Finally got the ChessBase report up. Going through 32 games for such briefly noted highlights doesn't seem like a very productive use of time.
November 2005 Archives
Tiebreak day. I just went through all the games at the official site to figure out the scores to post them at ChessBase.
Douglas Bryson has a nice little item for chess trivia fans in his column in the Sunday Scotsman.
Hikaru got knocked out by Ganguly. Don't miss a very cool stalemate trick that was missed by Miroshnichenko.
No official announcement yet, but it looks like all our positive vibes helped get Alex Yermolinsky into the 2006 US championship.
Jennifer Shahade had an op-ed in the New York Times yesterday on what she calls the current crisis in American chess and how it can look to the success of poker for guidance.
The FIDE World Cup in Khanty-Mansyisk, Russia (Siberia) is underway. It's a 128-player knock-out, two-game mini-matches with tiebreaks on the third day. Round one was today.
Only eight months behind the curve(s), the de facto chess guy at the NY Times, Dylan Loeb McLain, has an item today on women chessplayers and physical attractiveness.
Clint Ballard is putting his money where his mouth is by putting together a tournament using this radical scoring system. Dec. 10-11 on Bainbridge Island across the Sound from Seattle.
Happy Thanksgiving to all, even those who only consider it a weird American thing.
The official site for the Morelia International Chess Festival is now up in Spanish and English.
I just updated the US Championship website with the semifinalists of the "State Champion of Champions" event.
Various computer blind spots were on display in the second round of the Bilbao Human-Machine tournament in northern Spain.
I'll polish off a good weekend away from the blog with links to the latest from Kramnik manager Carsten Hensel and a short reply from FIDE's Makropoulos.
Morelia is soon to be put on the chess map in a big way, as San Luis, Argentina was last month. As rumored for months, the 2006 Linares supertournament is going to be divided between Linares and the Mexican city.
America's Foundation for Chess (AF4C) and the Internet Chess Club (ICC) have teamed up to again bring a special US Championship qualifying event. It's the State Champion of Champions online blitz tournament with the winner going to play in the 2006 championship in San Diego starting Feb. 28.
The official site of the 2005 FIDE World Cup in Khanty-Mansiysk has been updated and populated with rather unhandy Excel files with the participants list and pairings.
An article on an interesting study about a possible cognitive relationship between music and reading skills. It's that last bit about the brain not being immutable that is most relevant to chess.
We've heard from Kramnik and Topalov. Now Makropoulos, Deputy President of FIDE writes in with "match, what match?"
Continue reading UEP + KCM + FIDE.
Topalov's side responds to the Kramnik group's press release of two days ago. They don't talk money, but titles and authority. Weird.
Continue reading Topalov Responds.
A quick look at the list of participants at the Istanbul World Junior Championship confirms that those rich in chess talent get richer.
Garry Kasparov just left New York for parts west. When the news came out the negotiations for a Kramnik-Topalov match had broken down I mentioned that many have suggested that Kramnik might now come after him.
A long, snippy press release from Vladimir Kramnik's management in Germany blames Veselin Topalov and FIDE for the breakdown of a proposed match between Kramnik and Topalov. It's a predictably vitriolic and one-sided document and there is no way to know how closely it resembles reality.
Dutch businessman Bessel Kok and Turkish chess federation president Ali Nihat Yazici have formed a ticket for the May, 2006, FIDE presidential elections.
And take Ilyumzhinov with you! This Spanish article in Marca talks with Anatoly Karpov about chess politics and the world championship. Some excerpts edited for brevity:
Several people sent this in, and I'd probably have mentioned it even if it were the first time I'd heard it. But this rumor was going around GM chess circles less than a week after San Luis finished, according to a review of my inbox.
Better late than never is the Russian team's new motto. The star-studded, if often underperforming, squad turned things around on the final day of the World Team Championship in Beer Sheva, Israel with a 3.5-0.5 win over the Chinese team...
It has gone unremarked as far as I can tell, even at ChessBase (which I'll fix in a bit if they are snoozing on the job). 20 years ago to the minute, at 21:55 Moscow time on November 9, 1985,...
The important culture and news magazine The Atlantic has a nice piece on Garry Kasparov's political life in Russia this month. He's been out stumping in the hinterlands off and on all year, no small task in a country with...
Low-budget film about a small-time faux Fischer making a comeback.
A knock-out, actually. Swiss #1 Vadim Milov scored a big upset in the Corsica event when Vishy Anand melted down against him in the rapid playoff final.
A new 500-page book by researcher José Antonio Garzón names Valencia, Spain, as the cradle of the modern game.
Apologies to Cheer's fans. We can welcome the US's newest International Master. Welcome him back, that is.
I love writing headlines, really I do. Anyway, US Gata Kamsky has confirmed that he will play in the 2005 World Cup in Khanty-Mansiysk starting on November 27.
The latest volley in the world championship cycle rule change is a comprehensive summary from FIDE's Makro. It sounds like we're stuck with tournaments instead of matches, at least until they change their mind again.
Continue reading FIDE Sez.
For no reason other than useful underpromotions in serious play make me happy. See game below. And to chastise the World Team Championship for dropping a team of 2300-2400 players into the event.
Continue reading Underhanded.
I was hoping that if waited long enough ChessBase would post this press release so I wouldn't have to. French organizer Leo Battesti has been endorsed by the French chess federation in his run for FIDE president in the May 2006 elections.
