Nguyen Ngoc Truong Son Wins HDBank Chess Vietnam 2014

Despite having a busy chess week of FIDE Candidates, European Individual 2014 (won by GM Alexander Motylev) and Reykjavik 2014 (won by GM Li Chao), chess lovers from South East Asian being excited with the HDBank International Open Chess Tournament in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam.

photos from official website

The tournament was held from March 6th to 16th 2014. Seeing the dates and the location, the tournament not only competed with European's events and also right in the unfortunate week of Malaysian Airlines Flight MH370 missing episodes.

The tournament won greatly by GM Nguyen Ngoc Truong Son, who is now completely taking care of his country chess forces after his 'senior' GM Le Quang Liem must split concentration with his study in US. Nguyen won the nine rounds with seven points. GM Zhang Zhong, Singaporean now, sit in as runner up, a great come back by the ex super GM in the middle of 2000s. GM Le Quang Liem also on the third place, and for information all three players was tier with the same 7 points.

On the Indonesian participants, WGM Irene K. Sukandar must worked hard to earn her 5.5 points out of 9 rounds. She was the second highest woman player. Irene slightly lost a tie breaker to Uzbekistan WGM Nafisa Muminova, also with 5.5 points.

Full Final Standing, 2014 HDBank Chess - Ho Chi Minh City

1. GM Nguyen Ngoc Truong Son VIE 2613 7.0
2. GM Zhang Zhong SIN 2600 7.0
3. GM Le Quang Liem VIE 2709 7.0
4. IM Nguyen Duc Hoa VIE 2496 6.5
5. IM Yap Kim Steven PHI 2407 6.5
6. GM Ni Hua CHN 2658 6.5
7. Tran Quoc Dung VIE 2270 6.0
8. IM Nguyen Van Huy VIE 2414 6.0
9. GM Lu Shanglei CHN 2558 6.0
10. IM Prasanna Raghuram Rao IND 2410 6.0
11. GM Shyam Sundar M. IND 2507 6.0
12. IM Dimakiling Oliver PHI 2364 6.0
13. FM Dang Hoang Son VIE 2043 5.5
14. IM Duong The Anh VIE 2335 5.5
15. Yeoh Li Tian MAS 2320 5.5
16. IM Kuderinov Kirill KAZ 2454 5.5
17. IM Shyam Nikil P. IND 2431 5.5
18. WGM Muminova Nafisa w UZB 2322 5.5
19. GM Tu Hoang Thong VIE 2434 5.5
20. IM Wynn Zaw Htun MYA 2408 5.5
21. WGM Sukandar Irine Kharisma w INA 2343 5.5
+ others

selected games:

GM Le Quang Liem vs GM Nguyen Ngoc Truong Son 0-1

John Paul Gomez vs GM Zhang Zhong 0-1

Tin Jing Yao vs WGM Irene Kharisma Sukandar 0-1