New look of AICF website

It has been proposed to make certain changes in the format of the AICF official website http://www.indianchessfed.org to make it more user-friendly. One of the features would be to enable players to download their e-id cards directly thereby eliminating avoidable postal delays. The State Associations / Tournament organizers would be provided with passwords to upload registration forms of all participants. But id cards would, however, be displayed in the website only on receipt of money from the State Association / Tournament organizers. Any problem encountered during the process of implementation of e-id card may be brought to the notice of AICF for speedy rectification

Tseshkovsky wins Agzamov Memorial

In the same week when Korchnoi turned 78 and Smyslov 88, another famous veteran had a notable success: 64-year-old GM Vitaly Tseshkovsky from Russia won the strong Georgy Azgamov Memorial in Tashkent, ahead of GMs like Kasimdzhanov, Amonatov and Volkov.

The 3rd Georgy Azgamov Memorial took place 15-26 March in Tashkent, the capital of Uzbekistan. The strongest player from Uzbekistan is of course former FIDE World Champion Rustam Kasimdzhanov, but anoter well-known player is their number two, Anton Filippov. Both played in the Azgamov Memorial but it was Vitaly Tseshkovsky who finished clear first with 7.5/9.

Tseshkovsky won the 1986 USSR Championship finishing clear first, after he had won it shared with Mikhail Tal in 1978. In 2004 he managed to qualify for the Russian Championship Super final which was eventuall won by Garry Kasparov.

[ Chess Vibes ]

ALERT

All players / coaches / parents and others connected with All India Chess Federation are hereby warned to be cautious of spurious emails received from indianchessfederation@rediffmail.com being sent in the name of All India Chess Federation and office bearers.

This email id does not belong to the All India Chess Federation. Please do not answer or entertain any mail from this email id. All India Chess Federation will not be responsible if you encounter any problem from the above e-mails.

Some of our players have received mails asking for passports and other family details. Hence this caution to all of you.

Aronian, Carlsen Join Anand

Levon Aronian of Armenia who won the world Junior at Goa many years back and teenaged prodigy Magnus Carlsen of Norway joined world champion Viswanathan Anand at the top in the Amber Chess tournament on March 24.

After nine completed rounds, Anand, Aronian and Carlsen have 11.5 points from possible 18 points. Two rounds or four games remain to be played in this Euro 216,000 prize money tournement.

Anand played two draws, one with the black pieces in the blindfold and another with white pieces in a Ruy Lopez rapid game against World No.1 ranked Veselin Topalov. The event is heading for a photo finish.

Combined standings (after round nine): 1-3. Anand (Ind), Aronian (Arm), Carlsen (Nor) 11½ each; 4. Kramnik (Rus) 10, 5. Leko (Hun) 9½; 6-7. Kamsky (USA), Topalov (Bul) 8½ each; 8-9. Ivanchuk (Ukr), Morozevich (Rus) 8 each; 10. Radjabov (Aze) 7½; 11. Karjakin (Ukr) 7; 12. Wang Yue (Chn) 6½.

Chief Arbiter and Deputy Arbiters for National Chess Championships - 2009

S.N	Name of the Event	Alloted to / to be held at	Dates	Chief Arbiter	Deputy Arbiters
1.	National Rapid & Blitz	AP	June 02 - 05	Mr.V.Hariharan	Mr.K.V.Sharma
2.	National Under-9 B&G	TN	June 15 - 23	Mr.B.P.Sharma	Mr.R.R.Vasudevan and Mr.Srivatsan
3.	National Under-11B&G	Karnataka	July 11 - 20	Mr.M.D.Bhagwat	Mr.Manjunath and Mr.Vasanth
4.	National "B"	Kolkata	Aug 03 -15	Mr.K.R.Seshadri	Mr. R.B.Sengupta, Mr.R.S.Bhattacharya and Mr.A.B.Choudhry
5.	National Sub Jr. B & G	Maharashtra	Aug 17 - 26	Mr.Udayan Kanthi Gosh	Mr.P.B.Bhilare and Mr.Vital Mahav
6.	National Women "B"	Nagpur	Sep 05 -13	Mr.R.C.Charterjee	Mr.R.Shidore and Mr.Shinvi Nitin
7.	National Jr. B & G	Kerala	Sep 19 -28	Mr.Debasish Barua	Mr.M.Ephrame and Mr.V.Vijayaraghavan
8.	National Under-17B&G	Jharkand	Oct 07 -13	Mr.Paul Arokyaraj	Mr.Kumar Bhuyan Jayant
9.	National "A"	Maharashtra	Dec 01 - 14	Prof.Anantharam	Mr.Praful Zaveri
10.	National Women "A"	Kolkata	Dec 01 - 14	Mr.K.Muralimohan	Mr.Debiprasad Battacharjee
11.	National Under -7B&G	Ahmedabad	Dec 16 - 23	Mr.V.Ravichandran	Mr.P.N.Rangarajan and Mr.Venugopal
12.	National Under-13B&G	New Delhi	Dec 21 - 29	Mr.Pranesh Yadav	Mr.Gopakumar
13.	National Veteran		Dec 25 -31	Mr.Bahadure	Dr.Tandel
14.	National Under - 25 Open	Rajasthan		Mr.Dharmendra Kumar	Mr.Mohd.Mehmood
15.	National Team	Kerala		Dr.Vipnesh Bharadwaj	Mr.N.K.Nandakumar and Mr.Soundramoorthy
16.	National Schools	Ahmedabad		Mr.I.G.Parmar	Mr.Vimalkumar Srivatsava

Review: The Black Swan in Chess

This is not a review of an actual chess book that was recently published. However, the article was inspired by a book, and I really wish someone would write this book with a view to chess. I’m talking about The Black Swan by Nassim Nicholas Taleb, which is about ’the impact of the highly improbable’.

As Taleb explains in the prologue, before Australia was discovered, everybody in the Old World thought all swans were white. The sighting of the first black swan was against all common sense and contradicted all available empirical evidence.

The Black Swan has been called ‘an angry book’. Taleb is angry (but in my opinion in a very humoristic way) because time and again, people fail to take into account highly improbable, often extreme events - events which nevertheless can have huge impacts. We somehow keep focusing on the predictable, whether it’s in finance, business, history or politics. In the book, Taleb displays a particular disgust for certain mathematical models used by statisticians, business forecasters and politicians who try to project them onto in ‘the real world’, i.e. the world of people, rather than simple physics. The much-used normal distribution or bell curve, for instance, is called ’that great intellectual fraud’ by Taleb. He argues that it’s simply not a valid model in the real world. You just can’t predict people’s actions with mathematics.

In chess, too, highly improbably events occur, of course. We even have our own statistical model to predict results in the chess world - the rating system invented by Dr. Arpad Elo. The FIDE rating system, too, is based on the normal distribution. (Although the USCF uses the supposedly more accurate logistic distribution.) In FIDE rating terms, an unexpected event - in other words, a black swan - might be defined as a win of a player rated 400 points below his opponent.

ent.

Anand Beats Kramnik For Sole Lead

Mid-way through round eight, Anand leads the Amber Chess Tournament after inflicting a defeat on Kramnik in the blindfold encounter. Anand leads the 12-player blindfold and rapid chess tournament with 10/15. There are seven games or three and a half rounds still to be played. Behind Anand on 9.5 points is Levon Aronian on 9.5 and Kramnik is on 9.

Kramnik blundered on move 27 when he missed a checkmating sequence which Anand had planned. Anand had a passed pawn in the middle of the board to trouble Kramnik. In the reverse game, Kramnik will play white in the rapid chess game.

Overall, Anand is playing at 2875, clearly at a new level in the strongest edition of the Amber Tournament. In the opening round, Anand scored 1-1 with Leko trading wins, then in the second he made 1.5-0.5 against his former rival Kamsky. After suffering a 0.5-1.5 defeat to teenaged Carlsen, Anand drew both games against Aronian for a 1-1 result. Then on, he is on a winning path, beating Ivanchuk 1.5-0.5, 2-0 sweep against Radjabov and 1.5-0.5 win against Krajakin. The 1-0 lead against Kramnik places Anand ahead of the 12-player pack.

Viswanathan Anand-Vladimir Kramnik, Round Eight, Petroff's Defence C43: 1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nf6 3. d4 Nxe4 4. Bd3 d5 5. Nxe5 Nd7 6. Nxd7 Bxd7 7. O-O Bd6 8.c4 c6 9. cxd5 cxd5 10. Nc3 Nxc3 11. bxc3 O-O 12. Qh5 g6 13. Qxd5 Qc7 14. Bh6 Rfd8 15. h4 Be6 16. Qg5 Qxc3 17. Rfd1 Bf8 18. Bxf8 Rd5 19. Qf6 Rxf8 20. Be4 Rh5 21. Rac1 Qa5 22. f3 Rb5 23. a4 Rb6 24. d5 Bf5 25. d6 Bxe4 26. fxe4 Qxa4 27. h5 Qxe4 28. Qe7 Qb4 29. h6 Rc6 30. Qf6 1-0.

Humpy Koneru Wins İstanbul Grand Prix

In the last round of İstanbul Women Grand Prix, Humpy Koneru won against Marie Sebag while Hou Yifan faltered against Shen Yang. Elina Danielian scored an important victory and outplayed Xue Zhao to take the second spot. Martha Fierro won against Maia Chiburdanidze while Pia Cramling closed the tournament with a win against Antoaneta Stefanova. Zeinab Mamedyarova and Betül Cemre Yıldız drew.

The leader changed for the third time and Humpy Koneru won İş Bank Atatürk FIDE Women Grand Prix with 8.5 out of 11. Elina Danielian took the second place with better tie-break having 8 points while Hou Yifan took the third place.

Detailed last round report below.

The crucial game of the round and actually the decisive game of the tournament was Marie Sebag-Humpy Koneru won by the Indian grandmaster. Black's choice was the less popular option of 9...a5 against the closed Ruy Lopez, which has some drawbacks but also have its own subtleties. Black equalized rather comfortably after the opening. White seemed to have better pawn formation and play on king side while black chose to seek her chances on the kingside. White eased black's intentions by playing Nd5 and black immediately exploitated the grave mistake and won swiftly.


White took over the initiative and utilized tactics from early on in Elina Danielian-Xue Zhao and the Armenian international master won rather easily against the Chinese player who has been one of the top performers until the last two rounds. The game was also crucial in terms of determining the top spots and Danielian took the second place by having better tie break against Hou Yifan. She also scored her second GM norm with a performance of 2658-norm performance-.



In Shen Yang-Hou Yifan, black chose a dynamic variation of Nimzo Indian which is occasionally played at top level intending to win and ensure the shared first place. However, white had somewhat better chances in the endgame which were eventually neutralized by the younger Chinese player and the game ended as a draw, which was only enough for Hou Yifan to share the second place but third because of having worse tie break.


Martha Fierro won against Maia Chiburdanidze with black pieces in Benko Gambit where black equalized after the opening. White's intention of exchanging queens with Ne4 allowed black to enter a much favorable endgame and the Ecuadorian IM converted and finished the first edition of GP with a win.



Zeinab Mamedyarova employed Colle System against Betül Cemre Yıldız and achieved a better position after the opening. White managed to win a pawn and close to win but with an open position on board and both sides having a queen and a rook meant the first side to create threats would take over. Black managed to create tactical problems for white which are particularly difficult to cope in time trouble and able to save the game.



The latest finishing game of the round was between Antoaneta Stefanova and Pia Cramling. The game was a very sharp and exciting one where black sacrificed an exchange sacrifice at move 22. Another remarkable feature of the game was that neither side castled but white king became much less safer and black collected some pawns against the exchange, therefore these two factors were enough for black to win.

Kramnik In Sole Lead

World champion Viswanathan Anand played two draws with Levon Aronian of Armenia in the fourth round of the Amber Chess Tournament at Nice on March 17.

Former world champion Vladimir Kramnik of Russia is leading the table with 5.5/8. Kramnik is also leading the blindfold with a big 3.5/4 score.

In the blindfold game, Anand played the ending well to draw after losing a pawn in the middlegame in a Ruy Lopez. The rapid game also saw them play a rook ending and draw with Aronian unable to do much with an outside passed pawn.

Anand is on four points from eight games and in joint seventh place. It is a 12-player double all-play-all. They face each other first in a blindfold game and then in a rapid chess game. The prize money is Euro 216,000.

Aronian and Morozevich are in second-third place with five points. With the strength at Elo 2759, a low scoring first place score should be expected. The winning score should be around 12-13 points and not more from the 22 games.

Humpy Rebounds With A Victory

Top seed Koneru Humpy rebounded to defeat Zeinab Mamedyarova of Azerbaijan in the eighth round of the FIDE World Grand Prix Tournament in progress at Istanbul on March 15.

With the queen of Bled Olympiad 2002, Zhao Xue defeating her young Chinese opponent Hou Yifan, the two Chinese have exchanged places in the lead with three rounds still to be played.

Zhao Xue leads with seven points and Hou Yifan follows with 6.5 points. Humpy is in third place with six points. In the last three games, Humpy has to play Zhao Xue, Marie Sebag and Stefanova.

The results (round eight): Hou Yifan (Chn) 6.5 lost to Zhao Xue (Chn) 7, Koneru Humpy (Ind) 6 bt Z. Mamedyarova (Aze) 1.5, A. Stefanova (Bul) 4 drew with M. Chiburdanidze (Geo) 4, M. Fierro (Ecu) 3.5 lost to Marie Sebag (Fra) 4.5, P. Cramling (Swe) 3 bt Shen Yang (Chn) 2, B. Yildiz (Tur) 0.5 lost to E. Danielian (Arm) 5.5.

Humpy In Second Place

Top seed Koneru Humpy of Vijayawada registered a fine round five win over Martha Fierro of Ecuador to reach four points in the FIDE Women's Grand Prix at Istanbul.

Humpy is in second place, half a point behind Hou Yifan of China who is leading with 4.5 points. Humpy and Hou are yet to face each other. It is a 12-player all-play-all. Six rounds remains to be played.

In round five, Humpy played the black pieces. In a Ruy Lopez, closed variation, she wrested the initiative and won a queen and rook ending by chasing the white king around the board.

The results (round five): Hou Yifan (Chn) 4.5 bt B.Yildiz (Tur) 0.5, Zhao Xue (Chn) 4 bt P. Cramling (Swe) 1, Martha Fierro (Ecu) 3.5 lost to Koneru Humpy (Ind) 4, E. Danielian (Arm) 3 drew with Z. Mamedyarova (Aze) 0.5, Marie Sebag (Fra) 2 lost to Antoaneta Stefanova (Bul) 3, Shen Yang (Chn) 1.5 lost to Maya Chiburdanidze (Geo) 2.5.

The European Women Ch and the Women Grand Prix after five rounds

To the astonishment of ECU President Boris Kutin and everybody else (well, perhaps except for our distinguished FIDE President) two highly important women events are taking place at the same time: the European Championship in St. Petersburg and the first Grand Prix in Istanbul. A brief update on these two tournaments.

The 10th European Individual Women’s Chess Championship takes place 7-19 March in St. Petersburg, Russia. The rules are similar to the men’s tournament: it’s an 11-round Swiss with over 150 players from which the 14 best will qualify for the next Women World Championship. Top participants are Anna Muzychuk, Nana Dzagnidze, Ketevan Arakhamia-Grant, Anna Ushenina, Natalia Zhukova, Kateryna Lahno and the Kosintseva sisters.

After five rounds, Hungarian (Vietnamese-born) GM Hoang Thanh Trang is leading the field together with IM Lili Mkrtchian, GM Monika Socko and IM Salome Melia who are all on 4.5/5. In the 6th round it’s Melian-Hoang and Mkrtchian-Socko.

European Women Championship | Round 5 Standings (top 25)

Rank	Name	Score	Fed.	Rating	TPR	W-We
1	GM Hoang Thanh Trang	4.5	HUN	2483	2709	+1.08
2	IM Mkrtchian, Lilit	4.5	ARM	2460	2694	+1.14
3	GM Socko, Monika	4.5	POL	2449	2728	+1.44
4	IM Melia, Salome	4.5	GEO	2422	2688	+1.34
5	IM Arakhamia-Grant, Ketevan	4.0	SCO	2500	2559	+0.33
6	GM Lahno, Kateryna	4.0	UKR	2488	2591	+0.60
7	WGM Pogonina, Natalija	4.0	RUS	2467	2518	+0.30
8	IM Kovalevskaya, Ekaterina	4.0	RUS	2442	2565	+0.73
9	IM Ovod, Evgenija	4.0	RUS	2430	2554	+0.74
10	IM Khurtsidze, Nino	4.0	GEO	2421	2555	+0.81
11	IM Foisor, Cristina-Adela	4.0	ROU	2412	2548	+0.87
12	IM Rajlich, Iweta	4.0	POL	2399	2515	+0.68
13	WGM Kovanova, Baira	4.0	RUS	2386	2508	+0.78
14	WGM Zawadzka, Jolanta	4.0	POL	2385	2555	+1.04
15	WGM Demina, Julia	4.0	RUS	2361	2448	+0.57
16	GM Dzagnidze, Nana	3.5	GEO	2518	2510	-0.02
17	IM Ushenina, Anna	3.5	UKR	2499	2480	-0.09
18	IM Kosintseva, Tatiana	3.5	RUS	2497	2417	-0.44
19	IM Paehtz, Elisabeth	3.5	GER	2455	2434	-0.11
20	WGM Romanko, Marina	3.5	RUS	2451	2466	+0.12
21	IM Lomineishvili, Maia	3.5	GEO	2437	2456	+0.14
22	IM Khukhashvili, Sopiko	3.5	GEO	2416	2470	+0.37
23	WGM Shadrina, Tatiana	3.5	RUS	2416	2478	+0.46
24	WFM Bodnaruk, Anastasia	3.5	RUS	2384	2444	+0.40
25	WGM Stepovaia, Tatiana	3.5	RUS	2379	2388	+0.06

(Full standings here.)

Hou Yifan leads after 5 rounds

As reported earlier, there’s a clash with the 1st FIDE Women Grand Prix which takes place 5-20 March in Istanbul, Turkey. The participants there are Humpy Koneru, Hou Yifan, Antoaneta Stefanova, Pia Cramling, Marie Sebag, Maia Chiburdanidze, Zhao Xue, Martha Fierro, Elina Danielian, Shen Yang, Zeinab Mamedjarova and Betül Cemre Yildiz, and everyone who can count quickly already knows that this event also runs 11 rounds.


The total prize fund is € 60,000; the winner earns € 6,500. Compare that to the winner of a men’s Grand Prix: he wins € 30,000. This event has also reached the 5th round and 15-year-old Chinese GM Hou Yifan is in sole lead; she’s on 4.5 out of 5 ahead of Koneru and Zhao Xue who have half a point less.

FIDE Women Grand Prix, Istanbul | Round 5 Standings

				1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	0	1	2
1	Hou Yifan	2571	+250	*				1		½			1	1	1	4.5/5
2	Koneru,H	2621	+41		*		1		1			½	1	½		4.0/5	8.50
3	Zhao Xue	2508	+219			*		½		½		1	1		1	4.0/5	5.75
4	Fierro Baquero,M	2403	+204		0		*	½					1	1	1	3.5/5
5	Stefanova,A	2557	-41	0		½	½	*			1			1		3.0/5	6.25
6	Danielian,E	2496	+69		0				*	1	1	½			½	3.0/5	5.50
7	Chiburdanidze,M	2516	-5	½		½			0	*	½	1				2.5/5
8	Sebag,M	2529	-123					0	0	½	*	½			1	2.0/5
9	Shen Yang	2448	-61		½	0			½	0	½	*				1.5/5
10	Cramling,P	2548	-325	0	0	0	0						*	1		1.0/5
11	Yildiz,B	2214	-55	0	½		0	0					0	*		0.5/5	2.00
12	Mamedjarova,Z	2362	-242	0		0	0		½		0				*	0.5/5	1.50

Links:

• Official website European Women Ch
• Games European Ch in PGN
• Official website Grand Prix Istanbul
• Games Grand Prix Istanbul in PGN

[ Report by : Chess Vibes ]

Results from the FIDE Presidential Board meeting in Istanbul

PRESS RELEASE

The FIDE Presidential Board (PB) meeting with an agenda of 80 items was held on March 5-8th in Istanbul, Turkey, concurrent with the first Women Grand Prix event organized by TCF.

FIDE President advised that he has visited ten countries in the last three months and was delighted that chess was now in the school curriculum in Moldova dn Armenia and that chess among women has growing popularity. He was very please that Women’s World Champion Alexandra Kosteniuk participated in the PB meeting. In his report, he also stressed the importance of strengthening the relationship with IOC and the NOCs.

The PB approved the new structure for FIDE Commissions and Committees the details of which will be announced on the FIDE website. The PB agreed on a commission to be set up to consider the zonal structure of FIDE. The PB approved changes in the Laws of Chess including that the default time would be zero unless otherwise specified in the regulations of the tournament. The PB finalized Title and Rating regulations and dealt with other matters left from the Dresden meetings. It agreed to postpone the World Championship match between World Champion GM Anand and Challenger GM Topalov until the latest April 20th, 2010 and asked for bids for the match. The PB corrected the mistake done by the organizer of the World Senior Championship and announced GM Kaufmann and GM Suba as co-winners. The PB decided upon a commemoration schedule of the former world champions starting with W. Steinitz in 2009.

The PB acknowledged and accepted the bid from UEP for the world chess championship cycle 2010-2011. In 2011, there will be a Candidate Matches/Tournament consisting of GM Kamsky, the loser of the Anand-Topalov match, two players from the Grand Prix series and one player from the World Cup, two highest rated players not already qualified and a player nominated by the organizer. The winner will play the World Champion in 2011.

The PB discussed several future events and decided upon the bid dates which will be published on the FIDE website. The FIDE President thanked the Turkish Chess Federation and its President Mr. Yazici for the excellent organization of the event.

Peter Rajcsanyi
FIDE Public Relations and Marketing Director

Humpy Among Four Leaders

Top seed Koneru Humpy of Vijayawada won the first two games in a row and then took a marathon draw in a rook and knight versus rook ending against B. Yildiz in the FIDE Grand Prix in progress at Istanbul on March 9.

In the 12-player all-play-all, Humpy who will be celebrating her birthday in the last day of this month leads the table along with Zhao Xue, Hou Yifan (both China) and Marta Fierro of Ecuador.

All four players have 2.5 points from three rounds. Eight rounds remain to be played. This event runs from March 7-19.

In the opening round, Humpy opened the king side of Pia Cramling (Swe) to engage the white king and win a rook for knight. In the second game, she crushed Danielian of Armenia by winning a piece and escaping a double attack.

AICF Calendar - 2009

AICF Calendar - 2009

S.No.	Name of the Event	Allotted to / to be held at	Dates
1.	Exposure Trip - Senior Men & Women	Australia and Paris	April 09 -19 and July 04 -12, 2009
2.	Asian Continental	Phillippines	May 12 - 23, 2009
3.	Asian Junior	Srilanka	May 20 - 28, 2009
4.	National Under - 9 B & G	Tamilnadu	June 15 -23, 2009
5.	Exposure Trip Sub Junior B & G	Spain	June 24 - 22 July,2009
6.	Exposure Trip Junior B & G	Netherlands	July 10 - 08 Aug, 2009
7.	National Under - 11 B & G	Karnataka	July 11 - 20, 2009
8.	National "B"	Kolkata	August
9.	National Women "B"	Nagpur	Sep 05 -13, 2009
10.	National Jr. B & G	Kerala	Sep 19 -28, 2009
11.	National Under - 17 B & G	Jharkhand	Oct 07 -13, 2009
12.	World Junior	Argentina	Oct 16 - 29, 2009
13.	Asian Indoor	Vietnam	Oct 30 - 08 Nov, 2009
14.	World youth	Turkey	Nov 11 -23, 2009
15.	National "A"	Maharashtra	Dec 01 -14, 2009
16.	National Women "A"	Kolkata	Dec 01 -14, 2009
17.	National Under - 7 B & G	Ahmedabad	Dec 16 - 23, 2009
18.	National Under - 13 B & G	New Delhi	Dec 21 - 29, 2009
19.	National Veteran		Dec 25 - 31, 2009
20.	National Sub Jr. B & G	Maharashtra
21.	National Under - 25 Open	Rajasthan
22.	National Team	Kerala
23.	National Schools	Ahmedabad

Yuri Vovk wins 25th Cappelle la Grande

Karjakin and Ivanchuk did well at Corus and Linares respectively, but another Ukrainian was successful in one of the biggest Swisses of the year. Yuri Vovk won the 25th Cappelle la Grande International Chess Open finishing clear first with 7.5/9.

The 25th Open of the French town of Cappelle la Grande took place February 28th - March 7th. The tournament always has all participants in one huge Swiss group and this year the number was 611 players!

Below you’ll find all games of the winner. In the third round Vovk escaped against Graf, who blundered with 32.Rxa5?? missing a check later on, but for winning such a big tournament you always need a bit of luck too. The round 4 game against Zinchenko is recommended for replay as well - a nice attacking game.

In Linares, Vovk’s compatriot Ivanchuk apparently worked without his second Manuel Leon Hoyos; the young Mexican grandmaster played in Cappelle and was Vovk’s opponent in round 7. A crucial game for Vovk’s tournament, in which he won a nice rook ending using the theme of activity to the max. With 6.5 out of 7, two draws in the last two rounds were enough to finish on clear first.

click here for replay games>>>

Grischuk wins Linares 2009 on tiebreak

Especially after such a wonderful penultimate round it was a bit of an anticlimax: all games in round 14 of Linares ended in a draw, and so Grischuk and Ivanchuk finished shared first. The Ukrainian had a better tiebreak and left the tournament undefeatd, but Grischuk was declared winner due to having more wins.

From February 18 till March 8 the 26th Torneo Internacional de Ajedrez Ciudad de Linares took place. There was no appearance fee for the players this time; the prize fund was € 314,000. Grischuk and Ivanchuk shared the first and second prizes of € 100,000 + € 75,000 / 2 = € 87,500. Carlsen earned € 50,000.

Round 14
There’s not much to say about the last round. All eight players played quite cautiously and this resulted in four games with lots of manoeuvering, but nothing spectacular came on the boards. Both leaders Grischuk and Ivanchuk came under pressure with the black pieces, but both held their own.

And so Grischuk, who had been in the lead for more than half of the tournament, was declared winner on the number of wins (three, against two for Ivanchuk), since the first tiebreak rule (head-to-head) didn’t work, with two draws between the two. After the game Grischuk said that he considered his game with White against Ivanchuk his best effort, despite the fact that it ended in a draw.

After a bad tournament in Wijk aan Zee, where he had other things to worry about (the drug test story), Vassily Ivanchuk showed his form of 2008 again, and didn’t lose a single game (two wins and twelve draws - a 2802 perfomance). His comment on that: “I was lucky.” Grischuk scored the highest performance: 2808. Carlsen, who finished clear third with a plus one score, was brilliant in a few games, but also had problems with his concentration in others, which kept him from playing for first place (”that’s why I didn’t win the tournament this year”, he said himself).

World champion Anand started with a beautiful win against Radjabov, but after that he couldn’t continue on the same level. He scored 50% which was a performance 40 points below his rating. Wang Yue and Dominguez scored almost exactly their expected results, while Aronian and Radjabov disappointed slightly, finishing on minus one.

And so the first three participants of the Bilbao Grand Slam Final, which will be held later this year, are known: Veselin Topalov (Nanjing), Sergey Karjakin (Wijk aan Zee) and Alexander Grischuk (Linares).

After Corus, Topalov-Kamsky and Linares, a busy period full of top-level chess has come to an end. But already in one week the world’s best players meet again, at their traditional gig in March: the Amber tournament. With Anand, Aronian, Carlsen, Ivanchuk, Kamsky, Karjakin, Kramnik, Leko, Morozevich, Radjabov, Topalov and Wang Yue it will be the strongest edition ever. More info here.

[ Report by : Chess Vibes ]

Linares R13: Ivanchuk joins Grischuk in the lead

In arguably the most spectacular round of Linares so far, Ivanchuk defeated Aronian to join Grischuk in the top of the standings. Carlsen missed a win against Radjabov and is in third place, half a point behind the leaders. Saturday is the last round.

From February 18 till March 8 the 26th Torneo Internacional de Ajedrez Ciudad de Linares takes place. There is no appearance fee for the players this time; the prize fund is € 314,000. The winner takes € 100,000, the second place is € 75,000 and the third player earns € 50,000.

Round 13
An amazing round with four great fights, that’s what Linares had to offer today. The funny thing is that in a way, the only decisive game of the day was also the least interesting. Aronian had an off-day and blundered a full pawn already at move 19, just after Ivanchuk had repeated moves. The 39-year-old Ukrainian, who will turn 40 during the Amber tournament later this month, made no mistakes, though there was a quicker win with the tactical shot 25.Nf5! that wins big material instantly.

Grischuk-Anand followed the main line of the Najdorf Poisened Pawn, and so the game was destined to end in a quick draw, not interesting at all, except for people who don’t know games like Vallejo-Kasparov and Topalov-Gelfand and see it all for the first time. But…

But suddenly Anand started thinking in a position that was still theory. He spent about 17 minutes for 20…f5 and another 21 for 21…Kh8, which was a new, and very risky move. Especially when Black seems to be (theoretically) fine after 21…Rf7. Rybka suggests 26.Rg3 as a (perhaps winning) improvement for Grischuk. Anand offered a draw as soon as the position had become more or less balanced, perhaps still shaking a little about the tense moments that were behind him!

Against Dominguez’ Grünfeld, Wang Yue tried the 4.Bg5 line and seemed to be getting a big advantage right out of the opening, but as so often it was easy to overestimate the power of White’s d-pawn. A cunning defence by the Cuban kept everything together - OK, Black had to give an exchange but with such a queenside majority that’s not a problem of course.

The round saw another tragedy for Carlsen, who had played a great game against Radjabov, but then blew a totally winning ending, falling for the last trick Black had in the position. He could (should?) have joined Ivanchuk and Grischuk in the lead, but instead he’s on half a point behind them, going into the last round.

15.h4!? was a very interesting pawn sacrifice: for the material, Black had to bury his knight on h8 and his queen and rook were a long way from home. White built up the pressure and eventually emerged an exchange up, but Black had two connected passed pawns on the queenside.

After the time control it turnd out that White was still winning because he could use a mating threat to activate his rook. Playing quickly, confident that he was winning, Carlsen had Radjabov on the ropes, until 47.Kf3?? which allowed the study-like 47…Nb5! after which it was suddely a draw. A huge disappointment for the 18-year-old Norwegian, who has been giving away so many winning or drawn positions already in 2009.

The last round has Radjabov-Wang Yue, Dominguez-Ivanchuk, Aronian-Grischuk and Anand-Carlsen, so all contenders playing with the black pieces. If we had to, we’d put our money on Ivanchuk (who also won the event in 1989, 1991 and 1995!).

click here to replay games

Koneru Humpy in Women Grand Prix series 2009/2010

The Turkish Chess Federation in collaboration with FIDE and Global Chess is organizing the first event for the new Women Grand Prix series 2009/2010. The tournament will be held in Istanbul, Turkey beginning on the 6^th of March 2009. The event will be held in İş Sanat

Gallery (İş Bankası Art Gallery) on the entrance floor of İş Bank Towers in Istanbul. Opening Ceremony will be held on the 41^st floor of İş Bank Towers which is the highest

place of Istanbul. The FIDE Women Grand Prix is a new series of elite tournaments which will be organized by FIDE and Global Chess. There will be 6 legs over two years in various countries around the world with three tournaments every year. The next tournament is planned in Nanjing, China at the end of September. This is the first time that such a series is being organized and is a significant development for the chess world. The introduction of the Grand Prix series means that there will be a World Championship contest annually now from 2010. In that year, the Champion will be determined from the World Championship Knockout which will also be held in Turkey and the following year, 2011, the World Champions will face the Winner of the Grand Prix series 2009/2010 in a match for the title.

This will be one of the strongest women tournaments of all times and it is important to point out that there are three ex-world Champions taking part as well as the highest ranked women players in the world.

The 12 players and the final list of Istanbul participants is

FIDE ID	NAME	TITLE	CTRY	RATING
5008123	Koneru, Humpy	GM	IND	2621
8602980	Yifan, Hou	GM	CHN	2571
2902257	Stefanova, Antoaneta	GM	BUL	2557
1700030	Cramling, Pia	GM	SWE	2548
617822	Sebag Marie	GM	FRA	2529
13600036	Chiburdanidze, Maia	GM	GEO	2516
8601283	Xue, Zhao	GM	CHN	2508
8600546	Chen, Zhu	GM	QTR	2496
13300210	Danielian, Elina	IM	ARM	2496
8603162	Yang, Shen	WGM	CHN	2448
13401521	Mamedjarova, Zeinab	WGM	AZE	2362
6302920	Yıldız, Betül Cemre	WIM	TUR	2214
		Average		2488.8

Topalov with trophy - Chess.FM video interview with Anand’s challenger

After the awards ceremony of the Challenger’s Match in Sofia, winner Veselin Topalov talked to Chess.FM’s Macauley Peterson, before leaving the National Palace of Culture for the last time. In a video interview, Topalov speaks about the match against Kamsky but he als looks ahead to a match with World Champion Anand, the details of which remain to be worked out.

Veselin Topalov did not disappoint his fans and his country over the past two weeks as he emerged with the match win over Gata Kamsky, in Sofia.

It was not the smoothest performance, but Topalov applied pressure to Kamsky at key moments and exploited his opportunities when they came.

Topalov is now looking ahead to a match with World Champion Anand, the details of which remain to be worked out. Topalov was is critical of the planned FIDE candidates tournament for the next world championship cycle, and hopes that FIDE will focus instead on the organization of his own challenge to Anand.

Responding to critics of his inclusion in the current cycle at all, Topalov said he realizes that he was, in effect, given a “privilege,” but, echoing a view expressed by FIDE Deputy President Georgios Makropoulos at the closing ceremony, he regards it as “compensation” for FIDE’s changes to the World Championship following the match with Kramnik in 2006. He stated categorically that he expects no more such privileges.

After the awards ceremony, Topalov talked to Chess.FM’s Macauley Peterson, before leaving the National Palace of Culture for the last time.

Linares R10: favorites falter

Favorites Aronian and Carlsen are having a very unpredictable and unstable Linares tournament so far, interchanging wins with losses. In round 10, the former lost to Radjabov while the latter went down against Wang Yue. Grischuk-Ivanchuk and Anand-Dominguez were drawn.

From February 18 till March 8 the 26th Torneo Internacional de Ajedrez Ciudad de Linares takes place. There is no appearance fee for the players this time; the prize fund is € 314,000. The winner takes € 100,000, the second place is € 75,000 and the third player earns € 50,000.

Round 10
Carlsen started with five draws in Linares, but in the next five rounds he added just one more, plus two wins and two losses. In this round he lost to Wang Yue, who thus scored his first win of the tournament. The Chinese has had a disappoint year so far, after his amazing undefeated streak in 2008, but clearly he’s still a very dangerous opponent.

In a Chebanenko Slav, Wang Yue went for an IQP position where Black gets active play on the kingside. It was enough compensation in the game, perhaps also because of the knight on a4 that was totally out of play. Perhaps still shaking because of the 24…Rxb6 blow, Carlsen missed a better defence at move 26 and had to walk with his king all the way the b5. In timetrouble he got one more chance (38.Qd7 wins an important tempo because of the back rank mate) after which the Chinese made no mistake - clearly his best game of the tournament so far, and a deserved win.

Radjabov also won his first game; he defeated Aronian and one could add: “in the style of his opponent”. This time Radjabov didn’t go for the sharp stuff, but instead he played a quiet, not very dangerous set-up. Still, he managed to get a very promising position right out of the opening after inaccurate play by Aronian, who perhaps had dozed off already!

Black couldn’t find a good way to put pressure on White’s d-pawn and when he went for 19…h6, he missed that after 20.Bh3 he cannot play the natural 20…Rd8 because of 21.Bh5! as was explained by Radjabov after the game. So from that moment Aronian had to do with a pawn less and confidently liquidating to a double rook ending, Radjabov finished the game as strongly as he had started it.

Despite the Petroff start, Grischuk-Ivanchuk was not bad at all - these two players can create great stuff from any position, or so it seems! The Ukrainian had the same position on the board as the round before, when he had come up with the new move 16.a4, and was also well prepared for Grischuk’s copy of a Jakovenko game. 24…hxg5 looks very good for Black; after that the position was equal.

Anand also looked at a position he had played himself at the other side of the board: a blitz game from ‘93! Dominguez’ new move 12…Ng4 doesn’t seem to equalize fully, but after allowing 25…e5! White’s small advantage vanished quickly.

Grischuk has been leading the field since round 2, and has been at clear first place since round 6. With just four more rounds to go, and the favorites faltering, he’s getting pretty close to a sensational Grand Slam victory.

[ Report by : Chess Vibes]

Linares: Carlsen’s Dragon does Dominguez

In the 9th round of Linares, the three games Ivanchuk-Radjabov, Wang Yue-Grischuk and Aronian-Anand were quite uneventful draws, but in a sharp Chinese Dragon Carlsen scored a nice win with Black against Dominguez. The Norwegian climbed back to second place and shares it with Ivanchuk and Aronian; they are still a point behind leader Grischuk.

From February 18 till March 8 the 26th Torneo Internacional de Ajedrez Ciudad de Linares takes place. There is no starting fee for the players this time; the prize fund is € 314,000. The winner takes € 100,000, the second place is € 75,000 and the third player earns € 50,000.

Round 9
Just as Radjabov quickly followed Carlsen’s example and started playing the Dragon as well in 2008, now Carlsen followed Radjabov’s footsteps by going for the relatively unexplored Chinese Dragon (10…Rb8), which was what the two got on the board against each other in September in Bilbao.

“Just when you think you had covered it all, the lad lets go of his rook on b8 instead of c8…” might have been a thought running through Dominguez’s mind. Well, probably not, because in the opening phase of this great game, the Cuban again knew exactly what he was doing. His 18.Rhe1 was new - the more direct (and standard) 18.h4 had been played before. It seemed logical to play positionally, against Black’s hanging pawns, but it wasn’t really dangerous.

Thanks to the bishop on d7 (a better piece than Nb3 which had nowhere to go) pawn e6 was well protected and so with two half open files, Black already had the better chances. After some regrouping Carlsen grabbed the initiative with d5-d4-d3 and Rxf3 and Dominguez immediately went wrong there with 29.d4? (29.Qd2 was necessary).

A forced series of moves followed, with both sides making use of back rank mates, but after the smoke had cleared Black was a pawn up, and White’s knight had gotten into a terrible pin. Carlsen gave Dominguez one more chance by allowing 39.hxg6, but the Cuban missed it and then it was dead lost. Long live the Dragon - who would have thought, two years ago?

Of the other three games, only Ivanchuk-Radjabov was interesting, but after some manoevering and a pawn push in the center, these players also called it a day - something that Grischuk, Wang Yue, Aronian and Anand had done long before.

Besides Grischuk, the only player who’s still undefeated is Ivanchuk. Guess what? They play tomorrow!

[Report by : Chess Vibes]

Linares resumes, Aronian beats Carlsen

In the first round of the second half in Linares, Levon Aronian recovered from two losses in a row with an excellent win over Magnus Carlsen, who missed a chance to reach a theoretically drawn f+ h rook ending. All other games were drawn and so Grischuk retained his one-point lead.

From February 18 till March 8 the 26th Torneo Internacional de Ajedrez Ciudad de Linares takes place. There is no starting fee for the players this time; the prize fund is € 314,000. The winner takes € 100,000, the second place is € 75,000 and the third player earns € 50,000.

Round 8
Despite good fights on all boards, like in the previous round there was just one decisive game: Carlsen-Aronian 0-1. The Norwegian chose the same Latvian Slav with which he had beaten Anand, but Aronian was well prepared for it, since he plays it often with White too. Carlsen didn’t react in the best way to the novelty 14….c5! and soon found himself in a difficult ending, where he had to give up a pawn. Black was probably winning at some point, but after the game Aronian said he shouldn’t have exchanged the bishops.

Smyslov in 1947

Eventually a rook ending was reached with two connected pawns (f+g) for Aronian versus a h-pawn for Carlsen. With reversed colours, a classical example is Gligoric-Smyslov, Moscow 1947, in which the later world champion showed the way to draw: sacrifice the h-pawn at the right moment to force the famously drawn f+h rook ending! (Two years later, Smyslov also drew this rook ending against Keres - both games can be found below today’s Linares games).

Carlsen missed this idea, after which Aronian had no trouble winning the game. And so history repeated itself: at the 2006 Tal Memorial, Carlsen also lost a totally drawn (f+e pawns vs f-pawn) rook ending against Aronian.

It was remarkable to see that the players with the White pieces were all in trouble today - even Ivanchuk, who faced a Petroff played by Wang Yue! In the tabiya for the 5.d4 main line, he managed to come up with a new move (unless I’m missing something here), 16.a4, where 16.h3, 16.Bg3, 16.Bd3, 16.Qa4, 16.Qc1, 16.c4, 16.Bf1 and 16.Nd2 have all been played.

Petroff players need not worry - White got nowhere close to an advantage and in the ending he actually soon stood slightly worse. Apparently Ivanchuk was confident enough to hold the rook ending with a pawn down when he went for 32.Bxc4 and indeed - the way he held it was instructive (creating a weakness on h6 himself). A good round for studying rook endings!

Tournament leader Grischuk escaped with White against Dominguez. The players followed an old Timman-Jussupow game and once more the Cuban showed that his openings are more than all right. He proved “Delroy” (pawn d6) to be more weak than strong, and with 24…Kg8! he could have picked it up with no compensation for White. Later on 28…Re6 would have been strong.

The last game, Radjabov-Anand, was certainly not the least. Like his opponent, Radjabov has incorporated 1.d4 as an important part of his repertoire but here too he goes for the sharp stuff. Anand knows his king-in-the-center Slavs and was more than OK after the opening. The blow 24.Ne5!? was answered by the counter-blow 25…g4! (after 25…Qc7 White’s idea is 26.Bxb7 Qxb7 27.Rxe6!+ Kf8 28.Qh6+ with perpetual) which led to a slightly better rook ending for Black, but it wasn’t enough to win.