Michelle Catherina of Tamil Nadu upset overnight leader Soumya Swaminathan of PSCB in the seventh round to open up table in the 42nd Women's National Premier chess championship here today.
Defending champion Padmini Rout and Swati Ghate, who were trailing half a point behind, snatched the lead with easy wins over V Varshini of Tamil Nadu and Neha Singh of Bihar, respectively. But Soumya now trails with half a point behind.
Bhakti Kulkarni and Pratyusha Bodda are in the joint third spot with 4.5 points apiece.
A computer engineering student of Anna University, Chennai's Michelle won two pawns in the centre playing white in an Accelerated Dragon against Soumya. She then thwarted Soumya's attack and swapped her pieces to take the game into a winning king and pawn ending.
Soumya played on for some time but could not stop the inevitable and resigned.
Top seed Padmini of Odisha once against played a splendid game to outclass Varshini in a Sicilian defence, while Swati faced little resistance from tail-ender Neha in a Ruy Lopez opening with black.
IM and former national champion Tania Sachdev of Air India tried desperately to squeeze out a win from a sterile position against Partyusha Bodda in a bishop ending in what was the longest game of the championship as it went on for 124 moves before a draw was agreed upon.
World junior girls' U-14 champion R Vaishali of Tamil Nadu gave up her rook for bishop against Priyanka Nutakki of Andhra Pradesh for a central pawn advance in a Larsen's opening.
Goa's Bhakti was fortunate to turn the tables on K Priyanka of Tamil Nadu.
