PANAJI: Close on the heels of achieving the International Master title last week, Nitish Belurkar got his first Grandmaster norm, when he was declared the champion at the Vezerkepzo International GM Tournament in Budapest, Hungary.
With 5 wins and 4 draws, Nitish remained undefeated in the tournament. He had a performance rating of 2612. Nitish is a Geno Pharmaceuticals brand ambassador and a student of S.S. Dempo College of Commerce and Economics, Cujira.
Playing in a strong field of IMs and GMs, Nitish defeated GM Pap Misa of Serbia and drew with GM Kovalev Andrei of Belarus and GM Chakravarthi Reddy of India, while also defeating IM Manish Christiano of India and FM Murphy Connor of Ireland among others to score 7 points out of 9 , thus becoming the champion in this tournament.
