David Lafarga

Saturday, June 9, 2018: Rest in Peace

Today we received the sad news of David Lafarga's passing. He lost his battle against a serious and long standing illness leaving us with a deep feeling of sadness, remembering his personality and superlative trajectory in our chess modality, especially since we recently celebrated his 52nd birthday.

He battled cancer for 6 years but was still able to carry his responsibilities in the events he participated as well as with the teams he captained, in the Olympiad and other european tournaments. He also took the time to say goodbye to close friends in AEAC.

I constantly acquired chess knowledge from him either via our email exchanges or conversations. He had great analytical abilities but his final master lesson has been his display of endurance and serenity until the very end. AEAC has lost his strongest player in history and also a great friend and human being.

His achievements in correspondence chess are excellent. Obtained the IM and SIM titles in 2005, and then the GM title in 2007. His elo has been way above 2600 since 2006, accumulating a total of 9 GM norms in the multiple events he played. In regards to team events, he was the main reason behind Spain's achievements in the Olympiad where he earned two medals and most likely will earn a third one in the current version of the event where despite his serious heatlh struggles, he defended our first board with guaranteed success.

He also spent time within the AEAC organization and was elected President in 2011. Unfortunately he was soon after diagnosed with pancreatic cancer which limited his options to materialize his ideas.

Finally, I would like to mention that he was a very strong over-the-board player, becoming Provincial Champion in many occasions with brilliant performances in the Autonomic Championship of Aragón. He also spent time teaching and coaching young players.

R.I.P

Íñigo de Carlos

AEAC President

• David Lafarga