NAGPUR: It was business as usual for India's 71st and quickest Grandmaster (GM) Sankalp Gupta.
Three weeks after he became city's second GM in Serbia in just 24 days, the 18-year-old came home to celebrate the achievement with family. And to achieve his immediate target of joining the super GM club of 2600 Elo, Sankalp headed right back to playing international rating tournaments at Barcelona.
Continuing from where he left off in Serbia, Sankalp sealed the table top finish in yet another round-robin tournament in Spain.
He emerged champion in the nine-day event at Barbera del Valles. Starting as ninth seed, Sankalp came up as a surprise for five higher rated GMs to seal the top position in style. In the nine-round event, Sankalp registered five victories, drew two boards and lost two games to collect six points for the gold. The 2468 Elo Sankalp gave a performance rating of 2584 and earned 13.8 international rating points. He took his tally of live ratings to 2517 Elo.
"Feels good to win in my first tournament after achieving the feat. This victory gives me more confidence for Elllobregat Open Chess. Here I should have scored one more point, now I will try to cover this in Elllobregat," Sankalp told TOI.
In Barcelona, Sankalp surprised second and third seeded Colombian masters Rios Cristhian Camilo and Hernandez Cristhian for a bright start. He then held fourth ranked Munoz Miguel of Peru, before defeating Spanish opponents Alonso Garcia Aaron and Lopez Martinez Jose Manuel respectively.
Sankalp suffered his first defeat in the seventh round but came back strongly against Chile's GM Vasquez Schroeder Rodrigo. After losing the penultimate round, Sankalp forced top seeded Spanish GM Asis Gargatagli Hipolito to split the points and emerge champion based on the tie-break score after five players finished the event with six points each.
