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The 1 million championship
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The promised head to head world chess championship match between Vishy Anand and Vladimir Kramnik has been announced. A best of twelve game Classical Chess contest will take place at the Art and Exhibition Hall of the Federal Republic of Germany in Bonn.
The organisers are Universal Event Promotion who handled Kramnik’s battle against the computer program ‘Deep Fritz ‘last year at the same venue. Once again there is official government support as German Finance Minister Peer Steinbrueck will be the patron of the event.
The prize fund will be 1.5 million Euro (Pounds 1,0006,000) which will presumably be split 60-40 between winner and loser. The twelve games will be played between October 11th – 28th and if necessary a speed chess tie break will be contested on October 30th. The match sponsor will be Evonik Industries AG a German enterprise with interests in chemicals, energy and property.
Head to head contests are what the world championship is all about and are the most fitting way to determine the best player. This match continues a tradition that goes back to the 19th century. Anand, 37, deposed Kramnik, who is five years his junior, as champion at the Fide world championship tournament at Mexico City. Kramnik’s condition for his participation was a rematch with the winner in a head to head battle.
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Set the egg-timer
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Twenty Seconds chess, an innovative idea, is being introduced to the UK through a new tournament to take place at Bush Hall, Shepherd’s Bush in London on Saturday January 19th. It promises to be a lot of fun and perhaps somewhat more pressured than conventional speed chess as the clocks will be in what could be described as ‘egg timer mode’.
Both players start with 20 seconds for the entire game. When play commences and White’s clock is started his twenty seconds reduces as normal but the time elapsed is added to Black's clock. When White has moved and pressed his clock, Black's clock begins to run down and White's clock increases. If either side runs out of time they lose.
Players will be divided into groups irrespective of rating and the top 32 players will advance to the knockout phase. A win scores two points and a draw half a point in the group stage. The tournament is sponsored by Lexmark and there will be ?3000 in prize money. The English Chess Federation website has the entry form.
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Shirov's fatal slip
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Gata Kamsky eased his way to victory at the Fide World Cup with a draw in the fourth game of his match against Alexei Shirov at the Siberian city of Khanty Mansiysk. Kamsky won 2.5-1.5 to take the winner’s prize of $120,000 and he earns the right to a world title final eliminator against Veselin Topalov.
Shirov went into the final game needing to win with Black to stay in the match and past precedent suggests this is an almost hopeless task and so it proved. Kamsky chose a solid line against the Sicilian Defence and the message was something like: ‘ We won’t be having any of your tactical tricks today Alexei’.
Kamsky hastened to exchange pieces and Shirov’s creative talents surfaced just once, see the note to White’s … move but Kamsky snuffed out any sacrificial possibilities.
When Shirov threatened to create some counterplay Kamsky produced a deep sacrifice off rook for bishop which ensured him several positional advantages and deprived Shirov’s pieces of any activity. Once again Kamsky’s play was very impressive and Shirov, who missed a chance for advantage in game three saw his world title ambitions curtailed again.
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Kamsky draws clear
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Gata Kamsky took the lead in the World Cup Final with victory over Alexey Shirov in the second game at the Siberian city of Khanty Mansiysk. This was a fine achievement as Kamsky’s calculation was superior to Shirov’s and few players can compete with Shirov in complex positions.
Game three was drawn and so Shirov is 1-2 down and must win with black in the final game to stay in the best of four game match and take it to a speed chess tie break.
Kamsky disobeys the standard rules of the opening and moves both his queen and knight more than once but to good effect. See the note to move eight.
G Kamsky – A Shirov
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An honourable draw
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Game one of the World Cup Final between Gata Kamsky and Alexey Shirov was drawn after 43 moves. Kamsky repeated a line of the Breyer Defence against the Ruy Lopez with which he was successful against Peter Svidler earlier in the event and although Shirov achieved a slight advantage he never looked like winning the game. The contest is the best of four games.
Kamsky looks very well prepared and having surmised that Shirov was going to produce an improvement over Svidler’s play, the American got his new idea in first and was very close to equality.
Since returning from a long lay off Kamsky’s main weakness has been a lack of opening preparation. His ability to defend difficult positions and his excellent technique have not deserted him. Now that he is working hard on his openings he can only improve further and threaten the very best players.
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Three Indian tales
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Indian players made almost a clean sweep of the Commonwealth Championships at Delhi as Gawain Jones’ narrowly missed out as he ended on 7/10. However an England Junior Squad, guided by GM Mark Hebden, acquitted themselves well and Ravi Haria of Elstree captured the bronze medal in the Under 8 age group for his score of 3.5/10 in the main event.
The Queen’s Indian is a solid defence to the Queen’s Pawn and so recently proponents of 1.d4 have revisited some pawn sacrifices to liven up the play and get some attacking chances. The following line was developed by Lev Polugaevsky but it was Garry Kasparov who honed it. Here is an early example.
G Kasparov – S Marjanovic
Malta Olympiad Valetta 1980
Queen’s Indian
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Experience tells
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Youth was vanquished a second time at the FIDE World Cup taking place at Khanty Mansiysk in Siberia as Alexey Shirov eliminated the former prodigy Sergei Karjakin 1.5-0.5 to qualify for the final where he will play Gata Kamsky. Kamsky eliminated the 17 year Magnus Carlsen in the other semi final.
At stake will be the winner’s prize of $120,000 and the right to play a world title eliminator against Veselin Topalov.
The first game between Shirov and Karjakin, given in part below, was an epic encounter with many twists and turns. After catching Shirov in a prepared line Karjakin appeared to have a huge attack but was rocked by some typically brilliant sacrificial play from Shirov that brought the white king into the open.
Karjakin defended desperately and after a huge time scramble the players reached an endgame of rook and bishop against two knights. These endgames have all been analysed out and in theory, according to the computer, Shirov could win if he found 208 perfect moves in succession. Of course in practice winning this endgame is extremely difficult and at Rapid Chess virtually impossible. Shirov tried until move 103.
In the return Karjakin was ground down in a rook and opposite coloured bishop endgame less a pawn that arose from the line of the Marshall Attack in which we saw Shirov defeat Jakovenko last week. Not an inspired choice from the youngster.
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Gata shows his teeth
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Gata Kamsky’s second chess career continues to gain momentum as he eliminated the 17 year old prodigy Magnus Carlsen from the FIDE World Cup to move just one match away from a world title final eliminator against Veselin Topalov. The American GM retired from top class chess in 1997 to study law but is now back at the board full time.
After a quick draw with Black in the first game Kamsky outplayed the Norwegian with white and not for the first time in this tournament employed a slightly unusual line to good effect. Carlsen went badly wrong in the middlegame and found one of his rooks trapped.
Kamsky won the exchange and then gave a textbook demonstration of how to exploit a material advantage while not giving the opponent even a hint of counterplay – it looked quite Karpovian.
The match between Alexey Shirov and Sergey Karjakin went to speed chess tie breaks after Shirov produced a new wrinkle playing black in the Ruy Lopez and made light of the difficulties he was confronted with by engineering a series of piece exchanges.
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Magnus marches on
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Magnus Carlsen was rock solid in game two of his match against Ivan Cheparinov and eliminated the Bulgarian from the Fide World Cup taking place at Khanty Mansiysk in Siberia. The seventeen year old Norwegian prodigy moved into the semi finals where he will take on Gata Kamsky of the USA, a former Fide world title finalist.
Carlsen gave up a pawn to reach a double rook endgame where he was more active and held on comfortably.
Kamsky upset the form book again and defeated Ruslan Ponomariov of Ukraine 1.5-0.5 with victory in the second game. Kamsky had been in serious difficulties with black in game one but escaped and with white he outplayed Ponomariov, a former Fide champion, in a sharp Sicilian Defence.
In the other semi final Alexei Shirov plays another prodigy Sergey Karjakin. Shirov was at his most impressive and followed up his win we saw on Saturday with victory in the second game after his opponent Dmitry Jakovenko blundered as he strove to create complications.
Karjakin needed a Rapid Chess tie break to overcome the Russian champion Evgeny Alekseev
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Californian Takes World Title At Children's Event in Turkey
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Children who play chess almost certainly learn practical skills. Some of the better players compete abroad, visit exotic places, make new friends, maybe become a world champion.
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Leonard Barden. December 8, 2007
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Michael Adams, the England No1, has a history of frustrating near-misses in world knockout semi-finals and finals. At Groningen 1997, Las Vegas 1999 and Tripoli 2004 he had winning positions, in two cases one-movers, which could have made him a world champion.
This week in Siberia Adams won his first three World Cup matches smoothly. In round four against Norway's wonderboy Magnus Carlsen he lost the first game but was on top in the return. With victory in sight, his nemesis struck again as he fell for a one-move drawing trap. At age 36, this was probably his last realistic attempt at the world crown.
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Carlsen clips Cheparinov
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The Norwegian prodigy Magnus Carlsen looks well set to progress at the Fide World Cup after defeating Veselin Topalov’s trainer Ivan Cheparinov in the first game of their fifth round tie. A chaotic game ended with Carlsen appearing to throw away his winning chances before Cheparinov blundered at the death when in sight of a draw.
This endgame was extremely difficult, I have only scratched the surface in the analysis below but it was clearly a case of Cheparinov being the unlucky player who blundered last.
The World Cup has a prize fund of $1,600,000, $120,000 of which goes to the winner who also earns the right to a world title final eliminator against Veselin Topalov.
Game one Karjakin draw Alexseev; Shirov 1-0 Jakovenko; Ponomariov draw Kamsky; Carlsen 1-0 Cheparinov.
We pick up the Carlsen game after Cheparinov has played 43…Ra5. White is clearly better as he has three active pieces and a strong passed pawn but Black’s pawn on a7 is a long term threat.
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Carlsen lost for words
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The Norwegian prodigy Magnus Carlsen who turned seventeen during the tournament is the only non-Russian speaker to get through to the last eight of the Fide World Cup taking place at Khanty Mansiysk in Siberia. Carlsen eliminated England’s Michael Adams in the fourth round and now plays Ivan Cheparinov
The World Cup has a prize fund of $1,600,000 10% of which goes to the winner who also earns the right to a world title final eliminator against Veselin Topalov.
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Carlsen clings on
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Michael Adams is out of the Fide World Cup after a 1.5-0.5 loss to the seventeen year old Norwegian prodigy Magnus Carlsen. Adams needed to win the second game with the white pieces to stay in the match and although he held the advantage throughout he was unable to break down his opponent’s defences despite holding an extra pawn.
Carlsen, like Adams, played a counter attacking pawn sacrifice with black. He chose a recent idea in the Ruy Lopez that has created a new range of possibilities for Black. Adams was well prepared, consolidated and gradually made progress but short of time, he missed a winning chance and Carlsen clung on for more than forty moves in a position with just queens, bishops and pawns remaining.
Last 16 results: Karjakin draw 1-0 Nisipeanu; Alekseev draw draw Bareev – tie break; Aronian draw draw Jakovenko – tie break; Akopian 0-1 draw Shirov; Ponomariov 1-0 draw Sasikiran; Svidler draw draw Kamsky – tie break ; Carlsen 1-0 draw Adams; Cheparinov draw 1-0 Wang Yue.
The Russian champion Evgeny Alexeev took the lead in his tie breaker.
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Carlsen goes bionic
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Michael Adams faces elimination from the World Championship cycle after defeat at the hands of Magnus Carlsen in the first game of their third round match at the Fide World Cup. Adams seems to have been undone by deep computer-assisted opening preparation at home by the Norwegian prodigy who turned seventeen at the event.
Adams played a well known pawn sacrifice which appears to give Black good compensation but Carlsen managed to consolidate after some strange looking moves which would be unnatural to play for a human player and although Adams fought back to nearly equalise at one point his two knights were gradually forced back.
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All too easily led astray
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The favourite and world number two Vasily Ivanchuk has been eliminated from the World Championship yet again. The Ukrainian fell in the third round of the Fide World Cup to the Romanian Liviu-Dieter Nisipeanu a former European champion.
Perhaps it is not a coincidence, Ivanchuk’s nerves are always frayed in these knockout events and it was Nisipeanu who eliminated him at Las Vegas in 1999.
Michael Adams faces the Norwegian prodigy Magnus Carlsen. The full draw is
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Berlin Wall falls to Adams
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The England number one Michael Adams is through to the last sixteen of the $1,600,000 Fide World Cup being held at Khanty Mansysk in Siberia. Adams overcame Zhou Jianchao of China 1.5-0.5, winning with white and drawing comfortably with black.
Adams’s victory came in the Berlin Wall endgame that seemed un-breachable when it was reintroduced by Vladimir Kramnik against Garry Kasparov in 2000. Adams played patiently and nurtured a slight advantage in a position with rooks and opposite coloured bishops. Zhou’s inferior pawn structure led to the loss of a pawn and Adams made progress very methodically, see below.
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Californian Takes World Title at Children’s Event in Turkey
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Children who play chess almost certainly learn practical skills. Some of the better players compete abroad, visit exotic places, make new friends, maybe become a world champion.
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Leonard Barden. December 1, 2007
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Speed chess, which is the norm if you play on the internet, now also has a higher over-the-board status due to Fide's World Blitz Cup in Moscow last month. Vasily Ivanchuk beat the world champion, Vishy Anand, in the final round to take the title with 25.5/38. In the first game below Anand fell into an opening trap (10...Bd6!) while in the other Black finds his queen trapped.
This weekend it is back to the serious stuff with the World Cup, a 128-player knock-out, under way in Siberia. Nigel Short was eliminated in the first round, while Michael Adams is in action today, live on the internet, in round three. He will need all his pedigree as a former finalist to reach the later stages. The World Cup winner and Bulgaria's Veselin Topalov are scheduled to play a match to decide the next title challenger to Anand or Kramnik.
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Bishops and blunders
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Michael Adams faces Zhou Jianchao in the last thirty two of the Fide World Cup being held at Khanty Mansysk in Siberia. The Chinese GM overcame Alexander Volokitin of Ukraine in the ‘Armageddon Game’, a blitz match in which White has six minutes to Black’s five but has to win.
The prodigy Magnus Carlsen is through after defeating Arkady Naiditsch in both Rapid Chess tie breakers but the former FIDE champion Rustam Kasimdzhanov was eliminated by Kiril Georgiev of Bulgaria also in Armageddon. This match was settled by a blunder – see below.
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Howell's hits and miss
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David Howell narrowly missed out on a medal at the World Youth Championships organised by the Turkish Chess Federation at Antalya. Howell started badly but a spurt of four straight wins in rounds seven to ten brought him into contention.
In the last round Howell faced gold medal winner Ivan Popov of Russia and went all out for the win with the black pieces but at the cost of weakening his own position and he lost in 38 moves.
As expected none of the other English players were in sight of glory but none were disgraced and all made respectable scores around 50%. Yang-Fang Zhou deserves a special mention for his 7/11 score. The full squad was
Matthew Wadsworth (Under 8), Adam Taylor (U10), Daniel Hunt (U12), Yang-Fang Zhou (U14), Ankush Khandelwal (U16), Callum Kilpatrick (U16), David Howell (U18), Anna Wang (U8), Maria Wang (U12), Radha Jain (U12), Abigail Pritchard (U14), Jessica Thilaganathan (U16) and Amisha Parmar (U16).
The squad were supported by GM Tony Kosten, GM Neil McDonald, WGM Jovanka Houska and IM Thomas Rendle.
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Taking the Mickey
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Mickey Adams crushed Mickey Gurevich in the second game of their second round match at the FIDE World Cup taking place in the Siberian city of Khanty Mansiysk Gurevich chose to play a line of the French Defence which is a speciality of the England number one, a risky strategy which led to disaster in the game below.
Adams will play the winner of the match between Ukrainian GM Andrei Volokitin and Zhou, Jianchao of China in the third round. Thirty two players remain in the battle for $1,600,000 in prize money and the right to a world title final eliminator against Veselin Topalov.
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Short shortcircuits
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Nigel Short crashed out of the World Championship at the first hurdle as he lost a speed chess tie breaker to the German David Baramidze at the Fide World Cup taking place in the Siberian city of Khanty Masisyk.
As reported yesterday Michael Adams is safely through to the second round where he will play Mikhail Gurevich, an ex Russian now playing for Turkey and a very tough customer. The top seed Vasily Ivanchuk will play Mateusz Bartel of Poland.
One hundred and twenty eight players are competing for $1,600,000 in prize money and the right to a world title final eliminator against Veselin Topalov. There were few surprises in round one. In one or two cases the stronger player lost game one but won the return and the tie breaker.
Michael Adams was one of the few players who managed to beat Vasily Ivanchuk the winner of the World Blitz Championship. This was an excellent game.
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Short shows nerves
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Michael Adams is safely through to the second round of the World Cup but Nigel Short must play a speed chess tie-breaker as the first round was characterised by nervous play, typical for a knockout tournament with matches over two games. Adams was worse with the white pieces against the Canadian Igor Zugic but managed to escape with a draw before winning with black.
Short, who had major problems getting a Russian visa, drew twice with David Baramidze of Germany. One hundred and twentyeight players are competing for $1.6 million. The winner will receive $120,000 and has the right to a world title final eliminator against Veselin Topalov.
Another miniature from the World Blitz Championship, where games were played with five minutes on the clock and a two-second increment per move. The switchback Be2-h5-f3 is a manoeuvre easily overlooked and ends the game abruptly. White’s pawn sacrifice certainly yielded a good attack.
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Another cunning plan
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One-hundred-and-twenty-eight players are assembled at Khanty Masiysk in Siberia for the Fide World Cup. England’s Michael Adams and Nigel Short are in the field, composed of players who qualified in regional events such as the European and Pan American Championships, or by rating.
The event was planned as a knockout tournament to determine a challenger for the world title held by Vishy Anand. However, following the “Toiletgate” shenanigans at last year’s title contest between Vladimir Kramnik and Veselin Topalov, which Topalov lost, his manager contrived to convince the Fide top brass that his man should be in the next cycle.
The current plan – and it changes constantly – is that the winner of the World Cup will play Topalov. The winner of that match will then presumably play the winner of next year’s match, still to be confirmed, between Vishy Anand and Kramnik, who reportedly still regards himself as champion until he loses in a match as opposed to a tournament. Kramnik’s reign ended last month, when he was second to Anand at the World Championship tournament in Mexico City.
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Gender Gap Might Be Wide, but Women Have Their Days
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A possible reason women lag behind men is that not enough women play competitive chess, so the talent pool is not as deep. But there is no obvious reason why.
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Garry Kasparov jailed after opposition rally
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The former chess champion Garry Kasparov was sentenced to five days in jail yesterday after taking part in an anti-Kremlin protest rally in Moscow.
Mr Kasparov, the leader of the opposition Other Russia coalition, was charged with organising an unsanctioned protest "of at least 1,500 people directed against President Vladimir Putin", chanting anti-government slogans and resisting arrest.
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A gruesome knight fork
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Vasily Ivanchuk the world number two won the 2007 World Blitz Championship after a dramatic last round victory over world champion and number one ranked Vishy Anand at Moscow. Going into the 38th and final round the pair were joint leaders on 24.5 points and in a crowd-pleasing coincidence met in the final game that saw the Indian reach a winning position but miss his chance and lose shortly thereafter to a gruesome knight fork.
Many of the participants including Michael Adams now move on to the Siberian city of Khanty Mansiysk for the World Cup knockout tournament which is the first stage of the next World Championship cycle.
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Smoothing wrinkles
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Peter Wells was back in form at the British Rapidplay held at Halifax over the weekend. The England team captain won with a convincing 9.5/11. Mark Hebden was second with 9/11 and Stewart Haslinger third with 8.5/11. Wells secured tournament victory with a crushing victory in one of his favourite lines in the game given below.
Since Wells has been one of the world’s leading experts in the Rb1 Gruenfeld for many years Black’s opening choice can hardly be called inspired. Indeed 12.Ng5 was an interesting and relatively new wrinkle. Black should have played h6 at some point to remove the annoying knight. After f5! Black suddenly realised that Qh3 was coming and was forced into retracting his previous move but of course by then his position was hopeless.
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Is China the One to Beat Now? Don't Tell This Russian Team
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The former Soviet Union and then Russia used to dominate team events, but in recent years the Russians have struggled. They’re back.
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