The Daily Dirt Chess Blog

July 07 Rating List

Ratings, ratings, getcher fresh, hot ratings here. Zombre beat me to it in the comments, but it's never too late to rescue a hijacked thread. Ivanchuk moved on up and he'll be a threat to leap over Kramnik and Topalov on the next list. Jakovenko hits the top ten, replacing his compatriot Svidler and validating Alex Yermolinsky's eye for talent. ["The tournament introduced a lot of strong young players. Jako is already a Top Ten material, no doubt about that. Nepo is a major talent, on par with Carlsen, Karjakin and Nakamura." Posted by: Yermo at December 18, 2006 12:30] Unfortunately his poor showing at Aerosvit probably means he won't be there for long. Wang Yue of China moved up to #22 with 25 games played. His 2696 is 40 points over his last rating of just three months ago, a great leap forward indeed. Adams is listed twice on the top 100 list, so the usual error corrections might be in order soon. [July 2 corrected list now below. Adams is #15. Topalov given a point that moves him up to a tie with Kramnik.]

That one game that cost the world champ three rating points was a Dutch league draw against Smeets. I think that would be an excellent name for a unit that measures the loss of rating points to much lower-rated players. 3 rating points lost in a draw = 1 smeet. It even works as a verb, as in "Kramnik got smeeted on this list." Our favorite, 13-year-old Hou Yifan, the one who asked Kramnik for his autograph while playing in the Corus C group this year, moved up a few more points to 2523. I hope the Chinese let her play some strong opposition again soon instead of having her score +6 in women's events while her talent stagnates.

Dortmund 07 r5-6

Four more draws today in Dortmund, leaving Kramnik still in the clear lead on +2 with two rounds to play. He reverted to the Petroff against Leko today to bring back memories of their 2004 WCh match in Brissago. Leko started to get just enough of a little something to impress Jon Speelman on Chess.FM that there might be extended torture afoot, but the Hungarian let the black knight back into the game and it was drawn immediately. A pity, since, as spectator RueeLopaith put it, "every time the Petroff loses, an angel gets its wings." I'd add the Berlin to that wing-giving category. Kramnik has been playing the non-Berlin Lopez (Lopaith?) lately.

Naiditsch-Alekseev was the game of the round. A strategically sharp Nimzo led to a sharp tactical battle on the queenside. Who tricked whom, or if anyone was tricked at all, is the open question. It looked like Naiditsch was setting up a risky maneuver with a rook penetration on the b-file. Then Alekseev answered with the clever 19..a6! and White had to give up his queen for rook and knight. Or was it all part Naiditsch's plan to "fall" into the trap since it turned out White had excellent play and threats after giving up the queen? The position became amazingly sharp. White got two rooks for the queen and it seemed like they should easily overwhelm the cut-off black king. But it wasn't easy at all. White's pieces were poorly coordinated and the black c-pawn became one-man counterplay. White's best chance was 37.Re6 and the black queen has no good squares. A computer might defend after that but the mate threats are constant. Alekseev went for safe harbor instead of trying for more with 45..Nb5.

Mamedyarov-Anand was interesting below the surface. White got more than expected thanks to the nice 15.d5 blow. Anand accepted weak pawns and a long defense instead of risking the attack after 17..g6. Even the endgame had some poison and many interesting lines, but Anand held the draw without too much trouble. Carlsen-Gelfand was another stealth affair that didn't liven up at all until Carlsen tried the combo 21.Nb5!? Gelfand had the wonderfully absurd 22..Na1! to save the day. Note that 24..Bb3? loses wood to the knight returning to a1! Black's up a pawn in the final position but the bishop pair holds things down easily. You get eternal fame and glory if you can find another ..Na1 or equivalent (white knight on a8) on move 22 or earlier without a capture. Get Krabbe on the line!

(Okay, I looked. There are hundreds. The first I found with ..Na1 was Schubert-Hromadka, Prague 1921. Luckis-Czerniak, Mar del Plata 1941 isn't exactly right but includes 20.Na1 Nxa1!. Pogrebissky-Novotelnov sees it very early, 14..Na1 and winning material. Polugaevsky beats that, and back in Mar del Plata no less. He played 12..Na1 in a 22-move victory. Smetana-Pacl is a lousy game but it might be a winner with 15..Na1 white resigns! Or it could be Beliavsky-Kasparov, Linares 93, which ended in 22 moves on a very unusual perpetual check with ..Nb3+ - ..Na1+. We can now resume our attempt to get a life.)

Round six on Saturday should again see the favorites go for wins with the white pieces against the less Elo-endowed. Anand-Alekseev and Kramnik-Naiditsch, plus Mamedyarov-Carlsen and Gelfand-Leko. Note that Sunday's final round begins two hours earlier than the other rounds: 1300 local, 7am EDT.

Ivanchuk Wins Aerosvit

Vassily Ivanchuk took a short draw with white against Svidler to cement his impressive victory in the 2007 Aerosvit tournament in Foros, Ukraine. Karjakin, the early leader, was the only player who could catch him but he had his own worries with black against Jakovenko and drew. Ivanchuk's solid +4 victory included several sparkling efforts typical of him at his best. He's been piling on rating points lately and might hit as high as #4. (He once reached #2, briefly pipping Karpov back in 1991.) Bonus trivia: one of the stem games of the wild Ragozin line in Ivanchuk-Nisipeanu was played by Adriaan de Groot, the Dutchman more famous in chess circles for his cognitive studies with chessplayers than for his play in the 30's and 40's. Getting back to the present day, in round 2, Nisipeanu gave up his queen instead of the usual piece, but couldn't hold the game.

The great show for the home team was completed by young Sergey Karjakin. He slowed his early impressive pace, drawing his last four games. It wasn't exactly the breakout performance I had wondered if he was ready for, but clear second in this category 18, and undefeated, is definitely his career best. It follows Magnus Carlsen's more sensational second-place showing at Linares this year so these 16-year-olds appear to be evolving in tandem. 3-6th places on +1 went to Onischuk, van Wely, Svidler, and Shirov. Svidler continues to go from grizzly to Yogi. He turned in 7 draws of fewer than 30 moves. Other than a late crush of Jakovenko out of the opening in round 10, it was a pretty tame show. He may be keeping powder dry for Mexico, but the pattern was similar in Linares too. I admit Kramnik's mid-career transformation from irresistible force to immovable object worked out pretty well for him, but it would be nice to have our growling Peter the Swede back.

A final jeer at the horrible single-control time control they used. Many of the games resulted in unsightly butchery unfit for anything calling itself a supertournament. The nervous stress caused, and/or threatened, by the control probably also contributes to more short draws. Overall it was a fine event with many interesting games, but any game that was still sharp after move 30 could turn into a blunderfest and several endgames were mutilated. Sasikiran was close to two wins -- against Svidler and Karjakin, although he first benefited from the time factor himself in the latter.

Kramnik Wins, Karjakin Survives

Dortmund 2007 really hit the autobahn today with two decisive games! That brings the total up to 5/16. The world's two top-ranked players wiped out two of the lower seeds with what could be described as Teutonic efficiency if they weren't a Russian and an Indian. In round four Magnus Carlsen was nothing more than a tasty strudel for world champion Vladimir Kramnik. A horrible positional blunder by the young Norwegian against Kramnik's usual Catalan and the game was all but over. On ICC Chess.FM GM Jon Speelman immediately pointed out the winning Nb3-Na5 plan and Kramnik wasn't far behind him in playing it. It's hard to imagine 16..Nd5 was preparation and we certainly won't be seeing it again. That moved Kramnik into clear first on +2 with three rounds to play.

Anand moved up in the pack with a steady win over Naiditsch. The nice move 23.Be4! punished Black for his premature ..d5 break. 23..Bxe4 24.Qxe4 Qc5 keeps the pawn but Black's light squares are going to be swiss cheese. Or some German cheese with holes. Naiditsch did a fair job of hanging on while Anand, as he often does, preferred to keep attacking rather than swap into a purely technical endgame. He was rewarded when a nice mating net caught a piece. Hard to say if Black could have drawn by grabbing the c-pawn, but 39..Be4+ definitely looked like a waste of several tempi. 39..Rc2 looks much tougher to beat. In the game, 40..Bd5 41.Nd4! would have typically clever Vishy tactics.

Alekseev tried to out-Leko Leko in a known instant-endgame line that doesn't seem much in keeping with the Russian champ's attacking style. The draw left Alekseev on +1 with Anand and Leko on even with four straight draws. Gelfand-Mamedyarov was an interesting boxing match in which nobody managed to land a punch. Thursday is a rest day in Dortmund.

Meanwhile, things only looked boring at the Aerosvit tournament in Ukraine. Both leaders played wild games, both badly marred by the absurd single-control time control I whined about before the event started. Even the world's best cannot play competently when they are essentially in a time scramble for 30+ moves. Horrible. Karjakin outplayed Sasikiran but then blundered badly and had to scramble back on defense. (33.Nf6! is the threat Black Karjakin missed.) Poor Sasikiran then proceeded to miss a half-dozen wins while playing only on the 30-second increment. It eventually ended in a draw on move 93.

That wasn't the longest game of the day, however. Ivanchuk played a remarkable queen sac against Bruzon out of a difficult position. The Ukrainian wizard then tried for ages to work out a win with R+N vs Q but couldn't do it against the Cuban's accurate defense. Chukky finally had to give up on move 136. I think that since Ivanchuk usually has so much trouble with his clock when he gets an increment from the start he just likes to drag things out to enjoy it. That left Ivanchuk and Karjakin tied on 6/9 with two rounds to play.

Shirov won the only decisive game of the day, taking down Jakovenko on the black side of a Sveshnikov. 45..Qxc3+! isn't the sort of shot we get to see every day. The win moved Shirov to a half-point behind the leaders.

Dortmund 07 r3

Round three today with Gelfand-Anand the flashback heavyweight matchup. These two veterans were playing crucial games against each other as far back as 1990. Gelfand used to be Anand's nemesis in those early days, but Vishy caught up quickly and Boris hasn't taken a full point from the current world #1 in well over a decade. But just about all of those wins were with white. Mamedyarov takes the white pieces into his first-ever game against Vladimir Kramnik. The young Azerbaijani treated the last world champion harshly when he stuffed Topalov at MTel a few months ago, and both of his first two games were decisive. We'll see if he's got the brass pawn pair needed to take a swing at the champ.

Alekseev knocked Carlsen out at the 2004 Lausanne Young Masters tournament and they haven't met since. Now Carlsen has the higher rating, but not the higher score. Alekseev is tied for the lead with Kramnik on +1 and is a tremendous attacker when given the slightest chance. That leaves us with Leko-Naiditsch, which we wouldn't expect to see many fireworks. But they have swapped wins in the last two years in Dortmund. Last year Leko pushed the German's Bogo-Indian off the board in short order.

I hear Kramnik and Anand are relieved that the winner of this tournament doesn't have to play a match against Topalov for the Dortmund title. But stay tuned on that. Speaking of, drop on by to listen to Jon Speelman on Chess.FM.

FIDE Follies Forever II

You know how sequels are usually worse than the original? This is actually the fourth or fifth edition of FIDE's plans for the current and future world championship cycles in the past year or two. First they said matches, then tournament, then matches again, then a world cup, then a unification match, then a challenge match. We had Topalov, then Kramnik, then Kramnik in his own qualifier, then Topalov is back. Now they seem to have done something truly remarkable and have tried to have it all by taking a "one of each" approach in a convoluted and anti-logical new plan. (Which, of course, could also change just as our indigestion begins to pass.)

ChessBase does their best to explain things, and there is a handy diagram that is only lacking a little cartoon guy with his head exploding. The most relevant addition in the short run is that Topalov has been added back into the mix no matter what happens in Mexico City. If Kramnik wins in Mexico, he has to play a match with Topalov in 2008 and then the winner of that will play the winner of the 2007 World Cup (in 2009?). If Kramnik doesn't win in Mexico, he plays the winner in a match in 2008. At the same time, Topalov will face the 2007 World Cup winner in a "challengers match," the winner of which will face the winner of the match between Kramnik and the Mexico winner.

It was obvious at the time of the Elista unification match between Kramnik and Topalov that it was really going to suck to lose. The winner would be the first unified champion since 1993 and hold a ticket to Mexico as defending champ. The loser would be out of the world championship cycle already underway (the 16 candidates had been decided nearly a year earlier) and would have to fight for qualification in the next cycle at the 2007 World Cup just like the piss-ant rabble, god forbid. Both players accepted those conditions and we know that because they both showed up to play. We don't even need to wave the contracts around.

Kramnik won, Topalov lost. Yep, it sucked for Topalov and his many fans. The battling Bulgarian, the #1-rated player at the time, lost his FIDE world championship title and handed his spot in Mexico to Kramnik. In early March, FIDE announced that Kramnik would get a match against the winner of Mexico if it wasn't him (which is as bizarre as it was expected) and that Topalov would get a match against Kramnik if it was. A month later, an interview with Ilyumzhinov confirmed the Kramnik vs Mexico winner match and appeared to disavow the Topalov vs Kramnik match. A later semi-clarification from FIDE said that Topalov would have the "right to challenge" Kramnik, which didn't exactly carve things in the marshmallow that passes for stone in FIDEworld.

The Bulgarian federation has been beating the drums to get Topalov back into the mix quickly instead of making him wait to play in this year's World Cup with everyone else. Why, exactly, Topalov deserves special treatment because he won in San Luis nearly two years ago is not clear. That is, unless you subscribe to the theory that winning any sort of world championship title alters human brain chemistry, instilling a massive sense of entitlement. (Uzbekistanis seem to be immune, to their credit.) Yes, it was sad and in many ways silly that the Elista unification match loser was booted out of the cycle. But they both went in eyes open.

This latest version makes even less sense because it imagines a supernatural bond between Kramnik and Topalov. If Kramnik wins Mexico, Topalov gets a direct world championship rematch, which wasn't in the Elista rules. If Kramnik doesn't win Mexico, a new match is created from thin air, demoting the World Cup winner from WCh challenger to semifinalist in an instant. If Topalov deserves an automatic WCh challenge, why is it only against Kramnik?! (I.e., if these extraordinary matches are to make any sense at all, first Kramnik would get his bonus match with the Mexico winner and then Topalov would play that winner.) Why drag the World Cup winner down? And how about the Mexico winner (if it's not Kramnik)? Not only does he have to play a match against Kramnik, but then a match against the winner of the Topalov-World Cup winner match! Of course that's all good money assuming it can be conjured, so maybe it's the more the merrier. (Which is why it's unlikely the Mexico players will complain much.) But it's likely to be a short time at the top and a hectic year as these matches are squeezed into the calendar. FIDE went with convenience and faux-symmetry over logic.

I'm not saying it wasn't stupid hold a unification match in which the loser was out of the ongoing cycle. It was. And, not unreasonably, FIDE prefers to create new events instead of modifying ones that are already in place. So no expansion of the Mexico City field or fiddling with the candidates matches. And Topalov is an exciting player and one of the world's very best, no doubt at all. But now we've yet again postponed fair play and logic in the WCh process. When they couldn't come up with a way to put Topalov into the cycle, they put him on top of it, giving him the exact same post-Mexico rights as Kramnik, who, you may remember, beat Topalov. If Kramnik wins Mexico, they are both finalists. If Kramnik doesn't win, they are both semifinalists. Why? I'm going to take a wild guess and wonder if some of the money Topalov raised for his rematch challenge to Kramnik didn't come in handy in making a persuasive case to FIDE's finest.

As for the long run, the creation of a Grand Prix sounds dandy, and I'm all for more events and more money, but do we need both a Grand Prix and the World Cup? The announcement says "The Grand Prix series will span a period of two years with one tournament every year in America, Asia and Europe." So either they can't count (three continents, two years...) or that means three events per year wedged into the calendar and in need of sponsorship. That's not impossible, and Bessel Kok is up to the task if anyone is, but it contributes to the Frankenstein nature of the proposal. Why choose a coherent system when we can mix and match two or three different ways of doing it!

This Grand Prix, still a glimmer in FIDE's eye, also raises the specter of conflicts with traditional events and the nascent Grand Slam program proposed by Silvio Danailov and the organizers of most of the world's top events. There is the possibility that these two "Grands" may overlap or even combine, but that's a long way and a lot of "ifs" into the future.

Kramnik Rolls Up Gelfand

Two of seven rounds of Dortmund 07 are over and it's been a rather conservative event so far. That's not unexpected with this field and the short length of the tournament. The young firebrands -- Carlsen, Alekseev, Mamedyarov, Naiditsch, don't seem to be quite as fiery in the presence of veterans Leko, Kramnik, Anand, and Gelfand so far. Round two split those groups neatly.

Carlsen surprised GM Benjamin on ICC Chess.FM by agreeing to a repetition in a position where he could play on with better chances against Naiditsch. That the 16-year-old had the black pieces was likely a factor. He did a fine job of gaining activity against Naiditsch's Exchange Ruy, which is what the German used in their game at last year's Bosna tournament. In that game Carlsen played the goofy 5..Be6 but survived. This time he went with the only slightly more pedigreed 5..Qf6. At the end of the game we were expecting Black to dive in with 32..Qa2 with threats on the back rank. White has to be precise not to lose a queenside pawn in traffic.

Anand-Leko was another inch along the Marshall Gambit trail and a draw in 29 moves. The new idea came when Leko played his rook to e7 instead of the usual e6. Anand used this subtle difference to play 22.Bf4, when 22..Bxf4 hangs the e7 rook to the back rank weakness. Swaps are supposed to be good for the side with the extra pawn, but Leko correctly figured that his bishops would have no trouble holding the queenside pawns. Anand agreed without debate. Instructive.

Mamedyarov looked helpless in a Scheveningen against Alekseev. It reminded Joel of the way Karpov used to play these positions back when the young Tolya was playing 1.e4 the likes of Spassky and Andersson. Mamedyarov gave up just about every possible positional card you can give up in these positions. Allowing a5 and never getting in ..d5 pretty much leaves Black with nothing to do. That is, nothing but give up the exchange for little compensation. It was either that or sit and wait for White to crash through with an inevitable kingside pawn wave. The depressed Mamedyarov showed little of his usual defensive tenacity trying to rush Alekseev in time trouble. He opened up a set of new weaknesses and lost abruptly with a run of bad moves after the time control. That dropped Mamedyarov back to an even score and put the Russian champion into a tie for first with the day's other winner, world champion Vladimir Kramnik.

Big Vlad once again displayed his ability to do a lot with very little. He played a fairly discarded line of the Semi-Slav against Gelfand with a quick 7.e4 break. Gelfand appeared to take his problems lightly, but that's really the point. It doesn't look like Kramnik has much in these positions until the game is practically over, then it appears clear that Black was bad the whole time. Or perhaps Gelfand was overreacting instead of the opposite? He pitched his b-pawn and then left his minors and king dominated while his queen went to get the pawn back. Kramnik got his c-pawn rolling and even creative and precise defense from Gelfand failed to hold. (41..Bf7 needs analysis.) The tricky relocation of the knight with 28..Ne8!? 29.Qc5+ Nd6 just looks like another road to zugzwang. 43..g6 looks like a much better endgame, but it's hard not to defer to Gelfand on that one. 44.Ke3 is probably good enough.

Monday is a rest day (Thursday is another), so we can watch AeroSvit, where they are playing eleven rounds with just one rest day. Karjakin leads, and if he holds on to win I get a bonus cookie for my not terribly daring suggestion he was ready for a breakout performance.

Dortmund 07 Begins

It's again time for the powerful sprint that Dortmund has become in recent years. Round one is today. Apparently the live games appear 15 minutes after the rounds begin at 1500 local time, 9am EDT. Eight players, seven rounds, two rest days. The field: Kramnik, Anand, Leko, Mamedyarov, Carlsen, Naiditsch, Gelfand, Alekseev. That last qualified from this year's Aeroflot, an excellent tradition I'd love to see other supertournaments take up. Kramnik's participation was in doubt due to a health scare, but it's now been confirmed he's playing in what has long been "his" event. He tied for first with Svidler last year with +2, his seventh clear or shared first in Dortmund.

With hurricane Kasparov leaving town tomorrow I'll be updating more often. Lots to catch up on.

Update: Mamedyarov beats Naiditsch in the only decisive game of round one. Hard to see 7.Be2 as the novelty of the year, but hey, whatever works. The big Kramnik-Anand showdown was one of those Kramnik Slavs that is either a minuscule endgame edge for White or nothing much at all. This one was the latter.

Aerosvit 2007

It's great to see the return of this powerful event in the Ukrainian Crimean resort of Foros. The first round is Monday the 18th. Here's the official site. Don't see anything on live games; don't think they had them last year. [You can download a client to watch the games, but reviews on functionality are mixed so far.] I tipped the field a few months ago, but it's had one interesting change. That item mentioned Radjabov and not Ivanchuk, but Ivanchuk is playing and Radjabov is not. Perhaps Chukky has become Radjabov's full-time understudy after filling in for him in Morelia? More likely the initial report was erroneous, or just a list of people the organizers were trying to get. Whatever the case, this is again a very strong field, with a few players coming from the candidates matches in Elista. The full list: Svidler, Ivanchuk, Jakovenko, Shirov, Nisipeanu, Sasikiran, Eljanov, Karjakin, Rublevsky, Dominguez, van Wely, Onischuk.

Unfortunately, they are again using a single time-control system of g/120'+30". These inevitably lead to butchered endgames. No matter how much time you start with, or how big the increment, unless there are additional controls the players inevitably get down to the increment sooner rather than later. Yes, this is their own fault, but we should just avoid it with, say, 40/90' + g/60'+30" or something that at least gives the players a chance to catch some wind at some point.

The first round sees the intriguing Ukrainian match-up Karjakin-Ivanchuk. The veteran beat the youngster in 2005 and 2006 and they drew at this event last year. I'm interested in seeing Karjakin, who has been keeping a pretty low profile compared to the super-tournament travels of his peer Magnus Carlsen. He had a miserable European Championship, but has turned in a couple of fine events recently. Might he be due for his own breakout performance on his home turf? He really fell apart here last year, with three losses (and 0.5/3) before a consolation win at the end. Rublevsky is the defending champion. Ivanchuk was second last year.

Flashback Tournaments

Bust out your best pair of cords and turn up the Pink Floyd, we're going to party like it's 1979. At least that seems to be the theme at the Bazna Kings Tournament currently underway in Romania. Is this an anniversary event in which they invite everyone back 25 years later? There must be something going on. It's a strong round-robin, but the youngest player is Andrei Sokolov, who is 44. (Khalifman is 41, but some of his major organs are in their seventies.)

I'm happy to report all of the following are alive and well and playing in Transylvania. The Sibiu area, to be precise. Portisch, Ribli, Andersson, Timman, Vaganian, Chiburdanidze, Suba, Mecking, Beliavsky complete the, umm, 11-player field. (Was Ljubo a late dropout? Nunn?) I'm sure this will come as a shock, but there have been a lot of short draws so far. It really is like the 80's are back. Nothing like a 13-mover in the first round to make you regret wishing our many great veterans had more chances to play. Two of the world's greatest-ever Hedgehog experts, Andersson and Suba, and they decide to skip it. Sigh. Vaganian, bless him, isn't ready for the dustbin and has scored 2/2 to lead. Check out the pawn wall in Vaganian-Mecking. It's just two pawns shy of being an Alterman Wall. Khalifman is also at 100% but he had a rest day after beating Portisch. I'm sure other fighters like Timman and Beliavsky aren't just content to be there. This is all making me want to go rent Breaking Away.

Anatoly Karpov isn't there with his old punching bags because he's playing in the Gorenje tournament in Serbia. This is the first classical tournament Karpov has played in since Carlsen's voice changed and he has a share of the lead with 3.5/5. He even played 1.e4 against Nikolic (!) and 1.e4 e5 against Iordachescu instead of the Caro-Kann he's been over-relying on for years of not studying seriously. I think his last (non-team) classical tournament was coming in last at Essent in 2003, and he made the decision to stick to rapid after that. It's tough for someone so great and so competitive to struggle with age. Nice to see him back and facing players against whom he can show his old black magic. Let's hope he keeps it up.

You get a cookie if you remember the last time Karpov played 1.e4 in a classical tournament game. I thought it might go back to the Polugaevsky Sicilian Thematic in Buenos Aires in 1994, when of course he had to play 1.e4 in all the games. But the MegaBase says it was against Jussupow in 1996. Everybody knows the story of Karpov pretty much giving up 1.e4 after failing to beat Kasparov in game 24 of their 1985 world championship match and losing his title. Garry likes to give that as an example of someone learning to adapt and find his true style, saying it's a big part of why Karpov managed to remain at the top level for another ten years.

June Swoon

That's just my fancy way of saying I've been sick. Bleh. How sick? If I were famous I could hold a charity auction for my mucus. Good, now that you're as disgusted as I am we can move on. (Even my internet connection has caught the bug, it seems.)

Grischuk completed the sweep of the rating favorites by drinking Rublevsky's Scotch to the bottom. It must have been some lousy off-brand junk, or perhaps of the bathtub gin variety. Grischuk won both games with black and survived a little pressure with white to go through in three games. That puts him in Mexico with Kramnik, Anand, Svidler, Morozevich, Leko, Aronian, and Gelfand. Not exactly a lot of new blood thanks to FIDE grandfathering in three-eights of the field, but it's nice to see Aronian and Grischuk there.

The matches were great, much more interesting than most tournaments. The tension of elimination, the narrative drama of head-to-head play, the high stakes of world championship qualification, and enough classical games to sink your teeth into. Of course it would be best if they continued with matches instead of now heading to yet another elite double round-robin, something we aren't in short supply of these days.

Garry Kasparov just arrived in town. He's giving his annual master class to many of America's top kids today and tomorrow for the Kasparov Chess Foundation. I'll be there Sunday for pics and more. (It's the perfect place to distribute this horrible virus I'm carrying across the nation.)

More soon, but for now enjoy some blitz action from the National Open. Don't forget the volume because this one comes complete with trash talk! (?!) I was going to say something about pride going before the fall, but Nakamura won clear first in both this blitz tournament and the main event.

Aronian, Gelfand, Leko to Mexico

Grischuk and Rublevsky are playing tiebreaks tomorrow for the fourth and final spot. That's the last chance for a real underdog to appear in the world championship tournament in September, as Rublevsky would be the only player there rated under 2700. He and Grischuk played another Scotch game in round six. They reached a repetition conclusion so neat and tidy it's hard to not to imagine it wasn't on a board between them sometimes the night before! At least then Grischuk's early draw offer in game five would make more sense. Paranoia aside, it will all be settled tomorrow bright and early when the match of four rapid tiebreak games begins at 5am EDT.

In the other groups, Mr. Elo once again had his wicked way. Gata Kamsky decided that it was just as well to go home a day early by pushing even his vaunted defensive skills beyond the limits of rationality. He lost to Gelfand with white and was eliminated 3.5-1.5. On Chess.FM Jon Speelman quite admired Kamsky's fighting spirit, deciding to play on in a simplified position a pawn down rather than take a draw and come back the next day with the nearly hopeless task of playing a must-win with black against Gelfand. Most of the heat on my fellow Brooklynite is (again) about the opening, in which he must have overlooked a cute liquidation sequence (11..d5!, found by Ivanchuk in 2003) that has been played many times before and which leaves White nothing at all. No doubt frustration at that sour turn of events played a part in his decision to continue on down a pawn instead of taking the last chance at an easy draw with 20.Qxd5. Time trouble helped Kamsky miss 34..Qe6! and it was over.

Thus ended a Quixotic run at the world championship by the world's strongest lawyer Grandmaster. It was both magical and frustrating seeing how well Kamsky could play when he got a chance and knowing he'd rarely get those chances without the opening work required at the highest levels. It was as if Gelfand started every game with a big plus as Kamsky went for difficult, passive positions he knew with black or undemanding lines where there was little hope of getting an edge with white. Still, as rough as the second match was, it was an unexpected bonus to begin with. Kamsky sounded pretty pessimistic as he headed to Elista from Sofia. But he wiped out Bacrot when the Frenchman's nervous system collapsed after he lost the second game on time. Kamsky's knack for patient maneuvering and waiting for his chances worked to perfection. Gelfand wasn't having any of it and, after a few flutters in game two, cracked down mercilessly like the pro he is.

The speculation around Kamsky's chess career, or lack thereof, will now begin anew. Will he hit the database and play full time? Will he drop it completely, popping up now and again just for fun? Or will he continue this curious limbo of being able to maintain a 2700 level despite not playing and studying regularly? Gata enjoys interviews and speculation about his life as much as he enjoys playing the Slav against Gelfand, maybe less. There's no reason he has to make a statement clarifying what he's going to do one way or another, especially since there isn't any reason he should know. Time will tell, although we do hope to hear from him on his wild run.

Peter Leko duly moved on to Mexico City when Bareev dully played his usual Caro-Kann't in a must-win situation with black. The 19-move draw looked straight out of a meaningless team competition, not an elimination game for the right to go to the world championship. Pathetic. Maybe a leopard can't change it's spots, but what the hell? If it's all or nothing you spray-paint some stripes on your raggedy leopard ass and go out like a tiger. Leko returns to the world championship tournament, the only one of the four candidates who played in San Luis 05 to do so. Adams, Polgar, Kasimjanov were eliminated in the first round of matches. It's a pity Anand, Svidler, and Morozevich weren't forced to qualify too.

In game five, Aronian briefly tested Shirov's preparation in the Grunfeld Shirov lost to a spectacular Topalov effort at Corus this year. He passed the test and a draw was agreed without further ado. That set up today's all-or-nothing for Shirov, his second such scenario. In the first round he came back to beat Adams and then eliminate the Englishman in tiebreaks. Aronian was tougher prey and the Armenian favorite held quite easily with black in a Spanish game to eliminate Shirov and move on to Mexico, where he will be a welcome dose of excitement in a field that will miss Topalov's fire. He will also be among the favorites with Kramnik and Anand, I would say, as one of the few players I can see getting hot and reaching +4, which will almost certainly be enough to win clear first. (If Kramnik's uncanny gravitational pull can slow the event to where +2 wins a share of first, then it's more a matter of who will be there with Kramnik.)

But let's save that for another item; we still have a final candidate to push to the eighth rank (on the seventh day, no less) and promote to a world championship participant. Will Mr. Elo claim yet another scalp? If Grischuk goes through it will be a perfect 4/4 for the top seeds from each group of four, although Elo cheated a bit because Ponomariov and Grischuk are both 2717. Grischuk would add more flash and dash to Mexico City than Rublevsky. But as I mentioned before, Rublevsky's second is my old friend Maxim Sorokin and it would be cool to see him in Mexico...

Nakamura Wins National Open

Hikaru Nakamura ruined the fine run of Miami's Renier Gonzalez by beating the leader in the final round of the National Open to take clear first place at 5.5/6 and the $8,000 first prize. The event was part of the Las Vegas International Chess Festival, which included simuls by Viktor Korchnoi and 2007 US champ Alexander Shabalov. Six players, including Korchnoi, tied for 2-7, making around $1,000 each. Nakamura also won the blitz tournament; not sure who won the game/10 event [parsnips says it was Ehlvest].

In the key final game (below) Nakamura perpetrated a Petrosianesque king walk across the board before beginning to massage the black position. Gonzalez erroneously grabbed the e-pawn and the position was ripped open much to White's advantage. (72..Re7 doesn't defend because it's an easy pawn endgame win for White after taking on e7 and swapping queens on e5.) Shabalov again paid the price of loyalty to the Botvinnik Semi-Slav, losing in the 5th round in 25 moves to Black Belt annotator Irina Krush. She'll be able to save time by doing that game for the next issue! If you recall, Shabalov was also, umm, crushed in the BSS by Onischuk at the US Championship. The round 3 Ehlvest-Gonzalez game seems to be MIA. Anyone have it?

[Event "National Open"]
[Site "Las Vegas"]
[Date "2007.06.10"]
[Round "6"]
[White "Nakamura, Hikaru"]
[Black "Gonzalez, Renier"]
[Result "1-0"]
[WhiteELO "2738"]
[BlackELO "2526"]

1.d4 d5 2.c4 c6 3.e3 Bf5 4.Nf3 e6 5.Nc3 Nd7 6.g3 h6 7.b3 Ngf6 8.Bb2 Ne4 9.a3 Be7 10.Bg2 b5 11.cxd5 Nxc3 12.Bxc3 cxd5 13.O-O O-O 14.Qd2 a5 15.Rfc1 Be4 16.Qe2 Qb6 17.Bb2 Rfc8 18.Bf1 Bxf3 19.Qxf3 b4 20.a4 Qb7 21.Bd3 Rxc1 22.Rxc1 Rc8 23.Re1 f5 24.g4 fxg4 25.Qxg4 Qb6 26.Kh1 Bf6 27.Rg1 Nf8 28.f4 Rc7 29.Qh5 Kh8 30.Qe8 Kg8 31.Rf1 Qb7 32.Qh5 Qb6 33.Bc1 Rc3 34.Qd1 Qd6 35.Bb5 Ng6 36.Bd2 Rc8 37.Bd3 Ne7 38.Qh5 Qd7 39.Rg1 Kf8 40.Rf1 Kg8 41.Qh3 Rc7 42.Kg1 Nf5 43.Kf2 g6 44.Rg1 Kh7 45.Qg4 Qf7 46.Ke2 Rc6 47.Kd1 Rc7 48.Qe2 Bd8 49.Bc2 Qf6 50.Qa6 Qe7 51.Kc1 Ra7 52.Qe2 Rc7 53.Kb1 Qf7 54.Bd3 Qf6 55.Bc1 Qf7 56.Bb2 Bf6 57.Ka2 Qd7 58.Bb1 Qc6 59.Qg2 Qe8 60.Bd3 Qf7 61.Qe2 Qd7 62.Rd1 Qg7 63.Bb1 Rd7 64.Qa6 Nxe3 65.Re1 Nf5 66.Rxe6 Bxd4 67.Bxf5 gxf5 68.Bxd4 Qxd4 69.Rxh6 Kg7 70.Qg6 Kf8 71.Qxf5 Ke8 72.Re6 Kd8 73.Qf8 Kc7 74.Re2 Kb7 75.Qe8 Qg7 76.Rc2 Ka7 77.Qc8 Qe7 78.f5 Rb7 79.Qc6 Qd8 80.Qc5 Ka6 81.Re2 Rb6 82.Re7 Qb8 83.Qf2 Rb7 84.Re6 1-0

Candidates 07 R2 Day 5

Day 4 was another epic day of interesting chess, long endgames, and missed chances in Elista. Official site. Rublevsky told the world to stop underestimating him by striking back and leveling his match with Grischuk. He may look like Fred Flintstone and have a predictable opening repertoire, but let's not forget he won clear first at the 2005 Russian championship ahead of Svidler, Kramnik, Morozevich, and other people who get more respect than Rublevsky does on a good day. He's just very inconsistent in a mostly dull way, as compared to the spectacular way Morozevich is inconsistent. Today he played his Scotch again and smoothly took apart all of Grischuk's many pawn weaknesses.

That turned out to be the only decisive game of the day despite the early and late indications that buckets of blood were to be spilled. Kamsky again suffered against Gelfand and he was forced to give up the exchange and search for a blockade. GM Kaidanov on Chess.FM was almost sure Gelfand would find a way through, but Black kept it all under control and Gelfand wasn't going to risk his one-point lead with an unsound try. How tough is Kamsky? His openings look like they're out of Philidor's Analyse du Jeu des Échecs and he handles the clock like someone from an Audrey Niffenegger book. And yet he demolished Bacrot and is hanging on just a point down against the ultra-solid Gelfand. I don't think you can challenge for the world title just by surviving, but it's impressive nonetheless. Gelfand deserves kudos for controlling the play throughout, although his inability to land a KO blow so far could come back to haunt him should Kamsky finally get a playable game with white tomorrow.

Aronian-Shirov saw another surprising endgame miss, although it's hard to say exactly where and how Shirov could have converted his two pawn (!) plus. His rook ended up trapped on the kingside and Aronian's creative defense held the draw after 83 moves. Surely White has to play c4 at some point. A remarkable position and result after some fine play by Shirov to gain what looked like a decisive edge from a minimal plus. Aronian was again aggressive, tossing a pawn for activity early. Don't you wish they were playing a 12-game match? Leko came close to eliminating Bareev with black but couldn't find a safe enough endgame win and let his advantage slip away. He now only needs one draw in the last two games to get to Mexico and he didn't see any reason to risk today.

Grischuk-Rublevsky is the only match that can't end with today's fifth game. Leko only needs a draw with white to eliminate Bareev. Aronian and Gelfand have one-point leads.

USCF Board Elections

Apparently that annoying buzzing sound in my ear has been caused by yet another US Chess Federation board election. Call me irresponsible, and you wouldn't be the first, but over the years this has mostly looked like an exercise of well-motivated, intelligent people finding new and exciting ways to screw things up. Handing things over to a small minority of largely uninformed and/or uninterested members with the controversial "one member one vote" initiative added a dose of randomness that would at least have been entertaining had it not resulted in a mendacious nutball like Sam Sloan landing in a position to do real damage to others and the community at large instead of just to himself and anyone downwind.

Despite its name, the Dirt is mostly about chess and with so many good events lately I haven't wanted to drag it into federation politics (FIDE is a bigger fish). I thought about hosting a correspondence debate or something along those lines, but it seems enough has been said. For the most part I consider myself happily uninformed about the candidates and their positions, although in my defense I don't think much ever comes from those positions anyway. Please don't take this as expert commentary, but people keep asking for an item and my opinion, so this is it. I'd be looking for "sane, sincere, and not out for personal gain," but several of the candidates are relatively unknown. Voting for a known mediocrity over a newcomer with fewer credentials is distasteful. The link above gives position statements from the candidates with comments and endorsements from current board chairman Bill Goichberg, whose tenure and expertise I vaguely endorse despite undeniable conflicts of interest that don't seem to have manifested.

The most visible improvements of recent years, mostly those in Chess Life and uschess.org, are impressive. I'm not going to get into bang for the buck value on those transformations, but speaking only as an end consumer of those resources they are vastly improved. Many people are far too ambitious with what the USCF should be doing when they have enough trouble just doing the basics. Do the ratings, run the magazine and a decent website, find sponsors and organizers for a few official events, support scholastic chess while realizing it's not the holy grail, don't screw the professional players, manage the responsibilities efficiently, and don't go bankrupt. To that minimal charge I would add "welcome and leverage the knowledge and support of your members and the US chess community." There is a massive opportunity for volunteerism that is being squandered.

I don't really want to play the endorsement game because my role has always been one of equal-opportunity criticism. I'd probably be happy with an "anyone but Sloan" campaign, although I assume that's been taken. Since one of the other candidates, Mike Goodall, seems to think Sloan is a positive presence, I add him to my negative slate. Both Susan Polgar and her husband Paul Truong are running. While I wouldn't penalize them for this Bill & Hillary state of affairs as such, creating a de facto two-vote bloc is odd. They've done a great deal for chess in the US. I have taken issue with their take-no-prisoners methods on several occasions. They too often seem to feel that anyone who disagrees with them is an enemy of the state worthy of the most vicious assaults, a philosophy not conducive to collaborative and transparent governance. I'd vote for Susan because she knows chess and is a great ambassador. I'd say her election is a fait accompli anyway. But I'd take Paul only as Bill to her Hillary to save a vote and a voice of diversity on the board. Buy one, get one free.

That's three of ten candidates eliminated and there are four spots up for grabs. I haven't seen or heard anything veto-worthy about the others. I'm voting for Jim Berry because I've heard good things from people I like and trust, simple as that. And I'm generally in favor of new blood. Don Schultz is the oldest of the old blood, but I suppose experience should count for something. It's also possible that keeping him busy on the board will stop him from writing another horrible book. Joe Lux is an unknown to me but his statement was convincingly sincere. It's nice to see someone interested in the US Championship instead of a bunch of pie in the sky piffle based on money they don't have and never will. Let's deal with the problems we have instead of racing around making new ones. There's another vote.

So there you go, for what it's worth. Berry, Polgar, Lux, and a mystery candidate who won't be Sloan, Goodall, or Truong. Can I get back to the candidates matches now? My ear is starting to buzz...

PS Several people hereabouts suggested that the recent fulminations against our free speech by the company MonRoi should become an election issue. That they have become increasingly involved in USCF matters and with some people on the USCF board is clearly worth keeping an eye on. Being poor can mean being bought very cheaply. To my knowledge all of the candidates have remained mum on the matter, although I'm not sure why they would know about it. Dealing with sponsors is always tricky, especially if they are also elves with repressive tendencies.

Browne Cleans Up in Vegas

Berkeley GM and six-time US champ Walter Browne spends much of his time in the poker world these days, both at work and at play. He did a little of both this weekend, as pointed out by Michael Jeffreys. According to this site, Browne made it to the final table of a "No-Limit Hold'em" event at the world championship and finished seventh. His finished with $58,515 and due to his extended run he had to skip the National Open chess tournament at the Las Vegas International Chess Festival that's underway now. I'm sure he'll suffer through without a shot at the $8,000 first prize. (Buy a new laptop, Walter!) As I remember one European GM being quoted as saying recently, "I'm in the top 100 in the world in chess but make ten times more being in the top 10000 in the world at poker." Oh sure, but with poker you have to hang out with showgirls and get free booze. Wait a minute... Actually most of them seem to play mostly online, so I don't think showgirls and comped drinks are on the menu.

I've seen several articles lately about the inevitable deflation of the poker bubble, as the game slowly runs out of new players to take money from and as mediocre players realize the odds don't really favor them over the long run. (Or simply get bored with it as with anything.) But the big events are still drawing tons of players eager to gamble on what has become a very long shot at the top places. This press release certainly doesn't make it sound like they're running out of suckers. But disciplined players, and chessplayers tend to fall into that pattern, can grind out a living without being stars.

During the candidates, much has been said about Grischuk and Bacrot playing more poker than chess these days. Any links or items on the truth of that and how well they've done? Poker, or just about anything for that matter, seems a reasonable career alternative to chess for American players who struggle to make a living at the game under the best circumstances. But when top ten European talent is moving to poker (if that's really happening), it's noteworthy.

Candidates 07 R2 Day 4

It's the home stretch for the candidates and several have their backs against the wall. Bareev is down two against Leko and has looked entirely hopeless. Maybe he doesn't like Mexican food? He won't have to eat any if he loses game four today. Rublevsky has been hanging on by his toenails against Grischuk and will need to show something with white today. I'm still in shock that Grischuk let him off the hook the other day. I'd just been saying how good he was at finishing off attacks. Kamsky has played very tame stuff against Gelfand so far and is down one with two blacks in the final three games. He'll have to force the action now that he's behind. If he can't get his clock under control it won't matter what he plays. (He had around three minutes for the last 20 moves of game three.) Shirov is also down one, against Aronian, but every game has been a slugfest and he'll has white in game six.

You can listen to a free game of the day from the candidates over at Chess.FM. ChessBase has round analysis from GM Marin. Fabulous Freddy is in Elista, so onsite reporting should improve. Higher-res pictures would be nice, eh? The world has moved on from 450-pixel shots that are compressed to death. Servers are faster, transfer capacity is greater, and we're on broadband. Let's see some big pics! The official site is cranking out all sorts of analysis, but isn't much on the interviews and press conferences.

With a draw in game 5, Deep Junior just won the match against Deep Fritz after wins in game 3 and 4. I've never understood why official/important computer events use different hardware. It's bad enough with all the work the "trainers" put into the books. When one machine is running twice as many processors as the other, what's the point? They should all play on a standard platform known well in advance. I know that would be annoying for developers to an extent, but they don't seem to mind grabbing the fastest hardware they can at the last minute. Anyway, it was pretty cool to see them play the triple poisoned pawn sac Najdorf line that's been hot lately. I bet lots of GMs will be giving that one a look.

Didn't have time for much chess since game three. There was a Dissenters' March in St. Petersburg on Saturday and another is tomorrow in Moscow. There were other goings-on on the homefront as well. I've finally added to the list of things I don't have in common with Pushkin, Rimbaud, and Byron. Whew!

Candidates 07 R2 Day 3

We had lots of action the last time these guys had white, so will they try to slam the door or will they play it safe with the lead? Bareev and Shirov suffered unjust fates last time around. They'll have to watch the clock. I'm very curious as to what Kamsky will try to get something going against Gelfand. He got nowhere with his offbeat try against the Najdorf in game one. Note that the official site has game notes and analysis all over the place now.

Candidates 07 R2 Day 2

Underway! Three players are down one after white scored three ones yesterday. A bit busy these days, will get some reports up later.

Hot and cold chess today in Elista. Four draws, two of them of negligible interest on the board. Grischuk calmly neutralized Rublevsky's favorite line of the Scotch and they split the point after just 18 moves. Recapturing on e4 with the knight instead of a pawn didn't impress. Grischuk keeps his one-point lead and takes the white pieces tomorrow. Much more bizarre was Bareev's delayed offer to Leko on move 15, three moves out of theory, likely after realizing that 15..e5 is very strong for Black. Kasparov figured 16.Bg5 would be required. Leko was happy to get a free day with black and his one-point lead. Going down 2-0 in one of these matches is pretty much a death sentence.

The other two games offered more than enough compensatory compensation to compensate for those two lead zeppelins. Shirov played the hot pawn sac in the Queen's Indian against Aronian, obviously not wanting to waste any time leveling the match. It got really wild when he tossed 13.g4 on the fire. Aronian responded in kind and there was full-board action. Aronian decided to give up his queen with 19..Bb7! getting great activity with his pieces. Another way of looking at it was that the alternative 19..Qc8 is a move only a computer would love. (Kasparov called it a great game; about 19..Bb7 he simply said Black had no choice.) Aronian chose the sac and the initiative over White having a rook on the 7th and a menacing queen. Shirov managed to exchange a pair of rooks before Black could double on the d-file, after which the white rook is a spectator. I thought Aronian might even be playing for more until 27..Nxe3, after which only White has chances. White might have tried 32.e4 with e5 and e6 to come to shake up the black position. Aronian found some clever maneuvers to get at the white king and force a draw. Tremendous fun and creative play from both players, just like their first game.

Gata Kamsky played yet another round of survivor and yet again came through in a scramble. Gelfand was really massaging the dubious-looking black position on all fronts for a while, but at some point he just failed to put his foot on a gas. GM Fedorowicz thought that 21.b4 was trying for too much. He kept waiting for Gelfand to get his Nc3 into the game since it didn't look like there was much Black could do. 30.Qb6 looked very strong as well. In mutual time trouble, where Kamsky always seems to shine, Black got his first glimpse of counterplay. It was enough to liquidate the rooks and reach a drawn endgame. Gelfand pushed his a-pawn for a while and could have played longer draws with 49.Qb8+ or 49.dxe5 but preferred to force the draw immediately.

I keep looking at these Kamsky games and I can't figure out whether he's become an anti-positional savant whose horrifying positions really aren't bad at all, or if he's just incredible at defending dubious positions. One cute move the computer looks at is 38..Bg3+, winning the exchange if White captures the bishop because Qxb8 comes with check. 39.Ke2 is fine, transposing into the game, but it would have been annoying in zeitnot. Now we'll see if Kamsky can do something with the white pieces. He can't keep getting zilch with white and hoping for time-trouble magic with black the whole match. Or can he?

Candidates 07 R2 Day 1

Here we go, in search of the final four! Aronian-Shirov, Leko-Bareev, Grischuk-Rublevsky, Kamsky-Gelfand. In each pairing the first player has white in today's first games. Kamsky and Gelfand have exchanged wins since Kamsky's return. Leko and Bareev have only played a few classical games in the past five years. They split wins in Dortmund 2002. Aronian beat Shirov in a famous endgame at the Tal Memorial last November. Grischuk beat Rublevsky a few years ago but I'm a little surprised they haven't played more often. Official site.

Rybka Goes Fishing

A few weeks ago FIDE surprised with the announcement of a computer match between Fritz and Junior with a prize fund of $100,000. It's six games and will take place in Elista alongside the second round of candidates matches, starting tomorrow. Apparently the games will be broadcast live on the official candidates site as well.

IM Vasik Rajlich is the programmer of the chess program Rybka, which has dominated the comp-comp rating lists since its appearance a year and a half ago. He has issued a winner-take-all challenge to FIDE and the winner of their "Ultimate Computer Chess Challenge 2007." To top it off, he offers to spot Rybka's opponent a full point in a 24-game classical match. You can read the full challenge announcement at the Rybka site.

Since both Junior and Fritz are ChessBase products and commercially available, this is a PR event from top to bottom. And there's really nothing wrong with that, by the way. When X3D Accoona hired Irina Krush, Almira Skripchenko, and Zhu Chen to play rapid chess it wasn't with their Elo ratings in mind. (You do have to watch out for slapping "world championship" on every event, however. "Ultimate" has a good pro wrestling vibe to it.) If FIDE thinks this is good promotion – and they say it's "sponsored by FIDE and the head of the Republic of Kalmykia, FIDE President Kirsan Ilyumzhinov" – that's just another curious investment decision from Kirsan, I suppose. (And I'm always skeptical of these FIDE prize fund announcements anyway.) We'll see if it generates any mainstream buzz. If it does, is that good if they mention a comp-comp match and not the candidates matches that qualify for the world championship?

Of course for purists and afritzionados it's a little annoying not to have the top-rated engine participate in such a high-profile match. There was no qualifier other than a good working relationship between FIDE and the top chess software company, ChessBase. Again not a problem in my eyes since it's a PR match and the general public hasn't heard of any chess computer other than Deep Blue, if that. Chess programming is a business, too. As I pointed out when it was announced, anyone with a few hundred bucks could host a Junior-Fritz match at home. (Or a Rybka-Fritz-Junior tournament to 100 rounds.) It's not as if six games is going to establish supremacy. Unlike the candidates matches, there is no next step. Unless of course FIDE takes Vasik Rajlich up on his challenge!

I do like the idea of the candidates and computer match in parallel. It gives us an opportunity to examine the quality of comp-comp chess as it stands today. It will be interesting to see how obvious it is, if it is, which game of the five is between Fritz and Junior. Hint: if it's a 22-move draw it's between the humans.

Candidates 07 R1 Tiebreaks

Boris Gelfand beats Rustam Kasimjanov and Alexei Shirov knocks out Mickey Adams. Both took just three rapid games. Aronian and Carlsen went all the way to blitz, where Aronian just finished winning both games to move on. A heroic fight from the 16-year-old Norwegian. Official site.

The final set of matches: Bareev-Leko, Grischuk-Rublevsky, Aronian-Shirov, Kamsky-Gelfand. They begin Wednesday, June 6. More soon.

Candidates 07 R1 Day 6

Preview: Five matches still going today and only two are tied at the start of the action. Carlsen-Aronian and Gelfand-Kasimjanov are equal at 2.5-.2.5, although the former has seen four decisive games and the latter none. Aronian and Kasim have white. Bareev-Polgar, Adams-Shirov, and Rublevsky-Ponomariov all need a win from the second player. Of those three, only Shirov has white today.

Bareev and Rublevsky through to meet Leko and Grischuk, respectively. Polgar and Ponomariov are out. Shirov beat Adams for force tiebreaks! Carlsen played some defense (about the first time in this match anyone has) to draw and go to tiebreaks against Aronian. Kasimjanov and Gelfand drew their sixth in a row and that's the third rapid match tomorrow. Kamsky awaits the Kasimjanov-Gelfand winner and the Aronian-Carlsen winner plays the Shirov-Adams winner. The second round of matches begins June 6, Wednesday. Same format.

Note that the tiebreaks start two hours earlier, 5am EDT (9am GMT, 1pm local Elista). The official site says they're the same time as the rest of the rounds but Misha on the scene in Elista confirms that it's the earlier time. It's the same tiebreak format as the Topalov-Kramnik WCh match. Four rapid games at 25'+10" (brutal), then two blitz at 5'+10" then armageddon at 6' vs 5' (no increment) and black has draw odds.

Happy Birthday to Gata Kamsky, who turns 33 today. Despite his long layoff he'll be six years younger than his opponent in the next round should Gelfand beat Kasimjanov (27).

Candidates 07 R1 Day 5

Preview: Two more matches can end today with just a draw, Bareev-Polgar and Grischuk-Malakhov. If Aronian beats Carlsen that one is over, same goes if Adams beats Shirov or if Rublevsky takes out Ponomariov again. I'm on the verge of losing my bet with Kasparov that four matches would go to rapid playoffs. I'm happy about it though because I really thought they'd be playing much more conservative chess. (And Polgar-Bareev and Kamsky-Bacrot were two of my 3-3 picks. Oops.) With Brooklyn already through and France (family alliance with my bro-in-law. Sorry J-B!) eliminated, my cheering today is with Carlsen to equalize and set up a dramatic game six with Aronian. A crushing win by Polgar in an Advance Caro would also be nice. Get your live games while they're hot.

Secrets of Grandmaster Success! That's first round winner Gata Kamsky of Brooklyn, USA, in Elista taking it easy with some fine web literature before his second-round match against either Kasimjanov or Gelfand. Gelfand is trying to squeeze a win in a rook endgame but most bets, including that of GM Speelman, say draw. [Yep, drawn quickly, leaving their match at 2.5-2.5.]

Carlsen beat the unstable (!) Aronian easily to again equalize their match. It's winner take all tomorrow in game six, Aronian with white. GM Nielsen, a Carlsen coach, pointed out early on how odd it is that they are taking turns just crushing each other. All four wins have been very one-sided. Today Carlsen had a strong mating attack but decided to go into an endgame instead. A little strange perhaps, but he won it easily enough so no complaints! Grischuk is through to the next round after drawing with Malakhov today. Polgar smashed through against Bareev to win and stay alive. She'll have to win again tomorrow with black to force tiebreaks. Rublevsky held Ponomariov and Pono will have to win tomorrow with black or go home. Adams-Shirov was also a draw and Alexei with have white in game six in a must win.