Hay­den Lee dom­i­nat­ed Thurs­day’s fi­nal stop of the Prom­e­nade club “I Love Chess” Tour at Piz­za Hut Price Plaza in Ch­agua­nas on Re­pub­lic Day, scor­ing a com­mand­ing 8 points to cap­ture first place in the Ab­solute di­vi­sion. Demon­strat­ing sharp fo­cus and tac­ti­cal bril­liance through­out the day, Lee nav­i­gat­ed a com­pet­i­tive field to fin­ish at the top of the stand­ings in the tour’s ac­tion-packed fi­nale.

​Right be­side him was Kendry Daniel Morales Mo­ra, who fin­ished sec­ond at Price Plaza to of­fi­cial­ly se­cure the most cov­et­ed ti­tle of the cir­cuit: over­all Open cham­pi­on of the en­tire sev­en-stop tour. Morales Mo­ra’s in­cred­i­ble con­sis­ten­cy was the defin­ing sto­ry of the se­ries, pow­er­ing through the com­pe­ti­tion to win five out of the sev­en Piz­za Hut stops host­ed across the coun­try. Round­ing out the Ab­solute podi­um at Price Plaza was Si­mon Ram­dath, whose steady strate­gic play earned him a well-de­served third-place fin­ish.

​The tour­na­ment was host­ed un­der an in­ter­na­tion­al­ly rat­ed FIDE Swiss-Sys­tem for­mat with a rapid time con­trol of 10 min­utes plus a two-sec­ond in­cre­ment per move. The nine-round event fea­tured 19 play­ers, in­clud­ing four fe­male com­peti­tors who bat­tled di­rect­ly against the male field.

​In the Fe­male di­vi­sion, Sand­hya Ram­sa­roop set the stan­dard with ex­cep­tion­al board vi­sion and pa­tience, tak­ing top ho­n­ours with 4.5 points. Ar­i­an­na Dube pushed hard right be­hind her, se­cur­ing sec­ond place with an im­pres­sive 4 points af­ter a se­ries of tough games. Adria Ed­wards com­plet­ed the podi­um in third place with 2 points, demon­strat­ing re­silience and grit through­out the day’s rounds.

​In the Ju­nior di­vi­sion, the next gen­er­a­tion of lo­cal tal­ent de­liv­ered a spec­tac­u­lar show­ing. Omari Bernard played com­posed, cap­tur­ing first place with 6 points. Castil­lo Man­swell and Sameer Sookraj bat­tled in a re­mark­ably tight race for the re­main­ing spots, with both play­ers fin­ish­ing on a strong 5 points. Af­ter tiebreaks were tal­lied, Castil­lo earned sec­ond place while Sameer claimed third.

​The Price Plaza fi­nale brought an end to a jour­ney that stretched across Trinidad, fol­low­ing ear­li­er legs at Trinci­ty Mall Atri­um (Au­gust 14), Val­sayn Piz­za Hut (Au­gust 23), Roxy Piz­za Hut in St James (Sep­tem­ber 4), Gulf View Piz­za Hut in San Fer­nan­do (Sep­tem­ber 11), and South Park Mall Piz­za Hut (Sep­tem­ber 18).

​With the tour of­fi­cial­ly in the books, all eyes now turn to the prize giv­ing cer­e­mo­ny sched­uled for Oc­to­ber 11 at a par­tic­i­pat­ing Piz­za Hut branch. Fes­tiv­i­ties will kick off with a nine-round Rapid tour­na­ment fea­tur­ing a fast-paced 10-minute Blitz for­mat. Once the clocks stop tick­ing, the over­all cham­pi­ons and top per­form­ers of the en­tire cir­cuit will step for­ward to re­ceive their tro­phies, prizes, and ac­co­lades.

Fri­day’s re­sults

Ab­solute: 1. Hay­den Lee 8, 2 Kendry Daniel Morales Mo­ra 7, 3 Si­mon Ram­dath 6

Fe­male: 1 Sand­hya Ram­sa­roop 4.5, 2 Ar­i­an­na Dube 4, 3 Adria Ed­wards 2

Ju­nior: 1 Omari Bernard 6, 2 Castil­lo Man­swell 5, 3 Sameer Sookraj 5