The Galleria BYOB – 10th edition

The Galleria BYOB (Bring Your Own Board) series came back with a bang bagged with full of surprises. The 10th edition saw the emergence of the fresh blood in the top prize categories. The emerging youths had come with vendetta after falling out of the prize category for long. They had done their homework right and the dinosaurs were about to fall.

Lennox Mangi, a youthful player and a former TUK player toppled the veteran bigwigs and bagged the prestigious title of the Galleria Shopping Mall BYOB chess champion of the 10th edition. This is after putting up a never-seen before spirited fight. He was launching attacks at every opponent and destroying their territories, which helped him garner a staggering 89 Elo points with a score of 10.5/11 points!

Mangi who was on fire this time round had a clean sheet. He recorded only a single draw out of the possible eleven rounds to take home gift vouchers worth KShs. 6,000. He had gone for the national champion, Martin Njoroge’s jugular in the fifth round but failed to outwit him. The duo settled for a draw. Githinji Hinga who was the defending champion of the Galleria BYOB had it rough defending his title as he was sent off balance and lost his games to Mangi, Timothy Mwabu and Martin Njoroge. This was no doubt a coup staged by the youth to swindle the wins from the veterans. Hinga had to settle for fourth position, pocketing KShs. 1,000 in gift vouchers as Njoroge came in third and took home KShs. 2,000 gift vouchers.

James Panchol had also seemed to be in good shape and was ravenously hungry for the title this time round. His dreams were however cut short by the eventual winner Mangi, after thrashing him in the fourth round. This was the only disappointing loss of the day for Panchol that pushed him to the first runners up position thus getting gift vouchers worth KShs. 4,000.

Ben Nguku had a rough evening as he played dismally unlike his usual self. He conceded defeat from unlikely corners and he had to settle for the tenth position where the gods had dictated he would belong. His Titanic started sinking from the moment he encountered a weakening loss from Githui Victor, a junior who had no time on the clock, 10 seconds to be precise but had the brains and a bishop suffocate Nguku. His eyes flipped, seeing a checkmate from a bishop from an opponent who was running out of time while he had more than a minute to cry over the board. He later succumbed to more losses and a draw.

One promising junior, Isaiah Oluoch, had everyone talking about him after recording a winning streak of five consecutive rounds from the start of the event. He was taking no chances as he hammered the likes of Philip Singe and Anthony Kionga. Unfortunately, after rising to the top, he encountered more dinosaurs who devoured his feeble games rendering his streak fruitless. He could not reach the podium finish but his writing was already on the wall as the highest Elo earner with 158.4 points. He will surely be back.

The venue was filled to the brim with 120 participants, and the event started right on time courtesy of the superb organization from the event managers in conjunction with Terrian Chess Academy.

The next event will be held on April 29, and the subsequent ones will fall on every last Friday of the month! A big thank you to Galleria Shopping Mall and Urban Burgers for the kind sponsorship!