Start of Season: FM Daniel Lam wins the Rapid Section

On the very last day of August, Caissa opened the door for the season opener: Start of Season Open Rapid 2025. A full house joined the tournament. 40 players of different ages and strengths fought it out on the 64 squares of the chessboard.

After six rounds, one man was ahead of the pack: FM Daniel Lam. With a clean sweep he raced through his games and clinched first place. Congratulations Daniel!

Daniel’s dominance doesn’t mean there wasn’t any excitement, on the contrary, all the other prizes were very close until the last round. Let us start with the youngest in the U10 category. Shun Wang Liu scored 5/6, only losing against Daniel. That gives him a well deserved second place overall, which means we have to look further down the table to find Shayne Meng who took the U10 trophy home with a respectable 4/6.

In the U12 category, we had the same story. Kelly Elise Lilian also won 5 out of her 6 six games, only losing against Shun Wang Liu. She had a worse tiebreak than him, giving her third place. With that, she was the best U12 player and the best female player in the event! It was Zachary Tong, however, who took the U12 trophy home, also with a respectable 4/5. Xiruo Sun took the female prize with her.

For the best U16 player, we have to look once more in the top 6. Athan Wong ended in fifth place with 4.5/6. Nathaniel Wong took the prize home with 3.5/6.

Honourable mentions have to go to Hoi Cheung Wong (U12) and Ching Yin Law (U10) who completed the top 6 tournament with a fourth and sixth place. Both obviously also did well in their age categories. Hoi Cheung was actually in second place before the last round, but was paired against Daniel, giving others the chance to jump over him.

Congratulations to all the winners! It was good to see the youth giving the adults a good fight and being well represented in the top places!