Carlos Daniel Albornoz

Havana, Dec 19 (JIT) The Cuban players who participated in the Carlos Torre in Memoriam 2024 International Chess Tournament, held in the Mexican city of Merida, said goodbye on Wednesday without reaching the podium of the Magistral group.

The best performance among the exponents of the island was signed by Carlos Daniel Albornoz, who could not retain the crown won a year ago, and had to settle with a fourth place, after scoring six points in nine rounds.

The Camagüey native's farewell was sealed with a draw against American Kyron Griffith to round off a performance marked by three draws, four wins, and a costly defeat in the sixth round against the new champion, local Jose Eduardo Martinez.

Martinez also starred in the closing round in a winless duel against his compatriot Sion Radamantys Galaviz, with which he reached seven points, a figure out of reach for the rest of the contestants.

The Colombian Joshua Ruiz defeated the Peruvian Jorge Cori in his last presentation to "climb" to the second place with 6.5 points, half more than the accumulated by his victim, who completed the trio of winners.

Michel Alejandro Diaz and Dylan Berdayes gave Cuba the sixth and seventh places in the ranking, thanks to six and 5.5 units, respectively. The other member of the island's armada who finished in the top 10 of the competition was Lelys Martinez from Santiago, also with 5.5 points and ranked ninth.

Although she lost to the host Sergio Morales, Cuba's Greter Caballero was the best woman of the tournament, ranked 25th with four points.

As usual, in the Mexican event there were other age groups and in those there was also Cuban presence. Among the under-10s, Alberto García dominated with a perfect performance in seven games, escorted by home players Cronos Galaviz (5.5) and Saraí Hernández (5).