Georgians in Miami

CHESS LIFE ONLINE (Ray and Darmen Tie; Ray Wins Armageddon) reports only the results of the open section of the Miami Open. The lack of info emanating from the tournament makes one think of North Korea! It can be best summed up by what was written in a post to the USCF forum (Miami Open) by Sevan Muradian on Sat Sep 13, 2008 3:11 pm:
The sad thing is also that the 6th round is pretty much over and there are no pairings, no standings, no players list available. There's no broadcast on MonRoi or on ICC.Not sure what the organizers are attempting to accomplish by keeping everyone in the dark.
Sevan A. Muradian, FIDE ArbiterNorth American Chess Associationhttp://www.nachess.orghttp://www.nachess.blogspot.comsevan.muradian@nachess.org
888.80.CHESSA USCF Gold Affiliate

The only info as of this writing is a crosstable of the open section, where one learns that FM Kazim Gulamali finished with a plus one score of 5-4. He got off to a fine start with a win over one of the co-champs, GM Darmen Sadvakasov. He then lost to IM Renier Gonzalez. He came back from that defeat to beat IM Drasko Boskovic and IM Davorin Kuljasevic in the next two rounds! That put him at 3-1. Unfortunately Kazim lost his next three games, to IM John Bartholomew, GM Victor Mikhalevski, and IM David Pruess. It's tough at the top! IM Boris Kogan used to say the measure of a chessplayer is how he does after a loss. That goes triple for a player who loses three in a row! To prove what kinda player he is, Kazim came back to win his last two games, beating Juan Camilo Arango, and Sylvain Leburgue. Boris also said it was important to not only finish, but that how you finished was important! Kazim would have, no doubt, earned the Kogan stamp of approval!
Joseph Moon also finished with a 5-4 score in the open section, but his score does include a full point bye in round two, and a half point bye in the last round. He did, though, hold his own in the open section, with two wins, two losses, and three draws, a fine result! He lost to IM Drasko Boskovic in the first round, but did draw with IM Marko Zivanic and IM Daniel Fernandez, in the fourth and fifth rounds. After a loss to IM David Pruess in round six, he did beat FM Renard W Anderson in round seven. That's one win, two draws, and two losses versus titled players!
There is a disturbing post on the forum by cranken on Mon Sep 15, 2008 11:02 am #113934, in which he writes: "To receive a check, you had to sign some acknowledgement agreeing to the 50% payout. If you did not sign, then you have to appeal to Bill Hall (the beleaguered Executive Director of the USCF-WMB) and will receive money pending resolution of the appeal. This was inappropriate since players may have felt pressured into signing."
The organizers guaranteed $70,000 but it appears they are unable, because of the small turnout, to pay it! The $100,000 prize fund was based on an unrealistic 650 entries. They only had half that turnout last year. All they had to guarantee was half of the prize fund. Since they chose to increase the guarantee, it would seem they should have had at least $70,000 in the bank before the tournament. Coming as it does on the heels of a lawsuit filed by USCF board member Susan Polgar AGAINST THE USCF, this is either a body blow, or another black eye for the reeling USCF. I fear there are dark days ahead for our chess world...