Gopaul sweeps three titles at Chess Federation’s Game Fest

Bullet chess ace Joshua Gopaul stormed to three tournament titles at the Guyana Chess Federation’s Game Fest 2026 event on Saturday, outlasting a field of seasoned players and newcomers to claim the day’s $30,000 grand prize with the tournament’s highest overall score.

The competitions, held at the Royal International Mall, attracted seasoned players and newcomers competing for cash prizes sponsored by V&V Distributors, Movements Family Hotel and Bar, Premier ND Plus Enterprise, S. Pooran Equipment Rental and the Fernandez Ciria family.

Keron Sandiford, WCM Jessica Callender and FM Anthony Drayton each won one of the remaining Bullet Chess Competitions.
Play began at 12:00 pm in a two-minute-plus-one-second increment bullet format. Each tournament fielded 14 to 16 players across seven rounds, with a prize fund of $50,000 per tournament.

Prizes were awarded to the top five finishers in each event, along with separate awards for Best Female Player and Best Newcomer.

Other prize winners included Kim Shing-Chong, Ethan Spencer, Treskolé Archibald, Chelsea Harrison, Angelina Yhap, Darrel Abrams, Kishan Puran, Tremeur Alleyne, Dominic Sam, Jaden Denny, Odinnie Reece and Javier Davenand. Newcomer prizes went to David Chow, Naresh Sukhu, Tajiri De Abreu, Derek Quaicoe and Mahendra Persaud.

Arbiters and event management included Ethan Lee, Ronan Lee, Oluwadare Oyeyipo, Italy Ton Chung and Keron Sandiford. The GCF booth was organised by Mrs Ieda Harrison, Mrs Michaela Khan-Smith and Mrs Marcia Lee, with support from Abrianna Tinnie, Odit Rodrigues and Nathan Williams.

The GCF thanked its sponsors and the organisers of Game Fest 2026 for the platform to showcase chess at the event.