Archive for February, 2009

I have posted the Garden State Chess League Schedule on the league’s website.

Arunas Simonaitis of Queens, NY has annotated one of his USATE games for my blog. In it, he convincingly outplays his opponent in a Ruy Lopez sideline. Here is the replay & PGN.

200 players in 19 different tournaments took part in the 7th International Chess Festival in Nancy from 16 to 22 of February 2009. This town is located in the east of France, between Paris and Strasbourg. The tournament system is unusual: the players are divided into groups of ten and play round robins. You will get to know a lot of new players in this giant pictorial report by IM Christophe Philippe.

The Editor of Chess
Notes presents a compilation of photographs, engravings and sketches of
Howard Staunton (1810-1874). They include art-work by Sam Loyd and a group
photograph taken at Redcar, 1866 which has come to light only recently. Much
of Staunton’s life is shrouded in mystery, and the origin of some of the
pictures is unknown. Enjoy a rich compendium of historic illustrations.

Our examination of game headers continues in the latest ChessBase Workshop. When you load a game and then save or replace it there are certain important things to consider. You’ll discover quite a number of “hidden” fields that are used to correctly maintain tournament information as we unlock the mysteries in our
latest Workshop installment.

As part of the Aeroflot Open Chess Festival one more big event was held in Moscow. 165 players took part in the Qualification Tournament for the World Blitz Championship, among them over a hundred grandmasters. For the majority the blitz tournament was part of playing in the Aeroflot Open, but some arrived in Moscow only to qualify for the World Blitz.
Photo report by WGM Yana Melnikova.

Players of the Dragon are traditionally interested in a certain number of “bottlenecks” – i.e. variations which are very critical and which cause them a lot of concern in their games. The lines after 9.0-0-0 have been pretty unpromising. In ChessBase Magazine 114 André Schulz took a long and hard look at the move 12…Nxc3!, which he baptised the Bjerring Variation. Add it to your repertoire.

The King’s Indian has been doing well in Linares. Black hasn’t lost a single game, and today Vassily Ivanchuk scored a victory with it, against Levon Aronian. Vishy Anand used his white game against Alexander Grischuk to experiment with his new 1.d4 repertoire, Grischuk was happy to draw. The other two games were also drawn. Report with annotations by GM Dorian Rogozenco.

At the Kenilworth Chess Club tonight, John Hagerty will be stopping by to draw lots & make the Garden State Chess League schedule. After that, I will assign players to the 2 Kenilworth entries & club members will have a chance to vote on the best game from our recently concluded Championship.

The Checkmate Championship concluded on Sunday with the following results :

Things didn’t look that good for France’s top GM, until victories in the last two rounds put him at the top of the table and gave him first place on tiebreak points. Second, with the same number of points (6.5/9) was Alexander Moiseenko of Ukraine. We bring you all results and games from the top group, plus, from wintry Moscow, a big photo report by WGM Yana Melnikova.

Veselin Topalov sacrificed a pawn in a Tarrasch, which Gata Kamsky took. By move 25 it looked like the American GM had winning chances. But in time trouble he blew a number of opportunities and went down to the counterplay of his opponent. That means Topalov has 4.5:2.5 points and is the winner of the eight-game match. Final report with commentary by GM Mihail Marin.

Would you believe it? After keeping it secret from all but the family circle, today they sent us the happy announcement: Kateryna Lahno, former child prodigy, European Women’s Champion, Ukrainian chess grandmaster, has married Robert Fontaine, French grandmaster and well-known TV reporter for the French chess magazine Europe Echecs. We have pictures and memories.

Two big sensations in round six: Magnus Carlsen beat World Champion Vishy Anand,
and did so convincingly, with remarkable techincal skill. Alexander Grischuk
defeated Levon Aronian to increase his lead in this event to a full point. Sorry,
three sensations: the incalculable Vassily Ivanchuk agreed to a draw
in a winning position. Report with GM commentary and pictorial impressions.

“Who said beating a World Champion is easy?” asks our annotator. And indeed, after running into an opening problem against Vassily Ivanchuk, Vishy Anand used some miraculous stalemate motifs to save the game. All the other games were also drawn, Dominguez-Radjabov being the most volatile. Pictures, annotations by GM Dorian Rogozenco, video interviews and another truly atrocious pun.

It is hard to assess whether chess is becoming more popular, but one chess activity is rapidly expanding: problem solving. Most European countries now have a national solving championship, and every year there is a world championship for individuals and countries. The 2009 British Championship was held at Oakham School and won by guess who. Report by John Nunn (with problems).

After a month of training – mainly walking and saunas – Kiril Georgiev was ready to take the challenge and play a simultaneous exhibition against 360 opponents. For every move the Bulgarian GM had to walk half a kilometer, and after six hours of play had made only eight moves. After 14 hours it was over, he had scored 88% with 284 wins, 70 draws and 6 losses. The record was broken!

Many of the games from this legendary tournament, which included three world
champions and three challengers, are well-known – they are included in
anthologies and textbooks. But here’s one that you probably do not know. In
his Playchess lecture Dennis Monokroussos
shows us the fantasy adventure that occurred in Janowski-Ed. Lasker. See you at 9 p.m. ET.

“Who said beating a World Champion is easy?” asks our annotator. And indeed, after running into an opening problem against Vassily Ivanchuk, Vishy Anand used some miraculous stalemate motifs to save the game. All the other games were also drawn, Dominguez-Radjabov being the most volatile. Pictures, annotations by GM Dorian Rogozenco, video interviews and another truly atrocious pun.

In the sixth game of their eight-game match Topalov played the Caro-Kann as black (no Sicilian yet in this match) and once again produced the novelty – on move eleven. Kamsky was not able to gain or hold a tangible advantage, and so the game became drawish. In the end he gave Topalov a pawn and drew by perpetual. GM commentary by Mihail Marin.

What was missing from our reports on the Aeroflot Open? Why pictures, visual impressions of the action. Not a single one was on the official site, and so it was a pleasant surprise when a colleague sent us a very nice bunch from Moscow. The include some critical shots of the contentious game Mamedyarov-Kurnosov from round six. From Moscow here is Misha Savinov’s big pictorial report.

Shakhriyar Mamedyarov is the top seed in the 2009 edition of the Aeroflot Open in Moscow (February 17–26). After five rounds he was leading, together with Alexander Moiseenko and Igor Kurnosov. In round six he was crushed by Kurnosov in 21 moves. Mamedyarov filed an official complaint, essentially accusing his opponent of cheating, and withdrew from the event.
Breaking news.

Vishy Anand outplayed Wang Yue with 1.d4, Alexander Grischuk punished the creative but over-optimistic play by Teimour Radjabov, while Levon Aronian laboured for 92 moves to overcome Leinier Dominguez’ resistance an hour before midnight. After four rounds and before the free day Aronian and Grischuk lead with 3.0 points. Server statistics and annotations by GM Dorian Rogozenco.

Here are the revised pairings for tonight’s 5th & final round of the Checkmate Championship at Barnes & Noble in Springfield :

1. Mann – Kernighan
2. Sherry – Minkov
3. Wu – Shiffman
4. Azzarello – Renna

Don Carrelli & I are taking 1/2-point byes.