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The 14th World Computer Chess Championship is underway in... Turin! Yes, right next to the Olympiad. Defending champ Zappa Zap is there along with relatively new top-dog Rybka and the usual suspects Junior and Shredder. Results, games, and bulletins are at the official site. It's an eleven-round swiss, not exactly what you might expect from such a scientific bunch. After six rounds Shredder and Junior (old skool!) lead with 4.5 with Rybka and Zap right behind. It's a hotly contested prize, but the pros pay more attention to the myriad computer rating lists and epic head-to-head matches of hundreds of games between engines.
Hydra isn't there, but Zap is running on a massive parallel system using 512 processors. All the hardware specs are on the site but I've seen other reports say Rybka (running under its programmer's name, Rajlich) and Shredder are on eight-processor machines, not four. (And then you get into the dual processor processors, oh my.) Shredder programmer Stefan Meyer-Kahlen is blogging daily on his site. They had their own imposter scandal near the start when the Italian engine LION++ was ejected for being a clone of the popular open source program Fruit. (Latest versions aren't open source.) After a complaint was filed, they checked its source code and ejected the program.
That hardware list also says that Zap and Rybka aren't using endgame tablebases, interesting if true. It's been discussed for a while now that the speed hit they cause may actually lead to a practical decrease in strength, at least against other comps where every microsecond counts. The brand new Shredder 10 has new ultra-compressed bases that may partially solve this problem because they can be accessed at vastly faster speeds. More on them here.
Other discussions on computer chess are here, here, and here.
I put a handful of key games up for replay and PGN download. Link here. The official daily Olympiad bulletin "Turin Moves" is available from the FIDE website. (More current than the official site, which is still on issue #5.) All the results plus photos, interviews and more with good production value. Impressive stuff. They've also started adding the news items from that to the official English site at last. List of news links here.
From these we glean that there are three women playing for their national teams in the open section of the Olympiad this year, two of them on top board. (The comments point out Zhu Chen for Qatar, whom I had forgotten -- married to Qatar first board Al-Modiahki -- and Knarik Mouradian of Lebanon, also a national champion.) Hong Kong's national champion is the 15-year-old Anya Corke. The item credits her for being the second-youngest national champion in history since she won it at 14, saying the youngest ever was Capablanca. Sigh. They probably got that from the Wikipedia entry on Corke. Capa's 1901 match against Cuban champion Corzo was not for the national championship, although he could be called, and called himself, the moral champion. He finished 4th in the 1902 championship and never actually held the title.
I suppose we could count months to see if Corke was younger than Fischer when he won the US championship at 14. I believe Paul Truong says he was champion of Vietnam at the age of eight. As with Corke in Hong Kong, I doubt we're talking master opposition. But a record is record. Corke was born in California and recently played in the Susan Polgar girls tournament, where she tied for first.
Some of the latest tidbits and links from the Olympiad. It's been confirmed by several correspondents in Turin that yes, Aleksandrov really does need his brain dry-cleaned. He mixed up his mental move order and played 18..Bc8 instead of playing ..Kf7 first and resigned immediately. You are excused if you believe this is all part of a Bulgarian conspiracy to push the betting odds on Topalov-Kramnik down so the Topalov supporters can make some money.
Round 9 team pairings are here. It's mostly medal contenders doing battle at this point, with Armenia-Ukraine the headline match-up. That's the 2004 bronze winner against the gold medal winners Ukraine, but this time Armenia is leading by two points. Because it's all about board points, that's hardly an insurmountable lead with five rounds still to play. After the top teams have faced each other they are inevitably paired with weaker squads and big scores can happen. (Russia snatching the gold from the USA with a 4-0 whitewash of Netherlands in the final round in 1998 comes to mind. See below.)
Mark Orr is keeping a fine Olympiad blog page. He's the captain of the Irish team. Are there other pages like this one? Scotland has some daily info here. The USCF site was supposed to have a blog by arbiter Carol Jarecki but if it's up I can't find it. Rob Huntington continues to liveblog from Turin. Daaim Shabazz is back from Turin and has quite a few audio interviews up at The Chess Drum here.
From Orr's Irish team page:
Who can forget the famous Saleem-Timman imposter scandal at the Olympiad in 1998? See after the jump for that saga if you have. Replay the relevant games.
So how did Russia A take the gold by a full point over the US despite entering the last round a half-point back? In what will certainly be remembered as one of the most sensational scandals in Olympiad history, GM Jan Timman, first board of the Russian�s opponent, the Netherlands, SWITCHED PLACES WITH A PLAYER FROM THE US VIRGIN ISLANDS TEAM IN THE FINAL ROUND!! The amount of money involved is as of yet undisclosed, but we can assume that with the considerable tourist resources possessed by the US Virgin Islands it was a considerable sum. Terrified of going through 52 Olympiad games without a single win, the Virgin Islanders bribed the Dutchman to take the place of fourth board Abdullah Saleem against Jersey while Saleem played against Svidler of the Russian A team! Their plan worked from one perspective as "Saleem" (Timman in a Hawaiian shirt and white Panama hat pulled low) won with black against Hill of Jersey. In a masterful ruse so as not to raise suspicion he pretended to hang a full rook before embarking upon a ruthless two-knight assault on Hill�s king. In true Grandmaster fashion he took Hill�s hanging queen right off the board! Thus "Saleem" (previous score: 0/12) notched up the US Virgin Island�s first and only win during the event. Unfortunately things didn�t go so well for the real Saleem playing for Timman against super-GM Peter Svidler on board 1. He lost the Exchange, but then began to put up heroic resistance, particularly for an unrated player! And just when through divine providence he reached a completely drawn position against the number nine ranked player in the world and only needing to move his bishop back and forth to guarantee the draw, HE PLACED HIS BISHOP RIGHT IN THE PATH OF SVIDLER�S ROOK. I guess the pressure was just to much for "Timman" (Saleem in a baggy, ill-fitting suit) and reports have the poor chap desperately trying to take the move back, much as he might have done playing against his friends in a Saint Thomas caf�.
A few weeks and hundreds of emails later...
IT WAS A JOKE!!!!!!!! A JOKE! A JOKE! A JOKE! AAAAUUUUUUGGGGHHHHHHHH!!! If you hadn�t guessed, this is a note to all those who wrote me in astonishment regarding the "Timman-Saleem affair" in Mig on Chess #71. I simply had a little jest to highlight two of the most amazing games of the last round: Jan "Santa" Timman leaving a bishop en prise against Peter "Swede" Svidler in a drawn ending and Abdullah "0/12" Saleem scoring the only win for the US Virgin Islands during the entire Olympiad. This was not intended as a hoax, it never occurred to me that some idi^X^X^X, um, people would believe that this could or would actually happen! However, in order to profit from this situation I am currently offering for sale the e-mail addresses of the dozen or so readers who wrote me saying things like, and I quote, "I can't believe they got away with that! Isn't Mr. Timman a well known grandmaster? Are they going to take the point away from Russia?" and "I can't believe [This is a popular refrain, and yet they DO believe it...] this could happen because someone would tell i think. didn't the holland team want to win a medal?" and "Waht a funny story about the players who changed teams! Has that ever happened before...?" and "My question is: How could they get away with it at all? Or for some reason is the switch allowed, but merely frowned upon. Why haven't I seen mention of this occurance anywhere else?" For a reasonable price you can have all their e-mail addresses so you can sell them swampland or bridges.
To be kind, several, but not all, of the above messages included disclaimers like, "Are you kidding?" and "Are you pulling our legs?" Memo to Brian and Terence: YES I AM. But these folks pale in comparison to one fellow whom I sincerely hope is reading this. I received an e-mail from Sr. Pablo Ba�ados of Chile a few days after my article appeared at TWIC and he had some surprising news. It appears that the largest circulation newspaper in Chile, El Mercurio, ran my little joke about Timman and Saleem switching places as being true in their chess section!! Their regular chess columnist (who will remain nameless, if only because I don�t know his name), apparently a TWIC aficionado, wrote on Oct. 20:
"...Rusia1 gan� la olimp�ada por un punto de diferencia sobre EEUU, que lleg� a la �ltima ronda aventaj�ndola por 0,5. En esta crucial ronda, seg�n se denunci�, se produjo uno de los esc�ndalos m�s incre�bles de la historia ol�mpica: el GM holand�s Jan Timman, quien deb�a enfrentar al primer tablero de Rusia1, Peter Svidler, intercambi� (l�ase, vendi�) su lugar con el cuarto tablero de Islas V�rgenes, d�bil equipo que hasta Chile derrot� por 4-0. Su reemplazante, por supuesto, perdi� contra el noveno jugador del mundo, regalando el valioso punto que necesitaban los rusos"
For the Spanish challenged, that is:
"Russia A won the Olympiad by a point over the USA, which had been leading by a half point giong into the final round. In this crucial round, according to reports [That would be me, I imagine. � Mig], there occurred on of the most incredible scandals in Olympic history: The Dutch GM Jan Timman, facing Russia A first board Peter Svidler, exchanged (read: sold) his place to the fourth board player from the Virgin Islands, a weak team that even Chile defeated 4-0. His replacement, of course, lost to the world's ninth ranked player, gifting the Russians the valuable point they needed."
I feel terrible about the whole thing, of course. (SARCASM: PROBABLY NOT) So from now on I will clearly label all traces of humor or irony that might be misconstrued by those among us who possess the decency and childlike innocence the rest of us cynics have lost. (SARCASM) This may make things a little more boring for us jaded souls, but if it helps prevent horrible accidents like the one above, it�s well worth it. Worse were the several people who wrote to warn me that I had been taken in by a prankster myself! They earnestly admonish me for being so credulous as to believe such a wild story and report it as true. Thanks guys, I�ll be more careful from now on. (SARCASM: PROBABLY NOT)
The moral: no matter how absurd a story, someone will believe it.
Game replay and results here at the official site. Some games still in progress as of this writing. The tidal ebb and flow of the Swiss system and board point tossed some weaker teams into the gaping maws of the favorites today. Cuba's 3.5 victory over Indonesia earned them a shot at Armenia. That one ended 3-1 in favor of the leaders. The amazing performance by the Czech team continues as they held Russia 2-2 thanks to a win by Navara over Svidler on board one. (Morozevich's win on board three looks suspect. Perhaps the position is wrong or at least not the final. Or maybe he lost?!) These aren't (all) the same guys that Kasparov demolished by himself in a clock simul in 2001! (I have incredible photos from that event since I snuck in and grabbed some shots during the games.)
Ukraine beat Sweden 3-1 and the Netherlands continued to collapse, losing to France 1-3. Philippines finally played their rating after a strong run and lost to China 3.5-0.5. USA also acted like the high seed they are, playing their big three and scoring a 3-1 win over Denmark. Kamsky and Onischuk came back from their rest day to notch the wins.
The USA faced Russia on the top board in the women's event and held the favorites to a split thanks to a win by Irina Krush on board two. The USA is two points off the lead but is still is still in good medal position. China moved back into contention with a whitewash of Latvia.
Round 7 board pairings are up here. Those and live games will be here. Netherlands-Armenia is the top board. Russia gets one of the surviving underdogs, Belarus. India faces Ukraine in a real heavyweight match-up. Anand has white against Ivanchuk. With a big rating advantage the USA needs to put up a good score against the outperforming Swedish squad. Kamsky and Onischuk rest so our own Hikaru Nakamura appears on board one for the second time. Magnus Carlsen is in action for the second day in a row for Norway. He won easily yesterday and now faces Mickey Adams. The English team is trying to prove me wrong and do even worse than in 2004.
If the Russian men have, if briefly, fallen off the pace, the Russian women continue to lead. Katerina Lahno, mysteriously on board two for second-place Ukraine, has 5/5. USA is playing well on all boards and faces India, where star Humpy rests today.
Russia was lucky to escape the Netherlands with a 1.5-2.5 loss today. Van Wely mangled a winning endgame against Grischuk, but of course this is still a great result against the mighty top seed. Sokolov decided not to find out about Kramnik's form and the game was a short draw. Nijboer turned in the decider by beating Rublevsky, who is looking every bit the sixth board so far. (What was wrong with 30.Rd2?) It's damaging because Russia usually scores big on the lower boards.
Armenia is the sole leader after edging Uzbekistan. Lots of close matches again with none of the blowouts I expected. (Not as bad as my predicting that Topalov was "out of contention" at the MTel, but as a mitigating factor most of my other predictions during that event were pretty good. Not Migstradamus bad at least.)
USA beat China 2.5-1.5 with wins from Onischuk and Kaidanov. Kamsky suffered his first lost, to Bu, when he took a solid position and went pawn crazy on the kingside. There is a downside to trying to win every game. Iran surprised by holding Ukraine to 2.5 points. India showed signs of life, beating Germany 3-1 to move into the pack at 16.5, a point and a half behind Armenia. Round six board results here. Round seven team pairings here.
Quick replay link for a few of the top round six games here. PGN here. Culled from Playchess.com and thanks to the relayers there. (Fixed some errors in early moves of the Shirov score with best guesses.)
A pleasant day with work not related to chess, believe it or not. But back to this wonderful Olympiad. The official site even seems to be working well now, yay. Round 6 games will be here. Wiener-Zeitung has team pairings up here, board pairings will be here. Quite a few tough match-ups today, although there are plenty of lightweight teams still hanging around at the top that are paired with each other, so the real cull won't come for another few days.
Speaking of, we're still waiting for the heavyweights to really squash somebody. Is today the day Russia or Ukraine puts up 3.5 to break away from the pack? The Netherlands have lost only one game so far. Kasimdzhanov has been a rock for Uzbekistan but the 30th seed is living a dream. Stay tuned...
A day with 2-2 results on the top five pairings left things even tighter. The USA gained a little ground on the pack scoring 2.5 over Georgia with wins by Kamsky and Onischuk while Nakamura lost. The many drawn matches allowed Iran to jump up but the 51st seed faces Ukraine next and a wake-up call is likely. (Not tomorrow, the 26th is a rest day.) The Netherlands will face Russia. (Full pairings here)
Vladimir Kramnik smoothly outplayed Levon Aronian to move to 2.5/3. Either he hasn't been seriously tested yet or he's really in incredible shape! He had a solid plus out of the opening and then exploited what looked like a serious blunder by Aronian, 19..Rc7 missing 20.Rc6 and Black has a lot of trouble stopping the pawn. Kasparov was reminded of a game he lost to Karpov in a Lyon world championship game with the same maneuver. 19..Qb7 was his recommendation, with "still unpleasant for Black". Btw, Aronian played this line with White against... Kramnik last year, all the way up to move 15. (15.g4 instead of Bg5. 1/2 in 85.) I suppose we still need to see Kramnik with black against a top player before jumping completely on the bandwagon. He's looking good and don't think Topalov isn't watching. Playing a match with Kramnik vintage 99 isn't like playing Kramnik 05.
Sargissian leveled the match by beating Morozevich. His personal score is now 4.5/5. Kamsky is continuing his MTel form and won a very complicated game with Jobava. Nakamura played the same line of the Slav with the opposite result. I haven't had time to go over it but as a Benoni player the Onischuk game just looks terrible for Black out of the opening. 8.Qe2 is an Epishin idea that seemed to catch Pantsulaia off guard. 13.Bc7 is a world-class annoying move. It became amazingly complicated but Black's Iron King turned out to be a bit rusty. Game replay here.
We need to start a PGN project so we can get at least some of the top games asap. I'd imagine at least a few of the federations with competent websites are collecting their teams' games. Of course it's good they wait and check the scores to get rid of most of the terrible notation errors, but we should be able to avoid the worst of those. If you post PGN scores to the thread I'll collect them into a file and update. If a few people do a few games from those they are following we could have quite a few. Going to Playchess or the ICC and copying them there also recommended. They are relaying dozens of games. But having them on the web would be nice. TWIC, ChessBase, and the official site usually have them the next day, if not before the next round starts. Don't clutter the main round item with PGN though, thanks.
Sorry for the various server errors when commenting. The increased traffic and posts have brought these back, it seems. But I don't want to stop and rebuild the server with so many visitors. I'll probably reinstall everything after the end of the Olympiad. By the way, I'm going fishing with my dad for a few days on June 1, who would make a good back-up blogmeister?
It's a tight race after four rounds. Only two board points separate the top dozen teams. Leading medal contenders clash today as Russia faces Armenia. That's 2004 silver versus 2004 bronze. Armenia looks a bit overmatched but they usually overachieve in team events and they are always one of the most interesting teams to watch. Kramnik has white against Aronian. Then we have the battle for Asian supremacy as India and China do battle. India has a big rating advantage on the first three boards.
USA continued to move up the table yesterday. They showed their potential by beating the strong Polish team 3-1 with all games decisive � wins on the top three boards. Today they are up against an accomplished young Georgian squad. From a quick glance at the games (now in progress), I see that Kamsky and Nakamura got into the same Slav line on boards one and three. It's a little odd that the board shifting has left Nakamura three blacks to one white so far. You'd think they'd try to get him a few extra whites considering his sharp style, the way they used to do with de Firmian. But things aren't going badly. Team capitain Donaldson might be relying on Nakamura's ability to win with both colors.
Mickey Adams is having a fine event and has the highest performance rating of the Olympiad so far. But they lost to Turkey yesterday despite his win over Gurevich, amazingly enough. Cuba and Brazil are facing off for LatAm honors, but they are playing below my dear Argentina, where Felgaer appears to be coming into his own on board one at last. Dale!
We're getting to the all-GM matches at last. Live games and results. Russia-China could be interesting despite the massive Russian rating advantage. The Chinese have a grudge to settle from the World Team Championship. Kramnik is in action again, against Bu Xiangzhi on board one. He didn't get much of a warm up yesterday against Naiditsch, who was rolled like a five-cent cigar out of the opening. Accurate finish and all, but hardly testing. Svidler plays his first game today on board two. Wang Yue is 3/3 for China and faces Bareev, who is also 3/3. Quite a few teams have yet to lose a single game.
Kasimdzhanov-Ivanchuk and Almasi-Anand are the the highest-rated match-ups of the day. Azerbaijan will try to recover from their embarrassing start. The out-performing Greek team has a stern pairing with the Netherlands. There appears to have been a meltdown with the Kazakhstan team. Most of their top players from Calvia aren't here, including their #1, former world junior champ Sadvakasov. Anyone know why Norway has played the same four players in the first four rounds? Their top two, Carlsen and Agdestein (also Carlsen's trainer), haven't played. Are they delayed elsewhere?
Rob blogs about an old-fashioned Olympiad tradition, the wrong flag. A particularly poor choice this time, the Japanese Imperial Flag. I wonder if it was the emperor's chyrsanthemum flag or something else. Maybe the military one with the rays of sun? Photos, anyone? Daaim Shabazz at The Chess Drum is on-site and posting reports with a few photos.
I usually skip the birthday routine, but Karpov had some interesting comments in an interview with the hoary Russian paper Trud on his 55th b-day yesterday. Some cuts:
The most tragic moment of my career was losing game 24 to Kasparov [in Seville, 1987]. I was winning 12-11, but I had only 20 seconds to make the right decision. In the end I lost the title and $600,000. That was the price of those 20 seconds. I don't think you can lose that much money that quickly in any casino.
Karpov is referring to the famous double blunder on move 33. Kasparov missed a win with 33.Qb5 and Karpov, in bad time trouble for several moves already, returned the favor. 33...Nc5 would have drawn with best play.
Just underway, and for those who don't want to log in to Playchess.com or the ICC, the live games pages on the official site are working right now! (Men - Women) I'm not sure if this is only because much of the US isn't online yet or if they've fixed their server issues.
Kramnik is playing Naiditsch on board one of Russia-Germany. Svidler isn't playing this round, nor is Bacrot for France. Kamsky got right into action and is playing board one for the USA against Paragua of the Philippines. Anand is on board one against Mongolia. His opponent showed no respect and sacrificed a piece against him on move 14. I doubt Vishy is impressed.
I wonder how many times the four MTel players will meet each other in the Olympiad. Quite likely to have at least one or two encounters since Kamsky is playing board one for the US. Bacrot and Anand are also on board one, but Svidler is board two for Russia.
I'm just going to add new little notes now and then instead of updating old items. Too confusing. I'll put "Turin 06" in the title for posterity... I was wondering why Ukraine was playing on such a distant board in round one. This led to their result being missed by some places that just showed the results of the the top boards. It was because they were playing the IBCA (International Braille Chess Association) who, like the International Physically Disabled Chess Association (IPCA) team, play on the same board every day for practical access purposes. The Italy A team also plays on the same high board (7) each day, a concession to the fans and media to keep them on the stage.
Some have noted that I'm pretty much ignoring the women's event. Not maliciously, but I have very limited time and would rather put my energy into the event with the better chess. Apart from that, my dim view of women-only events is known to regular readers (hi Mom!). That's more toward professional events, however, and this is more like the Olympics, all are welcome. But chess is chess and time is time and I don't really care if some 2100 hangs a bishop. Even if she's hot. I'll try to add more.
I just heard from someone who heard from someone (Carol Jarecki from Albert Vasse) in Turin that Bessel Kok team advisor and ChessBase online commentator Yasser Seirawan [not Kok himself as given earlier] was supposed to arrive in Turin on Saturday but had his laptop and passport stolen in Amsterdam! I know what you're thinking, but this it's really too much to think that Kirsan could be behind this. When he doesn't like you he doesn't have your passport stolen. Your body just turns up in a ditch.
Other Turin tidbits from uber-arbiter Jarecki (if you've never seen an IA hold a cigarette lighter to a turkey wishbone, click here): At last the time control is confirmed. It was debated up till the last minute and not announced until the captains' meeting. Against the suggestion of the GM Council it's the old 90'+30" FIDE semi-rapid garbage. Tragic. (Opinions mine, not Carol's! She just provided the info.)
I noted in the agenda of this FIDE Congress that the ACP has proposed changing the official FIDE control to this plus an extra 30 minutes at move 40. (This wasn't the original ACP proposal, as explained on their site here.) Why not an at least an hour? Sad. They also mention the possibility of simply dropping the candidates matches. Treacherous bastards.
Also, Kamsky has arrived in Turin and ate dinner on site. No word on what he was eating but we're working on it.
Several people have sent in scattered results from round two. Don't see them posted yet. The official website is, of course, a joke. What would be useful doesn't work and what works isn't useful. Reminds me of the Spanish diplomat who told the press, "What I can tell you isn't interesting and what is interesting I cannot tell you." I wonder how many tens of thousands of dollars were spent on a site and web staff currently serving no demonstrable purpose. I wonder if it will be updated during the event at all. The "go to games" section never works for me until the games are over. How has your luck been? (It's up now, so you can piece together results here. Click the little arrow image on the left to launch the viewing applet.)
Anyway, post'em as you get'em. Wiener-Zeitung should have the full board results up here eventually. USA beat Morocco 3.5-0.5 to get into gear. Russia scored another 4-0 with the same team. Are they saving Kramnik for someone stronger instead of getting him warmed up with weaker opposition?
Update: Other notable results include Azerbaijan getting spanked 3.5-0.5 by Portugal. Quick, name a player from Portugal. Exactly. Radjabov didn't play and Mamedyarov isn't playing (?), but still, yikes. I hope their captain regrets the match strategy of giving a nine-move draw on board three, although maybe that was the only thing preventing a 4-nil score. Maybe all their training money is going to the Radjabov challenge of Topalov... Shirov also took a non-game draw today, on board one against Estonia's Kulaots, whose name is not French. England only edged Turkmenistan thanks to a win by Adams.
Russia is the only team with 8 board points. They play Germany tomorrow. The USA plays the tough Phillipines team. The Phillipine media is, as usual, providing a blizzard of coverage. The 53-year-old Eugenio Torre just set the record for most consecutive Olympiad appearances, 19. More on that record and others in this Manila Bulletin article. Ukraine got back on track and faces Serbia & Montenegro in round 3, probably the last time that nation will participate.
I'll add more here later, but wanted to get at least this one up now since it has some of the first round results. Buddy, former teammate, and erstwhile AP chess reporter Rob Huntington is blogging in Turin: www.allthingshuman.com. From the number of times I've watched his laptop crash over the years it's not going to win any tech or design awards, but hey, it's up and running so far! Actually, I see that WZ has the full board results up now. Check Rob out anyway. (A pic of him beardless at the bottom of this page. He's see no evil.)
The USA barely beat New Zealand, 2.5-1.5. Russia scored the predicted 4-0 over Kazakhstan. In a shocker, Morocco beats India 3-1! Get on that plane, Vishy!
Post links to other sources covering the Olympiad and I'll move the better ones up here.
This is it! The pairings give a big advantage to Topalov, who has white against Bacrot while his co-leader Kamsky has black against Svidler. But this has been a topsy-turvy tournament and anything can happen. Anand popping back up with a win over Ponomariov would really cause havoc. As I mentioned here, two players tied for first will play rapid and blitz tonight to settle the title. If three or more tie for first, it goes to systems. On a karmic level Kamsky simply doesn't deserve less than at least a share of first after his amazing start. Update after the round, post results below.
Quick update: Topalov wins his fourth straight game and the tournament. Unbelievable. Stupendous. Just like last year, if not better. He finishes a half-point ahead of Kamsky, for whom this is still a sensational result. He did his "job" losing only to the host, Topalov! Anand missed a clear win against Ponomariov (37..g2) after playing an excellent game. Tiredness? He was in time trouble again, something almost entirely alien to him. Svidler and Kamsky played a turgid draw. Congratulations to Topalov and Gata. Everyone but Topalov and Ponomariov now race to Turin. Much more later. Lots of good info posted in the comments, don't miss.
The Olympiad begins today! The greatest event in chess, this bi-annual celebration is in the Olympic city in Italy. Rounds begin at 1500 local time, that's 1300 GMT, 9am EDT. Rest days are May 26 and June 1. The official site is here. The Weiner Zeitung site has all the team listings and standings and other handy charts. Daily reports at ChessBase and all the other usual suspects, I'm sure. (Preview articles with schedules and more here and here.) Live games at the official site if we're lucky and broadcasts at Playchess with fantastic commentary from GM Yasser Seirawan on Playchess.com. I hope to get occasional reports from a few players and visitors. If that means you, send us some dirt! Feel free to post news links and local team coverage.
There are too many stories to keep track of apart from the team medal hunt. (The individual medals are too often delivered to weak players on very weak teams. What is this, the Chess Special Olympiad?) Kramnik being in action for the first time since his rehab is a big one. His last game was December 30, 2005. Tradition says he'll be playing on board one despite being rated lower than Svidler and Morozevich, although he might not play that many games if he shows any strain. The Russian team is strong enough to not need him to excel to win the gold. It would be great to see him even show flashes of his old form. We remind that his first big international success was his amazing debut at the 1992 Manila Olympiad as a teen. 8.5/9 as a reserve!
Russia is the massive rating favorite. Harikrishna has come up enough to make India a surprising second seed. This is because Ukraine is playing without Ponomariov, which will seriously hamper their chances of duplicating their 2004 gold. Armenia is the third seed and the new-and-improved Aronian now on board one makes them a serious contender for any color medal. Azerbaijan's team, led by Radjabov, is still incredibly young and dangerous.
The clash with MTel is a pity, although a few top players rarely represent their nations at the Olympiad anyway. It's a grueling event and the pay is usually terrible. Leko isn't there again, nor is Topalov, his third miss in a row. Polgar would have to worry about her water breaking in zeitnot. I hate it when that happens. (Need I remind that the Ninja board's very own Inky once played in the Olympiad for the Virgin Islands in an ominously gravid state?) Those are the only players in the top 20 not in Turin. It's great to have Anand back again. Shirov returns for Spain.
Then there is team USA, which is greatly strengthened on paper by the addition of Kamsky and Nakamura. I say on paper because while this team is clearly stronger, Olympiad results often more resemble alchemy than Elo. In 2004 the US team jumped up for a remarkable 4th place finish by stomping Norway 3.5-0.5 in the final round. More impressively, they drew Ukraine, Israel, and Armenia. Surpassing that result will be an achievement, but it's possible. Earlier note on the team here.
Gots to give a shout to my homies on the English team. They could accidentally show up at the Olympic bobsled venue and still do better than last time. They had McShane on board three behind Adams and Short in 2004 and were the sixth seed. They finished 30th. This year he's gone and they're down to 13th. They'll still finish higher.
In the women's event, defending gold medalist China has apparently rotated squads and are only the sixth seed. Wacky. Russia is the top seed in this one too, impressively enough.
So let your jingo flag fly high for the next two weeks and enjoy lots of great chess. The FIDE presidential election also takes place, but it's out of our hands so let's dig into the games. Time control, btw, is 40/100+30, 20/50+30, 20/10+30. That's almost classical, if a bit rough on the endgame.
Topalov wipes out Kamsky with black in the Najdorf to win his third straight and enter a tie for first with Kamsky. Amazing. This is the same Najdorf line that Kamsky has used almost exclusively of late (against Smirin, Sakaev, Vallejo, and Novikov) and while he has done okay (if you consider two wins and two losses okay) it scores very well for black. Being so predictable in such an important game is a little cringe-inducing, but I guess you dance with who brung ya, as the saying goes.
Now it seems so obvious that Topalov would have a strong novelty (14..e5, improving on the Smirin game from the World Cup, although Smirin won that one too) and win almost without a fight. White is so many moves behind by move 20 it's hopeless. (At the press conference Kamsky said he forgot to play 13.Kb1 instead of 13.Qh3. Then after 13..b4 14.Ne2 is playable, probably going into his game with Sakaev.) Tangling with Topalov in the Najdorf is a very high mountain to climb for anyone, no doubt. Very disappointing for Gata after such a tremendous run, but it's not over yet.
Svidler let Anand off the hook in another Ruy Lopez. Even in the final position it looks like Black can play on with the better chances, but there are dangers for both sides. The tail-enders drew a relatively bloodless fight. Topalov has white against Bacrot tomorrow while Kamsky has black against Svidler and a painful loss to recover from. Anand is just a half-point off the lead and has black against Ponomariov. Three more Ruy Lopezes? Ruy Lopi?
Ponomariov's sudden collapse against Topalov today led to the usual conspiracy talk. I've mostly ignored all this piffle as blatant sour grapes and paranoia. All the "Topalov is using a computer" garbage that came up after San Luis (due to oblique chatter from Kasimdzhanov combined with Topalov's amazing first half) is just a way to tear down a good player on a great run of form. Today it was compounded because Ponomariov is affiliated with Silvio Danailov, the Bulgarian IM who manages Topalov's career and is one of the organizers of MTel. (I.e., Ponomariov threw the game, as if this would be necessary were Topalov receiving comp assistance. Don't mix and match your conspiracy theories!)
The myriad scenarios of computer cheating so engage the imagination they are practically irresistible. Signals from a conspirator? Transmitters hidden in the clothes, embedded under the skin? A light or sound in the hall when there is an opportunity? Why not the old yogurt trick? Psychology can work in even more creative ways. If the thought your opponent might have computer assistance is in the back of your head it's really going to screw up your game. Conversely, if you had access to occasional computer assistance, even just a signal once or twice a game, it would have a dramatic effect on your chess and your confidence.
I've heard that a great deal of time was spent on these things during the Kramnik-Topalov match discussions. Expect them to play under Alcatrazian security conditions. And expect fringers to rumormonger anyway. (Especially with the anti-logic "okay, prove he's NOT using a computer. Uh, why?)
Only three rounds to go and Kamsky is leading by a full point. Today he has white against Anand, who is in second place. In some tournaments this might be a recipe for a short draw so it's great that's not an option in Sofia. A win by Kamsky basically locks up the tournament for him; a win by Anand and they are tied for first. Hoodoo over Anand aside, it's hard to imagine Kamsky's form breaking at this point. Who needs a hoodoo when you've got Brooklyn mojo?
Not that White has meant all that much here so far. Seven wins versus five for black. Anand can play just about anything against 1.e4. Will he go for it with a Sicilian? He played 1..e5 against Topalov and Svidler. Speaking of those two, they have white against the tail-enders today. Topalov in particular is capable of stringing together wins and he'll need a lot of them to have a chance at catching Kamsky. Last year Topalov finished by winning four of his last five.
Update: It's all Ruy Lopez all the time in Sofia. All the attention goes to the only decisive game, Topalov's sacrificial win over Ponomariov. Yet again he gave up an exchange to generate attacking chances. Yet again his opponent failed to defend under pressure. Ponomariov missed a good chance to play for a win by eliminating White's breakthrough chances with 29..f6. After that it was going to be a fight for survival, although Topalov also missed the best continuation. 30.Kh2 was a superior move order. 31..d5 was a real blunder, missing Topalov's pretty mating combination. (I put a diagram on the ChessBase report.) Pono had to give up his queen and went down slowly.
I talked to Kasparov for a while about this game, although I'm a little skeptical about his opinion of 29..f6. Not that he isn't entirely correct, it's clearly the best move, only that I'm not as convinced that it's so easy to find. (A secondary point is that Black still isn't lost after 29..Rbd8?) Garry is always quick to toss out a "any 2700 should find ..f6 with no trouble." Perhaps, not that I would know what a 2700 should find. I'm more of the opinion that Ponomariov saw White's f6 but entirely missed the brutal Kh2 - Nxf6 - Bb1 mating trick. And if you're not so worried about f6 there is no reason to spend a tempo on ..f6. But after spending 20 minutes on the move Pono definitely should have found it. Anyway, it's hard, or impossible, to judge how easy or hard a move is to find in a game. This isn't a composed puzzle; there are ticking clocks and tournament pressures.
Kamsky played the Exchange variation against Anand and not much came of it. A draw was certainly not a bad result for Kamsky here. Topalov is more likely to play a Sicilian against him tomorrow, however, and there's no exchange variation there. But Gata has played confidently throughout and should be ready to punish Topalov if the Bulgarian pushes his luck. Svidler and Bacrot drew another fighting Spanish game.
More only very vaguely chess-related trivia. Watching the 1927 film The Jazz Singer, best known for being the first feature film with sound. (And for one of the best known of the countless excruciating blackface scenes in Hollywood history, when the star Al Jolson sings "Mammy.") It's still mostly in silent film format, with interstitial dialogue frames. If you didn't know, the film is about a young Jewish boy, a cantor's son, who becomes a famous jazz singer. When he bumps into an old man he knew as a boy, who recognizes him, he says, "Mr. Yudelson, the kibitzer!"
Of course anyone with a Jewish grandma knows that kibitzer is Yiddish for a busybody, a meddler who offers unsolicited advice. But it's mostly it's used only in the chess world today and hasn't really crossed over into mainstream English. A Google News search turns up just 25 hits. Sad for such a great word. At least it's more than "zugzwang."
Getting the item up early since I hope to get some sleep at some point. Post results as you see'em. Get your pairings here. Anand-Topalov is the heavyweight duel of the day. Anand scorched the FIDE champ in the first half, and Topalov isn't one to lick his wounds and let discretion be the better part of valor when he's out of form. And another loss won't hurt Topalov as much as a win would buoy him, so he might go for it even with black.
Leader Kamsky has black against Bacrot, who showed signs of life against Anand yesterday after playing tamely for a few rounds. Ponomariov will try to get off the mat with white against Svidler, who said yesterday that his win against Topalov was one of his best games.
Update: Another round of rich, fabulous chess. And decisive chess! Topalov played "very well, very imaginatively" (Kasparov) today to beat Anand with black in the Najdorf. As I mentioned in the ChessBase wrap-up (now with many on-site photos), instead of the usual long castle, Vishy played for clarity on the queenside and castled short. Topalov wasn't having it and gave up a pawn for rook penetration. He later sacrificed on f3 and an endgame arose that was very tough to defend. A wonderful game.
Ponomariov's won an impressive game over Svidler. He squeezed the maximum out of his space advantage. I'm not sure how White is going to win if Black declines to take the knight on move 40 though. White gets a passed pawn in a queen endgame but there are checks enough to draw fairly easily. Bacrot got into trouble against Kamsky suprisingly quickly out of an unusual Slav line. Kamsky let him off the hook later by pushing the h-pawn prematurely, but it was still another strong effort.
Kamsky now leads by a full point over Anand and has white against Anand and Topalov yet to come.
Sorry, ladies (or gents, as the case may be), but the man himself will be long gone. One of the more bizarre promotions I've heard of is on the MTel site. Topalov has an apartment at the Grand Hotel in Sofia and you can rent it for 310 Euro per night, presumably when he's not there. According to a web check, a regular room at the Grand Hotel is 130 euros, a "panorama suite" is 320, and a "grand suite" will set you back 442. So the question is, does the Topalov Suite have a jacuzzi, hair dryer, and high speed internet? And what about flower arrangements? I hope they at least change the sheets.
Kasparov's old room in Linares now bears his name. By the way, for just 150 dollars you can sleep on the Brooklyn sofabed that has given discomfort to chess journalism luminaries John Henderson, Malcolm Pein, and Frederic Friedel. Cat hair at no extra charge. 20 meters from subway, two blocks from the park.
Just getting the discussion thread up early this time. Will add the round notes later. Feel free to post results if you're watching live. Leaders face tail-enders today. What are your predictions for the second half? Can Kamsky keep up his amazing level? Will Topalov turn in yet another comeback? Anand, Kamsky, and Topalov all have three whites. Last year the players tired in the second half, perhaps partially due to the no draw offer rules. It's hard to imagine more decisive games than we saw in the first half, although a decline in quality wouldn't surprise. We've seen several tremendous games so far.
Update: Wow. Gata Kamsky turned in perhaps his best game yet, outplaying Ponomariov and then demolishing him when the Ukrainian made an ill-advised attempt to get activity with 35..d4. (I'll toss 29..Rc2 out as a more active defensive try.) Very impressive stuff. If you haven't drunk the Kamsky Kool-Aid yet, it's time to step up to the bar because it's all about Brooklyn, baby! I'm a little surprised Ponomariov didn't play the Sicilian. Kamsky's positional and endgame instincts have always looked fine; it was sharp stuff where he was having trouble during the comeback. On the other hand, tell that to Svidler.
Speaking of, El Svid got just the sort of sharp Grunfeld position he loves against Topalov and made a nice show of it, making Topalov and his novelty look pretty bad. That knocks Topalov, the defending champ in Sofia, out of contention. Bacrot played the Marshall against Anand, or, since White usually avoids it, we can say that Anand allowed the Marshall against Bacrot. A very complicated game along the usual Marshall themes. Black has good attacking pressure, White defends and hopes the initiative will break. It eventually burned out to a tense draw. Very high quality material today.
It isn't really that boring if you look at all the games, at least not if you do so while being chased around the room by a Bengal tiger. 67% of the games at the Bosna 2006 tournament in Sarajevo were drawn, and this from a fighting group of players, at least on paper. Three players shared first on a mere +1: Malakhov, Carlsen, and Nisipeanu. The last of these finished out his event with draws of 13 and 12 moves, the last coming against co-leader Malakhov. What a joke. Perhaps he was ill? If not I hope he catches something. Ban the draw offer.
Young Norwegian Carlsen, a candidate if the candidates matches happen, added another pack of rating points. He won against the local hope and drew his other nine games. Most of these had meat on their bones and he was very close to a loss against that same outsider, Predojević in the last round. He also had to save a bad endgame against Sasikiran.
Naiditsch blundering into a mate against Malakhov provided some sparse entertainment. Carlsen faced the Dragon against Malakhov and then played it himself against Nisipeanu, both drawn. Sasikiran played two games over 100 moves, both drawn. Malakhov gave Zvjaginsev's 2.Na3 against the Sicilian a try against Nisipeanu. Drawn. (But a very interesting game.) You just couldn't buy a win in this event.
Not wanting to deluge the Dirt with the political releases coming out from the Ilyumzhinov and Kok campaigns on a daily basis I've skipped most of them here. (Although the Right Move position papers have made for good reading and are recommended even if you don't care about the election. Here's the latest one on sponsorship and a link to all the articles.) While the result of the election will have a huge impact on the sport we love, the only people that really matter are the delegates. In that regard Kok's campaign is hobbled by their unwillingness to pay cash for votes. Beyond that, from my chess fan's perspective it seems so obvious that Ilyumzhinov has been a disaster for the sport that arguing about the election here seems like a waste of space. Not only would anyone this side of Kirsan's friend Saddam Hussein be worth a shot at this point, but we have an eminently qualified and sane individual and team on offer in Bessel Kok.
I'm making an exception here for an open letter from FIDE General Secretary Ignatius Leong, who proposed a Faustian deal to the Right Move team. In it, Kok would abandon his campaign and join the Ilyumzhinov-led FIDE in a role surely possessing no actual authority but a great deal of scapegoatability. This page also contains Kok's reply, which, thank god, is no. Gee, I can't see why he wouldn't want to hand his credibility over for Ilyumzhinov to squander until it's gone.
Leong has experience with such things. In the last FIDE election Leong started out to run against Ilyumzhinov on a reform ticket that published a manifesto for change. He later bailed out and dropped his candidacy in exchange for a vice-president position and is now general secretary. Since Ilyumzhinov has 100% control, Leong may as well be coat-check boy when it comes to institutional reform. Guess how many of the changes he said were needed in 2002 have been made?
The FIDE edifice is hollow and condemned. It needs to be torn down so something decent can be built on the land, not propped up (new names with no power) or given a paint job (matches with no commercial sponsorship instead of a cycle). This isn't a matter of making the right move. For anyone who actually cares about the game it's a forced move.
Trivial, you want trivial? Watching the mediocre Woody Allen movie "Celebrity", wondering who the familiar woman was playing the supermodel character, checking the IMDB and seeing it's Charlize Theron, noticing she was born in Benoni, South Africa. This just to add another layer to the popular trivia questions about the origin of one of the most unusual names in chess literature. "Which Oscar-winning actress was born in a town with the name of a 1.d4 defense..."
Benoni is the name Rachel gives her son in the Old Testament and means "child of my sorrow" in Hebrew. Genesis 35:18, "And it came to pass, as her soul was in departing, (for she died) that she called his name Benoni: but his father called him Benjamin." Maybe we should call it the Benjamin Defense? Nah, Joel would get a fat head about it.
According to the ever-essential Oxford Companion to Chess (of which I've accumulated around seven copies): Its association in chess comes from the title of a German manuscript by an Aaron Reinganum published in 1825. It was the title of a book of opening research, mostly on gambits, that included analysis of 1.d4 c5. But the name Benoni didn't refer to any of the lines contained in the book. The author worked on his chess when he was depressed, which led to the title of the book.
Kramnik who? We're going to party like it's 1899! As tipped on an Azerbaijani new site a few days ago (more today) and announced today at the MTel Masters website, Teimour Radjabov is now slated to face Veselin Topalov in a world championship match in April 2007. (Azerbaijani oil money, it seems.) Of course contingent on Topalov beating Kramnik in September. If Topalov loses that one maybe Radjabov will try to get a discount to play Kramnik.
This is almost comical considering that FIDE still hasn't done anything with the candidates matches. Players with good financial backing don't need to bother with them anyway, it seems. Perhaps Radjabov will be the Janowsky of the 21st century. Everyone else gets to be Rubinstein. Viva the London Elista Rules! I really don't mind the "match for cash" concept, but the cycle is what really matters and it has bitten the dust.
Evan sagely predicts below that soon FIDE will just put the title up on Ebay. (Is there a Kalmykian Ebay?) Discussion and extra info in this Ninja message board thread.
Topalov finally picked up his first win of the event and he did it against the leader Kamsky. The world #1 kept an opening cramp and then broke up the black position with a nice exchange sacrifice. He prosecuted the kingside attack with ruthless precision to net the victory. The other games were drawn so Kamsky shares the lead at the half with +2 along with Anand. Topalov and Svidler have even scores while Ponomariov and Bacrot are in the tank at -2. Every player lost a game in the first half.
The latest from the dark-square mafia in this poster for the play "The Chess Players" now on sale at Ebay. But I do like the Ilyumzhinov-style sideways approach.
Man did I pick the wrong weekend to get a social life. Gata Kamsky is on a rampage in Sofia, winning his third straight by bashing Peter Svidler in just 24 moves. Svidler blundered with 15...Nd7 and was lost immediately. Just about anything else was better. (It was an unpleasant shock and not just for Svidler. The schedule we have at ChessBase is wrong so I was announcing that Kamsky would be facing Topalov with black today. Oops. I could swear I was looking at the schedule on the official site when I wrote that item though.)
Bacrot played not to lose against Topalov and succeeded. Anand bounced back by beating Ponomariov in a long grind. The Ba5-b6 maneuver gets major cute points. The Indian now has 3/4 with no draws and is a half-point behind Kamsky. Read that again. While long-term consistency will probably still take some time, and while this was basically a one-move loss by Svidler, it seems that Kamsky is back to being the player who had match victories over Kramnik and Anand a decade ago.
When it rains, it pours. Of course I have to do the ChessBase site the day I'm having people over for early dinner. So I'll make this brief. I just put up a quick round three wrap-up. Analysis by GM Marin will follow tomorrow. I just got his round two analysis now, of course.
Anyway, wow! Kamsky beats Anand with black to take the clear lead with 2.5/3! It's all about the Brooklyn, baby. As in his game against Bacrot, Kamsky earned a superior endgame and then converted the point with constant pressure. I doubt that rook endgame was a forced loss, but it was certainly very hard to hold, and impossible after 52.Kg4. 51.Rd5 is a good try, especially since passive defense looks hopeless. I didn't see the game live so I don't know if Anand was blitzing through the endgame as he does too often.
The other games were drawn, but not boringly so. Love the no draw offer rules because I can imagine both of these ending relatively early otherwise and we'd have missed some great chess. So, what to say about the American #1? Perhaps Bacrot and Anand played mediocre endgames to lose, but the point is that he GOT to superior endgames against these guys. Outplaying Anand on the black side of the Ruy is no walk in the (Prospect) park. I was thinking Onischuk should be on board one in Turin because he's so solid, and Kamsky and Nakamura would gobble up points on boards two and three. But Kamsky is making a pretty good case for being back to top-ten status. Okay, it's only round three, but it's exciting.
What's a single rating point worth? Not much. World #2 Vishy Anand (2803) beat world #1 and FIDE world champion Veselin Topalov (2804) with black today. Anand moves to 2/2 after "losing" the draw and starting out with two blacks! Anand made tandoori out of Topalov in complications. Kasparov was kibitzing on Playchess.com (full disclosure: and I was on the phone with him part of the time) and he was stunned by "Topalov's failure to calculate." Still, it looked like White would have been worse anyway. Svidler beat Ponomariov and Kamsky is trying to grind Bacrot in a drawn rook endgame with some small chances.
Update: Brooklyn Rocks! Kamsky beat Bacrot in R vs N in mutual time trouble. They aren't using increment in this event and it showed. If you have time to look three moves ahead you can't lose this endgame. Tragic for Bacrot, but fully deserved by Kamsky, who played a very interesting opening novelty, 13.Rb1 in a popular Spanish line. Kasparov was watching and sounded impressed. (He played 13.Bg5 against Adams in Linares, 1999.) Todd reminds below that Kamsky and Bacrot are paired in the candidates matches that are supposed to happen this year.
Tomorrow we have Anand-Kamsky and we'll see if the spell continues. In January, Kamsky crushed Anand at Corus with supernatural ease. One conspiracy theory going around is that the Bulgarians invited Kamsky to MTel because of Anand's problems with him (these go back to the 1990's) and that this might help Topalov's chances! Okay, just a theory. Vishy has two great games in the bag already so just surviving him with black would be an achievement for anyone.
The MTel supertournament is underway in the Bulgarian capital of Sofia. It runs through May 21. This is the second edition, again a six-player double all-play-all. The world's top two players, Topalov and Anand, are in action together with Svidler, Ponomariov, Bacrot, and the comeback kid himself, Brooklyn's own Gata Kamsky. A repeat of Corus? Fugheddaboudit! Topalov won by a full point last year.
Topalov and Anand are the big favorites, but Linares showed us that anything can happen. (Linares winner Aronian didn't want to play in this event. The event runs into the start of the Olympiad. Some of the players have to run to Turin after missing the first few rounds.) The ceremonial first move was made by Brazilian author Paulo Coelho.
The anti-draw rules are in effect. No direct offers at all, instead they must declare their intent to the arbiter. Draws only in the case of repetition or theoretically drawn endgame. Yay! Ban the draw offer! First tiebreak is most wins, second is head-to-head, third is the Berger system, fourth is higher number of total moves played (!). Don't remember seeing that one before. The regulations go on to say that if there is a first-place tie between just two players, there will be tiebreak rapid-blitz matches. The various formulas will only be used if there is a tie between three or more players.
ChessBase intro article and pairings schedule. Update: Anand beats Bacrot with black in the first round. Pono-Kamsky and Svidler-Topalov drawn.
Oh, the innocence. While our endless debates (search "Kreiman") tend to circulate around whether or not prearranging results is okay or not, it appears match fixing comes as a surprise in Vietnam.
Spectators shouted at Nguyen Vu Quan of Hanoi after he “lost” to Truong A Minh after only 22 moves. There are allegations that the two players had agreed upon the result beforehand and to equally share the top two prizes totaling VND42 million (US$2,650).
Say it ain't so! What won't people do for a few million dong these days? It's sad that many in the chess community have lost this sense of outrage about prearranged games and similar manipulations. Moral and peer pressures are stronger than penalties that are nearly impossible to enforce.
Perusing Baku Today, as I am wont to do, turned up this brevity on Teimour Radjabov being named a UNICEF goodwill ambassador for Azerbaijan. His focus will be on universal iodization of salt, still a big issue in many nations. Always good to see a top player getting involved with something outside of the chess world. Karpov has long been affiliated with UNICEF.
I'm always curious about how famous chessplayers are in their home countries, although this is a non-issue in most places. Countries that cover chess results in the sports pages are in a different category. Any time a country not used to the limelight produces a world-class star in any field they usually become a big hero at home, even if there is typically little national interest in what the person does. More rarely this happens in major nations, e.g. Fischer and Anand, who have booms named after them.
The final round of the French League saw a critical final match that contained a curious pairing. NAO beat Monaco to take the title for the fourth year straight, winning two and losing one with the rest drawn. Match board order is always a curious science, but I'm wondering whose idea it was to move Almira Skripchenko up to board seven, and/or Joel Lautier down to board seven. Perhaps Monaco hoped the psychic difficulty of someone playing their ex-wife would overcome a 260-point rating disadvantage? Or that they are still good friends might lead to a peaceful draw? It didn't, and Lautier won with black. Btw, many of the gamescores from the event are a jumble, including that game.
Or, the Carlsen Watch continues. The Bosna event has been scaled down year by year. This edition is a six-player double round-robin. Despite the lack of 2700 horseflesh, it's no wimpfest. Three 2690's plus Dortmund winner Naiditsch and the doubtlessly underrated Carlsen. The outsider is Borki Predojević, a local teen hope. He kept his head above water in the last two events, although scoring a win here will be a triumph.
Speaking of the Turin Olympiad, the official website has a pretty nifty promotional bulletin up (PDF format). There's lots of fun Olympiad trivia about games and players and I'll quibble with one bit. It says that of the world champs, only Steinitz and Lasker didn't play in the Olympiads. (Steinitz with the wholly reasonable excuse of being dead long before the first Olympiad took place in Paris in 1924.) It goes on to say that Lasker retired in 1927, which is true. (Tarrasch, 65 at the time, led the German team in the 1927 London Olympiad. Second board Mieses was 62! Lasker would have fit right in.) But Lasker came back to play professionally a few years later when in need of funds. He was certainly strong enough to play on any Olympiad team, even at 66. But for which team would he have played in, say, Warsaw 1935? He was essentially stateless at the time, having left Nazi Germany for England, then the USSR, then finally the USA. But the USSR didn't send a team until 1952.
The Torinos have squeezed the Chess Olympiad into some of the sponsorship packages of the Winter Olympic Games and the other activities they're doing this year. Organizers say they've also lined up significant direct sponsorship as well, which is good to hear. ChessBase has an intro report with photos of the city and venue. I thought that all this activity was part of some anniversary of the city but I can't find any mention of such so maybe I just made that up. (300th anniversary of the Battle of Turin?! Not likely.) Don't miss Wojtek Bartelski's amazing Olimpbase, by the way. Endless enjoyment.
Jan Timman is a round away from a clear victory in the 14th annual event in Sweden. The official site is here, with handy game summaries. Timman has an impressive +5 undefeated score and a full-point lead over Hillarp Persson. It's always great to see a veteran in good form in a classical time control event. (He took two 14-move draw rest days with white. Repulsive, but less so when the perpetrator is over 50.) Timman's 2800 performance isn't coming against the Wijk aan Zee crowd, but, like most veterans, when on song he can still show why he spent several decades as one of the world's best. No longer being frequently sponsored by Margaux and Burgundy can't hurt. Sure, a couple of his wins came after escaping dangerously inferior positions, but the winner always needs some luck.
Where's the rest of Timman's peer group, you ask? His generation is largely remembered for being relentlessly stomped by Karpov, who, like Timman, was born in 1951. Beliavsky is still hanging on in the top 100. Huebner is also in there, although he doesn't play often. Talk about a young man's game (or woman's, gracias to Polgar), only four players in the top 20 were born in the 60's or earlier. (Anand, Ivanchuk, Gelfand, Bareev)
The US Chess Federation has finally announced its Olympiad teams for Turin, 2006. If the silver medal winning 2004 US women's team was worthy of the over-used moniker "dream team," the same could be said about the US men's team this year. The names Onischuk, Nakamura, Kamsky are enough to get Yankee hopes up. Add seasoned pros Kaidanov and Ibragimov and rising star Akobian and it's an impressive array. Of course this won't make them a paper favorite to medal with Russia and Ukraine capable of fielding teams averaging 2700. (2004 gold medal winner Ukraine's board six was Karjakin...) But team USA will be an exciting and balanced group with legit medal chances. The Olympiad starts on May 20.
The women's team is without Susan Polgar, who led the medal run in 2004. The last two US women's champs, Zatonskih and Goletiani, are joined by Krush and Baginskaite. The men's team is captained by John Donaldson. The women get US championship runner-up Yury Shulman. Kudos to the USCF; this is really an all-star cast, other than Polgar's absence. (She wrote about it on her blog here, and scroll down on that page to read USCF exec Bill Goichberg's response and corrections.) The main funding came from my main man, indirectly. The Kasparov Chess Foundation put up $30,000. The Internet Chess Club ponied up $5,000.
Anyone up for a letter and press release campaign to see if we can't get the teams in the news? The local papers of each player's hometown is a good place to start. I don't know if the USCF actually pays to have their press releases sent out on the wires. They certainly wouldn't mind if we sent it, email or mail, along with anything else that might grab attention. Here's a PDF version of it you can download and send. Post below if you send it, or anything else to cut down on duplicates. Spamming won't be appreciated.
Norwegian teen Magnus Carlsen drew a four-game match against many-time Dutch champion Loek van Wely. It was sponsored by DSB Bank and held in the Dutch town of Schagen (not Schachen) in the north. Van Wely played the four blitz tiebreak games as if paralyzed and lost 3.5-0.5. After the players exchanged wins with white in the main match, van Wely needed a miraculous save to avoid losing with white in game three.
The relatively new, at least at the top level, 17..Bxe3 in the Sveshnikov, played by Topalov against Karjakin at Corus (and by Fernandez against Kudrin at the US Ch), brought the Dutchman a smooth draw in the final game. If this simple move, long considered inferior (17..g6 is the main line (this can also be move 18 if ..e6 Bf4 ..e5 Bg5 are inserted earlier)), can draw so easily it's yet another annoyance for White in this topical line. Of course ..g6 h4 is stiill much more fun if both sides are looking for a win.
With all the hoopla around the Topalov-Kramnik match the candidates matches of the 2005 cycle have been entirely ignored by FIDE. It will be great to have a unified world championship title – ingrate to have a championship tournament instead of matches in the future. But the sponsorship and credibility problems of Ilyumzhinov's FIDE are exemplified by the disappearing candidates matches. He's always been able to pull the occasional rabbit out of the hat – Libyan rabbits, Kalmykian cash, etc. But consistency and stability are what we need for serious sponsorship.
A letter from FIDE confirms that as of last week, no offers to host any of the eight planned candidates matches have been received. (Some "expressed interest.") They have apparently given up trying to find sponsors, assuming they were ever trying. The letter says they are urging the players' national federations to speed up the process. Apparently FIDE expects the national federations to find sponsorship for organization and $40,000 minimum prize funds for the six-game matches scheduled for the end of October.
There is some irony here because some potential sponsors were put off by the passing of the March deadline for bids to host the candidates matches. FIDE needs to formally reopen the process, although it's too much to hope they will actually do any of the required business development themselves. I suppose there's always a first time. For the past ten years it's been all politician/crony-to-politician/crony. There is simply no mechanism in Ilyumzhinov's FIDE to find international corporate sponsorship for events like these.