NAFTA Chess

First off, the official site for the Morelia International Chess Festival is now up in Spanish and English. Have they been taking web design classes with the wizards who put this up for the USCF awhile back? (¡Señor Cuchi, estoy a su servicio, llámame!) Anyway, it works. The festival, as previewed last week, includes the first half of the Linares supertournament. The seven confirmed players listed are the same as guessed at except with Aronian for Akopian, not that we'd notice. Kamsky, mentioned in at least one report, isn't there. They have one spot left. Who will it be? If they don't have Anand or Kramnik already it's because they can't afford them, which is sad for the first Linares of the post-Kasparov era.

Then there is the nine-round swiss international open. It has a prize fund of $158,000 and runs Feb. 20-28. The first prize is $50,000. With so much cash in play - and with travel and hotel being offered to some players - and the dates so close to the US Championship, clearly something had to be done so the players who really want to play in both events can do so without HG Wells.

From what I understand, they moved the Morelia event up one day and the opening ceremony of the US Championship has been moved back a day to March 1 with the first round now on the second. No date changes for the event, but the school visit day (Mar. 8, now the 13th) has been moved to the end of the tournament to make room. (Players can choose to do the schools thing on the 1st or the 13th.) So rounds 4-9 are played consecutively. It wasn't precisely a free day anyway since the players have to get up early to visit schools, although meeting kids is less tiring than another game. This is doing a good thing for American players at slight harm to the event; I'd say it's a good move. This way there is a day for travel from Morelia to San Diego, although it will have to be snappy. Let us know if you figure out a good travel plan because I expect to be making the trip myself. The official announcement will come out after Thanksgiving weekend and the US Championship website will then be updated.

Of course this bumps the Morelia Open further into the massive Aeroflot Open, which runs Feb. 8-16. There should be a special Phileas Fogg prize for anyone who tries to play in all three, apart from the frequent flyer miles. Shabba?