By Barry Eacker

Southern Idaho Open - Idaho Closed - MVCC Championship - and now the 2009 version of the ICA President's Cup has been won by Idaho State Champion Garrett Reynolds. Even with his second place finish at the recent Idaho Open, Reynolds is setting a blistering pace by winning virtually every event he has played in for the last nine months.

Reynolds lost two games in the first set of qualifying games, but turned up the heat when it counted, finishing undefeated in the Eliminator and Final Four. The hard luck player in the event had to be long time gentleman chess player Hans Morrow from Utah, who breezed through the Qualifying round with four wins, only to lose the first round in the Eliminator. Morrow won his second game, but missed the Final Four on tie break.

Janos Fucsko of Boise showed up in his moving van and breezed into the Eliminator round, taking time between rounds to move furniture in the 100 degree heat while bemoaning the evils of chess addiction by quoting text from the famous article in the 1959 Scientific American called "Descent into Chess". Quite a joy to have around, as you may guess. Fucsko was 1.5/2 in the Eliminator and finished second in the Final Four, losing only to Reynolds.

Daniel Pocol came all the way from Washington to participate in our little event and hung on by his fingernails to reach the Final Four and finish third. Fred Bartell of Twin Falls made the Final Four, but fell on hard times and ended up fourth.

The Blitz section of the event was won by Barry Eacker of Twin Falls, somehow achieving a 7.0/8 tally. Hans Morrow came in at 5.0/8 while Hugh Myers along with Louis "haven't seen him for awhile" Felice tied for third with 4.0/8.

The President's Cup has the distinction of incorporating four different time controls in the format; G/29, G/60, G/90 and G/5. Kevin "can't play enough chess" Patterson thought that was OK, but thought there should be more than seven rounds a day........Don't know if any of you were paying attention, but we invented this format LONG before FIDE borrowed it for their "World Cup"....but I digress...

The winner of the Final Four will have their name inscribed on the perpetual trophy which will spend it's time with the ICA president until the following year. THANK YOU to everyone who took the time to travel and participate....hope you all had a great time. I know I did and it was an interesting event, although I was very disappointed at the attendance.

Many thanks go out to the Best Western Twin Falls Hotel for the great playing site and to ICA Prez Jay Simonson for overcoming logistics to get all the administrative stuff taken care of. Congrats to all the winners of the event!