 4.5, 73 Anuprita Patil 4.5, 80 WFM Swati Mohota 4, 83 K. Haridas 4, 89 C. Natarajan 4, 98 P.I. Johny 3.5...125 players.
 

Home                                                                Published on 16^th April, 2008