August 2009 Archives

Whew, another busy weekend. Are you boxing up your old chess junk yet? The list of worthy causes is growing!

The top boards on the Experience team added wins on the final day to increase the final margin of their victory in the NH Tournament to five points, 27.5-22.5. Svidler beat Nakamura for the second time and Nielsen beat Hou Yifan; both wins came with the black pieces. Jan Smeets drew with van Wely after one original move in a, fittingly enough, Scheveningen Sicilian. That sealed his top placement in the Rising Stars group, which means he'll play at the Melody Amber rapid/blindfold supertournament in Nice next year. The affable Dutch champion came on Chess.FM for a while to chat and sounded as surprised as the rest of us! He's studying economics at university and doesn't play often, but the 24-year-old said he'd postpone some of his studies to make a go of it at Amber next March. Congrats to him on the big win.

Nakamura's misery continued and he lost his second white in a row. In the 8th round Beliavsky's strong center play out of a Giuoco Piano led to a kingside attack that won material. Today the American champ's desire to take the opening into less charted waters earned him an inferior position. Avoiding Svidler's renown expertise in the Grunfeld isn't a bad idea, of course, but the GM consensus today was that Black and his big lead in development were for choice after just a dozen moves. Nakamura got his chances in tactical complications, however, and had he played 21.d6!? things might have followed a very different path. Incredibly, the typically insanely fast American champion was already in severe time trouble (! Nakamura!) by the time he blundered with 24.Re1. (24.Rd1 is the only reasonable defense.) Svidler didn't miss his chance and scored a tactical knockout with 24..Ng4! It would have been even faster had he then found the pretty 26..Bh6! Larry Christiansen showed on ICC Chess.FM.

Nielsen, the top overall scorer in the event with a solid +3, also showed that the veterans don't only win with long endgame grinds. He offered a piece sacrifice against Hou Yifan in a line of the Giuoco Piano (what is this, 1840?) that has been considered bad for White since Shirov beat Adams in their candidates match in 2007. The slow white play with h3 and Nh2 allows Black a quick attack on the g-file with ..g5 and ..g4 and it didn't seem like Hou Yifan had seen it before. White was already close to lost after 12..gxh3!, although to the Chinese's credit she found enough play to make Nielsen work a little for the win.

Caruana finished second on the youth team with an even score. He scored his only win against Svidler in the 9th round when the Russian underestimated the dangers in an endgame where he was better for a long time and then suddenly losing to a runaway black h-pawn. The Brooklyn/Italian teen missed a win against Nielsen a day earlier in a wonderfully sharp game. The clearest win was going into a winning pawn endgame with 35.Re7+ Bf7 36.Rxf7+! and White wins when all the pieces come off. The a-pawn becomes a decoy that gives the white king enough time to come around and take the g-pawn. White's g-pawn is faster than black's d-pawn.

Stellwagen also showed signs of life in the later rounds, though he'll be remembered most for what he missed in his win against van Wely in the 9th. Some nice preparation based on van Wely's KID win over Radjabov at the 2008 Olympiad gave Stellwagen a nice attack. Apparently van Wely hadn't spent much time analyzing his victory because he spent a lot of time and almost immediately blundered. The computers all suddenly went nuts announced a spectacular mate that few if any of the assembled Grandmaster spectators could see. Stellwagen spent a long time but couldn't find it either, even when presented with two chances. Lucky for him and his family he went on to win anyway; had he not he would have been on suicide watch for a while. Stellwagen's missed immortal game went 28..Bc3+ 29.Bd2 Qg3! 30.Bxc3 e3! 31.Qd4 Rf1+! 32.Kxf1 Qf2#. Black is down a knight, bishop, and rook but mates with just his queen and a pawn. Legendary. Such a shame. Plus, missing the mate cost Stellwagen most of the much-coveted bragging rights over van Wely.

Nakamura's miserable health status didn't stop him from playing some very entertaining and aggressive chess; it only stopped him from playing good chess most of the time. He'll shed a huge chunk of rating points, though in a custom-made twist FIDE has decided to put out the first ever September rating list that of course doesn't include this result. That locks Nakamura in at 2735 and the #16 spot in the world. Apparently the rating list is now going to come out every two months.

The children, 2600+ though they may be, are not being spoiled in Amsterdam. The "Experience" team extended its lead over the "Rising Stars" in the NH Tournament to four points today thanks to wins by Nielsen over Smeets and Beliavsky over Caruana. Nielsen's win was slow and then sudden, coming after a long unwind that landed Smeets in terrible time trouble. The Dutch champ resigned after blundering horribly with around 30 seconds on his clock. Caruana "forgot everything" in the opening, his words to Macauley after the round. Big Al remembered and punished Black for his undeveloping sins in just 25 moves. The other three games were drawn, including a predictably wild show between two of the game's sharpest fighters, van Wely and Nakamura.

Caruana had drawn all his games before this and was really the only person with more than a fantasy chance of catching Smeets, who started the round on +3. That Caruana lost the same time as Smeets shows that the fates really are looking out for the Dutchman on his home turf. He still has a 1.5 point lead with just three rounds to play. His clock handling was suspect in the last round as well and you wonder if nerves are working on him a bit as the finish line approaches. He's three rounds away from collecting the prized invite to next year's Melody Amber tournament.

My fortune cookie tonight -- actually my first of three since my wife doesn't like them -- read, "don't be so critical and overly concerned about details." So I won't spend too much time on the losses by the youth team today. Smeets equalized against Nielsen by the time he played 15..e5, according to GM Kaidanov on Chess.FM. But the Dane had the bishop pair and lots of patience while Smeets was unable to find a plan. He drifted into time trouble and Nielsen made tiny improvements in his position. Eventually these two tendencies collided. Smeets had a shot at salvation with 34..Nxb3 and the disjointed black pieces somehow hold things together after 35.Rb1 Nc5 36.f4 Rxe4. In the game he blundered twice and Nielsen didn't pardon.

Caruana, in a popular line of the Queen's Indian, managed to forget Black usually plays 9..Nc6 instead of losing a tempo with a bishop retreat. It was playable, if difficult, but it also cost Caruana on the clock. Beliavsky didn't need an invitation to home in on d6 and bust with 12.e5 and Black was already fighting for his life. Clearly disconcerted, Caruana put up little resistance, tossing a pawn and then blundering a few tactics before resigning down a full piece. Really ugly stuff.

Once again the game that got most of our attention was that of Hikaru Nakamura. True to his word he threw down the gauntlet with black against van Wely, opening with 1.d4 g6 and heading into a funky Benko Gambit position that eventually looked like White could play it without much risk. But Nakamura found a way to complicate with the shot 16..e5!? Soon Black had his pawn back and good activity for his pieces. Van Wely didn't give ground, however, and went on the attack himself. Nakamura's 40..Qe6 allowed White's attack to reach dangerous levels and 41..h6? put him on the edge of disaster. Suddenly after 42.Qd8! the white queen and rook were coming in with mating threats and Nakamura needed to use a lot of his time to find the one defensive chance, a rook sac for a perpetual check. Nakamura played with total precision after that, walking his king on a tightrope all the way across the center of the board under fire. Eventually it was Black's turn to check and it was quickly a perpetual. Wild! It might have ended differently had van Wely found 43.Nf4, a nice attack/defense combo move. 43..Qd7 44.Qxd7 Nxd7 45.Rxd6 Nf6 isn't simple to break down though. The silicon rope-a-dope move 44.Qa5! keeps Black under severe pressure. The big battle we expected.

In the oldest vs youngest battle Ljubojevic failed to bamboozle Hou Yifan in slightly better endgame. Svidler thought he was getting somewhere with 21.e6 against Stellwagen, only to realize before he played it that Black was winning after 21..fxe6 22.Rxe6 Kg7 with ..Nc8 coming instead of the 22..Kf7? he'd been counting on. (Putting the king on a light square.) Svidler still had time to bail out into a pawn-down rook endgame he held easily.

Speaking of illness, I'm sick of wading through boxes here at our new apartment. The Great Chess Junk Recycling Revel is coming! Many people have already contacted me about worthy causes, mostly clubs, programs, and schools. What I would really like to do is make this a group project, in which all of you with a bunch of surplus chess junk (in other words, all of you), especially books, can join in. My plan would be to auction a few items that would generate money for a general chess recycling postage fund, so I could reimburse you for your shipping costs (optional, of course).

The Dirt will also serve as matchmaker (NOT warehouse) for the stuff. So if you have good books for kids, or extra sets or software, etc. it can get to a good home. We know enough people, and people who know people, to verify it's not going to end up on Ebay. And by good home I mean an institution of some sort where it is needed and will be used and appreciated -- not just collect someone else's dust. (Or end up at a rich private school where they should be buying new books and keeping England's GMs in chips and ale.) All donations will be made public here, as will any letters of thanks. If we're lucky might find someone in your area who can pick your stuff up, obviating the need for packing and postage.

So I'll start putting a few Kasparov-signed items up for auction on Ebay and mentioning them here. Keep in mind this is for a charitable cause, and your support will earn you eternal gratitude and fame on the Great Chess Junk Recycling Hall of Fame board, coming soon! I don't want to leave individuals out entirely, but there are already enough places for people to buy or trade used chess stuff for themselves, no? If you just want to donate to the postage fund, use the donate button on the left of the homepage and specify it's for the Recycling Revel.

As for you, get going! Put together a box of stuff (dust it off, please) and itemize it. Take a few pictures while you're at it. It can be one or two books or dozens of books with some software and a set tossed in, whatever is working and still useful. Let me know what you have by email and I'll let you know where to send it. We'll try to be as local as possible. Send it as cheaply as you can (for obvious reasons this is limited to the US unless you're paying your own postage) and let me know if you want reimbursement. Think of how warm and fuzzy you'll feel when you see the pics of kids thumbing through your old books. And think how happy your wife will be to have all that shelf space back. If you haven't looked at it or used it in a few years, recycle it! Your book could help the next Bobby Fischer. (No, that doesn't mean send in your old copy of Mein Kampf.) Let the Recycling Revel begin!

Quote of the day: "Well, if I go 4/4 I can still win." -- Hikaru Nakamura, in reply to a question about his illness at the NH Tournament and whether he would play solidly and rest now that he's so far off the pace.

Love it. Seriously, if Nakamura's crazy I wish we could bottle it and pass it around. He saw a doctor but the antibiotics haven't done much so far. I suggested that since his nosebleed during his last game he had a ready-made title for a future game collection, "Blood on Board." With thanks to Shirov, of course. Macauley's scoop on his 8.Nb3 being intentional demonstrates in equal measure his creativity, combativeness, and hubris! And maybe his illness, since you've got to be sick with something to toss your e-pawn on move eight...

Jan Smeets (rhymes with "fates") is proving that playing well is the best revenge on the doubters like me. I didn't give anyone other than Nakamura and Caruana a chance to make a plus score against the tough Experience squad at this year's NH Tournament. But after six of ten rounds the 24-year-old Dutch champion is the only player on the Rising Stars with a plus, and it's +3, a 2800+ performance. He played a nice control game to take out Beliavsky for the second time and take a commanding lead in the race to qualify for next year's Melody Amber tournament. The chance to butt heads with the world's best at rapid and blindfold in Nice next year seemed to be Nakamura's destiny before the event, but as the old saying goes, that's why we play the games.

Smeets impressed this time by steadily outplaying the veteran Beliavsky, who, lest we pity a fading legend in his dotage, is still rated 30 points higher than Smeets. This queenless middlegame shouldn't contain too much poison, but the Dutchman did a lot with the extra tempi Black handed him with the inaccurate 12..h6. White was about ready to reap the pawn harvest when he fell into Beliavsky's crafty counterplay against his king. (30.Ng3 would have kept the knight close enough to help on the defense.) So Smeets had to deliver a perpetual check. Except there was one problem, Beliavsky avoided it! Much like Nakamura a few minutes earlier, Beliavsky was quickly punished for his courage in rejecting a draw. Smeets only had a few minutes on his clock for four moves, but it was Big Al who blundered, playing 38.Nb5 instead of interpolating 38.Rb2+ first. (Black is also much worse there; probably 37..Nc5+!? was his last best chance.) That allowed Smeets to cover b2 with his knight and then, on the last move before time control, to calmly put his bishop on b1, where it is out of danger and headed to d3 with terrible effect.

Nakamura's lunatic travel schedule might not have caused the illness he's suffering from but it couldn't have helped. How is he going to overcome playing most of his events while based in Seattle, as rumor has it? Well, he's made it to the top 20 while staying based in the US and still playing American opens and Joel Benjamin confessed he didn't think that would be possible. Still, it's got to be a handicap, as sad as it would be to see the US champ set up camp in Europe half the year.

Nakamura lost his second in a row today, falling to Ljubojevic in a game that is very difficult to describe even after watching it move by move with GM Christiansen. Nakamura played what is considered a routine blunder on move eight against Ljubojevic's Accelerated Dragon. Only he can say whether or not 8.Nb3 was a wild provocation (wild even by his standards) or a pseudoephedrine-induced oversight (more likely). Both are hard to imagine but one must be the case. [Macauley posts an audio interview with Nakamura on the Chess.FM blog. Nakamura says 8.Nb3 was played with the intent of sacrificing the pawn. I'm glad he was up for talking despite what must be a very disappointing week and that he's staying positive for the rest of the event, which he concedes has been pretty much locked up by Smeets.] I've played the Acc. Dragon for 20 years and seen countless blitz opponents fall into that trap. (White has to castle first and then can play Nb3.) It gets a ? in every book. Larry C just couldn't believe it. Perhaps even more amazing was that Nakamura actually managed, with Ljubo's help (both ..Qg4 and ..Qh5 seem dubious), to get compensation and then later to have a forced draw available (and then to refuse it!). Horrible and amazing, sort of like Usain Bolt tying his shoes together at the start of a race but getting close to a win anyway.

Had Nakamura played 27.Qa6!? he might have even been playing for that win. The threat of Rb7 followed by Qa7 is strong and the black king probably has head for the hills. A few moves later White needed to force a draw with 29.Rxc8 Bxc8 30.Rb8! Kd7 (30..Qh2+ 31.Kf1 Qh1+ 32.Bg1 Kd7 33.Qb5+ also with a perpetual) 31.Qb5+ Ke6 32.Qc4+ and White can't stop checking. Instead he tried 29.Qb5+ and the black king achieved enough safety for his counterattack to be lethal. Down to the last moment LarryC was finding perpetual check swindles for White, but Ljubo was accurate till the end -- despite having to deal with startling moves like 46.Be3.

With Smeets winning a draw was pretty much worthless to Hikaru in the only race that really matters, so playing all or nothing made sense. Now with the ticket to Amber out of reach he might settle down a bit and protect his rating a little more. But as long as he had even a remote chance of beating Ljubojevic today he was going to push. And Ljubo is known for self-destructing in sharp positions in time trouble in these events. It's just that this year he's in much better form. Three wins! That's as many as he had in the last three events combined. (A vintage Ljubo pic for inky as long as someone is nearby to catch her if she gets the vapors.)

Svidler played the Pirc in the hopes of getting a complicated game against Hou Yifan. But apparently he did his preparation by googling "young Asian girls" and got a position that was anything but complicated when she forced the queens off with 11.Qg5. White can play for a plus here but 15.Ne2 was one knight retreat too many and Black broke in the center comfortably for a quick draw. Stellwagen hotted things up against Nielsen with a piece sac. After various exchanges they agreed to a draw by mutual fear in what would have been an interesting endgame to see played out. Caruana-van Wely was an old school Scheveningen that followed Karpov-Ljubojevic (!), a game I watched in person in Buenos Aires in 1994. Here Black got an advantage when Caruana declined to capture the rook on e3. With neither bishop playing they decided it was hopeless to continue and agreed the draw. Remarkably, that made six draws in a row each for two very combative players.

Another free day on Thursday, this one apparently due to an overbooking at the hotel. Check out the official site and chess.fm/blog for videos and reports.

Wins by Svidler over Nakamura and Beliavsky over Stellwagen put the Experience team back up to a two point lead over the Rising Stars at the NH Tournament in Amsterdam. (Official site round 5 report.) The showdown between the top-rated players, and the Russian champ vs the American champ, was a one-sided affair. As he did just a few weeks ago in San Sebastian, Nakamura played the Caro-Kann against Svidler. But unlike last time, a quick draw from strength for Black, things didn't go very well for Nakamura here. They followed a frisky modern sideline of the Advance Variation with 8..g5. Black varied from praxis with 12..Bxc5 when the few previous tries all went with 12..Be4. That funny-looking move looks less funny in hindsight, considering the numerous structural difficulties Black had in today's game.

It was always going to be tough to find a home for the black king, but the position did seem to have the sort of dynamic potential Nakamura thrives on. Yet it only took a few second-best moves to turn it into a positional nightmare against Svidler's calm and accurate play. The final lemon in the lemonade, according to Svidler, was Nakamura's energetic but anti-positional 19..g4, after which it's nearly impossible for Black to cover all his weaknesses. Just a few moves later Black felt he had to dump the g-pawn for a shred of counterplay, which wasn't much of a shred after Svidler's 24.e6! activated the white pieces to decisive effect. Nakamura put up about as much resistance as possible down the exchange without ever putting the result in doubt. The American let his time run out instead of resigning.

There's never any shame in losing to a player as strong as Svidler with the black pieces, but on-site reports make it clear Nakamura's still coughing and sneezing and in need of a longer rest than he's going to get with tomorrow's off day. Smeets has a full point lead over Nakamura and Caruana in the hunt for the golden ticket to Melody Amber 2010. He was in another interesting game today with van Wely, an interesting novelty at the start (11..g5!?) and a sharp four-rook endgame at the finish. Beliavsky won the battle of the tailenders against Stellwagen. Ljubojevic and Caruana shuffled around for a long time in a Hedgehog, delaying the action until the time control. A few moves later Caruana had an unusual winning move on offer, 45..Nc6!, trapping the white queen or winning a piece. But he missed his chance and 30 moves later it was drawn. Hou Yifan defended against Nielsen's Catalan with accuracy that impressed Larry Christiansen on Chess.FM

In the last year Vassily Ivanchuk has gone from #3 in the world to out of the top 30 and now it looks like he'll be back in the top five. If a foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of small minds, Ivanchuk's mind must be enormous. He capped off his rating rally today with a final-round victory over Akopian that made him the clear winner of the Jermuk Grand Prix in Armenia. His +4, 8.5/13 score was a half-point clear of Gelfand and Aronian.

With this strong result Aronian, who beat Inarkiev in the final round, actually clinched first place in the Grand Prix series even though there's another tournament coming. He took clear first in his two previous GP events in Sochi and Nalchik. That makes the Armenian one of the two GP qualifiers for the next stage of the world championship. The GP standings are here, though Jermuk hasn't been added yet. Congrats to Aronian. This also likely kicks a rating spot down the list a notch, where Kramnik is waiting.

Peter Leko's sad-sack routine added another chapter in Jermuk. Starting the final round sharing the lead with Ivanchuk, Leko lost to Gelfand to finish =4-6 with Kasimjanov and Alekseev. This was a repeat of his loss to Aronian in the final round in Nalchik, when he was again in the lead. These are only the most recent late collapses in Leko's career. Of course the most famous was losing the final game of his 2004 WCh match with Kramnik. Add the final-round loss to Kramnik at Dortmund 2006, again when tied for first, and losing his last two games at Linares 2006 (yep, was in clear first and finished fourth). What I'm trying to say is that Leko should start burning down playing sites with a few rounds to go.

No shame in losing to Gelfand though. The Israeli was in fine form throughout and played a nice steady grind before sealing the deal in a bishop endgame. Ivanchuk's last-round win was also the work of a professional craftsman more than a piece of modern art sensationalism. He's just very, very strong and after he found 32..f5! and ruined the white structure, Akopian was going to have a very bad day in Jermuk. Akopian played all the way down to trying a few stalemate tricks, perhaps hoping to help his teammate take a share of first, but there was no Chucky meltdown today. Let's hear it for the veterans. 40 is the new 20!

The Zuerich Chess Club 200th Anniversary Jubilee events are continuing. Yesterday was simuls, today is the rapid tournament with Anand, Hug, Karpov, Khalifman, Kramnik, Polgar, Ponomariov and Topalov. Results here. Games live now here, with cool webcam. -- Kramnik just beat Karpov in 17 moves to win the event.

Simul scores and photos here. Ponomariov made a clean 25-0 score while Karpov and Spassky predictably had a rougher time of it. Main site in English here.

The NH Tournament in Amsterdam has three rounds in the books. Today there was a game that had more excitement in it than the other 14 played so far combined. I don't know how today's battle between Beliavsky and Nakamura looks to those going over it at home after the fact. But watching it live on ICC Chess.FM with Nick de Firmian today was a remarkable experience. As so often happens in the King's Indian -- something of a surprise from Nakamura, who last used it against Karpov a year ago -- just when it looks like White is completely winning Black lashes out with spectacular tactics to turn the tables. At least that's the way it goes when Black does well, of course. Often enough White really is completely winning and Black's tactics are just a funeral pyre, as in Stellwagen's brief, doomed flurry against Nielsen in the first round.

I'm not sure if it's good news or bad that Nakamura is on +1 after coming very close to wins in his first two games. As the missed wins would attest, he's actually not in very good form after an insane few weeks of world travel. (You can follow him on his blog.) Sick enough, in fact, to have gone to throw up during today's game. (Not actually on the board. That would be the dreaded Bon Scott Attack, or maybe the George Bush Sr. Gambit.) But today the US champ played what some were calling the game of the year by the time Beliavsky resigned. Actually, what marred the game was Beliavsky's unsurprisingly weak resistance toward the end. He'd gotten into some time pressure and must have been reeling from the sharp turn of the game.

By move 20, Beliavsky had achieved the type of queenside domination and breakthrough White dreams of in the King's Indian. Nakamura's choice of the traditionally suspect 9..Ne8 line had been questioned throughout and it looked like Big Al, who was crushing the KID back during its 80s Kasparov-led renaissance, was about to show the whippersnapper how to break it off old school. The computers had buried Nakamura and put flowers on his grave, hitting +2 or higher for white. And when the speedy Nakamura finally took a long think it was seen as a sign he was finally realizing he was in trouble.

As it turned out, that was all pretty much crap. The stunning clearance sac 21..Nxe4!! flipped the script and put White under terrible pressure. Not only do the comps miss this, the mating tactics are so deep they continue to misevaluate it for a long time. Beliavsky tried to bail out with 22.Ne6 and to give back as much material as he could to break the black assault, but he just couldn't deal with the multiple threats. And getting hit with moves like 28..b5! doesn't help either. From some brief analysis it looks like White can fend off the attack with the computer-cool move 22.Qc2!, ignoring the knight on e4 and the rook on a8. It's a wild mess after 22..gxh2+ 23.Kxh2 Ng3 24.Nxa8 e4. Probably even stronger for Black is the thematic 22..Qh4 22.h3 Bxh3 24.gxh3 Ng5. It may well be White is almost lost at the very moment it looks like he's crashing through with an easy win after 21.Nxc7. Amazing. Maybe 27.Ra2 saves?

Just when it looked over, GM de Firmian and I were surprised to see 30..Qh1+ when it looked like 30..e3 was a clear-cut crusher. Was Nakamura's hasty play going to cost him another win, as against Ljubojevic in the first round? (A fascinating game by the way, full of aggressive and original ideas from both players. It only went sideways in the endgame.) There was further consternation when Black passed up another attacking continuation to grab material with 33..Nxf1+. But the joke was on us when just a move later Beliavsky resigned, both players having seen clearer than the gobsmacked commentary team. The quiet killer in the final position is 34..Qg1+ 35.Ke2 Rc3! and the black rook and queen are deadly after many checks. Still, a little surprising Beliavsky didn't force Nakamura to play till time control, though the American had plenty of time against Beliavsky's 3-4 minutes.

Whew, what a game! Seriously, if Nakamura takes up the KID regularly he deserves to double his appearance fees. Thrilling stuff. Blowing up the 55-year-old Beliavsky isn't the same as beating Kramnik, obviously, but this was really something to see from a very difficult position. I thought Radjabov was the only person who could pull this sort of thing off. We had to ignore the other four games and admittedly didn't feel like we missed much. Nakamura is now tied with Smeets on +1 for the golden ticket to the Melody Amber tournament next year. Ljubojevic, apparently a new rising star himself at 58, beat Stellwagen to lead all players with +2. I know a certain inky who is very very happy right now. Viva Ljubo!

Reports, video, and more on the official site. The ICC Chess.FM live audio is free to all from there, come check us out. Non-members can even listen to the Game of the Day analysis recap by the GM at chessclub.com and participate in the trivia competition for a $75 gift certificate to House of Staunton every round.

Yah yah, "what is this, the Weekly Dirt now?" But the new apartment is down to around 20 boxes. I even found the bath mat. Very exciting.

The Jermuk Grand Prix is trundling toward its conclusion tomorrow. Half the field is eligible for the top spot. Leko and Ivanchuk are tied for the lead with efficient +3 undefeated scores. Kasimjanov was also in the leading group until Boris Gelfand took him out today. Both are now in the chasing pack a half-point back with Aronian and Alekseev. Leko got little against Aronian in a Lopez today.

The other decisive game of the 12th round must have been a huge relief for the winner. Since 2007 Gata Kamsky has faced Pavel Eljanov of Ukraine five times. He has lost five times. An amazing stat, and after around three in a row I wondered if it had anything to do with Eljanov working as Gelfand's second when the Israeli beat Kamsky in their 2007 candidates match. But 5/5 goes beyond an opening nuance here and there, so it was nice to see Kamsky break the hoodoo and move up to -1 in the tournament.

The drawing percentage of 61% is about average and there have been some really wild games, especially if you look beyond the wins at a few of the draws. In the 11th round Aronian walked on the wild side against his Olympiad teammate Akopian on their home soil. In an unassuming position out of a Semi-Slav, Aronian tossed out 22..f5!?, a pawn sac right in front of his own king. The point was lever open the long diagonal to the white king. Aronian didn't stop there, giving up a rook with check to a promoted pawn. Really fantastic stuff. It was all working out for Black but he needed one more pretty move, 31..Ne5!, and he missed it. Soon afterward it fizzled into an oppo-bishop endgame draw. This game really typifies Aronian's "high-class va banque" style. It's somehow coffeehouse, but with really strong coffee.

Another game that stood out when I finally had a few moments to scan the file was Eljanov giving a demonstration of how not to play the Berlin Defense. It's hard to say how someone with as much experience in this line as Eljanov could fall apart as quickly as he did against Alekseev. On the other hand, checking the recent database stats of Eljanov in the Berlin, maybe he should give it up. He seems to lose about half his games with it.

As he did in the last GP, Peter Leko will head into the final round in the lead and with black against another contender. Last time he lost to Aronian. This time he'll face Gelfand. Ivanchuk, the other leader, has black against Akopian. Aronian has white against tailender Inarkiev. The final round starts 90 minutes earlier, live here at 4:30am EDT.

The official site -- and the GP sites have been consistently good on content and technical stability -- has some nice round reports and now a few clips with the legendary Yugoslav GM Svetozar Gligoric, who is there as a special guest. It's a funny coincidence because I just used the 86-year-old in a Chess.FM trivia question during the NH tournament, where I'm trying to come up with various young and old themed questions. (It was to name the player who, at 78, played in his national championship and made a 50% score. Hint, the country doesn't exist anymore.)

Gahh, crazy work deadlines and radio and boxes, oh my! It's a wild week here, and I'm scrambling to stay conscious. Sounds like a perfect day for some chess radio on ICC Chess.FM. GM Joel Benjamin will be breaking down all the action at the first round of the fourth NH Tournament, which pits a team of veterans ("Experience") against a team of younger players ("Rising Stars"). (I'm told the audio stream will also be available free at the official site!) Last year was a 33.5-16.5 blowout for the youth squad, so there's not so much gray hair on the veteran team this year.

It's Svidler, Nielsen, Beliavsky, van Wely, and Ljubojevic on one side. On the other it's Nakamura, Caruana, Smeets, Stellwagen, and Hou Yifan. The big prize is in play between the five teammates. Best score (if over 50%) will qualify the player for next year's Melody Amber blindfold and rapid tournament in Nice. It's hard to picture anyone other than Nakamura and Caruana having a shot at it, frankly, and the top seeds have usually done well in these events. Carlsen, Karjakin, and Wang Yue are the previous winners. Nakamura will also be looking to add even more rating points to his lofty 15th position on the Live List. But with top-ten talent like Svidler on board one, solid pros Nielsen and van Wely, and Big Al still hitting for distance on a good day, the veterans should make this one much more competitive.

Inky's dear Ljubo is welcome anywhere, any time, of course, and will no doubt blow at least three winning positions in time trouble and have at least one entertaining tantrum. He's managed to win exactly one game in each of the previous editions. Who will he nail this time? I'm still keeping the flame alive for Hou Yifan, whose trajectory has slowed considerably in the past year. She's still just 15 though, so anything can happen. More 2600+ opposition is the only hope.

Well, all of my worldly possessions have moved 200 meters to the east and my wife, daughter, two cats, and computer are still in working order. The new place is a disaster area of boxes and close to 2000 books (around half of the chess variety, the ones you're helping me get rid of). I'm battered, bruised, bleeding and bexausted. But it's a great new space, baby has her own room at last, and the air conditioner is in. That last just led to the discovery that the electrical system in this building is a horror show; apparently the landlord isn't much on maintenance. But at least the 3rd-floor walk-up will have me slimmed down in no time, whew.

Meanwhile, during all this I had to push a deadline for a 3500-word World Affairs article I'm working on with Garry, so I'm still not going to be around here too much this week. Then the ICC Chess.FM live coverage of the NH Tournament in Amsterdam (old lions vs young tigers, with Russian champ Svidler and US champ Nakamura starring) starts on Thursday. Maybe by then we'll have found a few other important things around here, such as the remote controls, the bathmat, and my underwear. Sweaty. At least we found the coffee maker 'cos I'm gonna need it.

Speaking of substance abuse, where's FIDE with their piss cups when you need them in London? Either Nigel Short is on something or the Dutch players he was annihilating at the Staunton Memorial found a Dutch coffee house near the tournament hall. The 44-year-old former world championship challenger just finished the team event with a bang, beating van Wely with black to rack up an amazing 8/10 score. I didn't think I was going to be missing much with this event, but now I'm sad my moving madness precluded a closer perusal. Short was the only player on the UK squad with a plus score, but his massive +6 (sorry ladies, he's married) made his team a winner, 26.5-23.5. Smeets led the Dutch on +2 and Sokolov had +1. Werle was the goat, losing five games without a win.

Some veterans who make Short look like a sprog were dishing it out as well over in the accompanying round-robin event. An inspired Jan Timman scored +5 to take clear first despite a loss to someone even older, Philidor's old sparring partner Viktor Korchnoi. The legend, now spinning at 78 rpm, took third place behind Cherniaev, who is only 40.

Down Jermuk way, the FIDE Grand Prix event in the Armenian resort town has exploded into activity from what I can tell. Aronian fell off the lead with two losses while Leko has remained steady and Ivanchuk has surged to take a share of the lead with +3. Kasimjanov is right behind on +2 after 8 of 13 rounds have been played. Ivanchuk's wins are spectacular stuff, vintage Chucky. Leko barely held on against Jakovenko in yesterday's game, managing to hold a pawn-down endgame with a knight against a bishop, not an easy thing to do.

Kamsky looked close to a win against Cheparinov but maybe his passed b-pawn just isn't enough? What about 51..Nf2? Kamsky nabbed his first win of the event against tourney dog Inarkiev. Theory watch: Akopian and Bacrot rehashed 15 moves from their encounter in the last GP in the Accelerated Dragon. Akopian won that one, but here he was the first to vary with 16.Rad1 instead of 16.Nb3. White tried the same quick e5 push but here couldn't avoid rapid exchanges and a quick draw.

Okay, don't tell my wife just yet, but after packing up 18 boxes of chess books, DVDs, and memorabilia (FIDE keychain! Botvinnik Memorial program! KasparovChess Online Grand Prix poster! Kramnik's discarded cigarette butt!) I realized how little of it I really care about or need anymore. Some of the computer stuff is obsolete, though I guess some people out there might appreciate Fritz 8 if they don't have any chess software. And the dozens of ChessBase Magazine CDs and training CDs and DVDs are high quality goods without expiration dates. Most are still sealed. (Wow, somebody is trying to sell some even more ancient chess software, asking $200. Good luck!)

As for the books, I'd keep a hundred or two of my favorites -- mostly history/biography, old tournament books, rarities, and game collections I've always appreciated. But since I'm not a real chess journo anymore and since I've discontinued the newsletters, I have no use for the many hundreds of instructional, opening, and general interest books. I probably won't find much use for a decade or more of Chess Life and a complete run of Inside Chess, either. (I've been putting stacks of Chess Life on the stoop along with old computer design and programming manuals. The pregnancy and first year baby books my wife put out went much quicker. If you stop by, ours is the apartment with the air conditioner supported by four old Informants.) New In Chess is sort of like National Geographic in that it's somehow too good to throw away. Would love to have them all in PDF instead of collecting dust.

I'm not really motivated enough to put everything up on eBay individually or in lots. I don't need the little money it would bring and it's too much work. Plus, most of what I'd be selling is hardly collectible quality. Libraries usually have little interest in such collections and chess clubs, are there still clubs? Most of this stuff isn't really apt for kids. Basically I would just like to see it all be of use and appreciated. How about "a box of Mig's chess junk" as prizes? But then shipping costs come in and I don't really want to take a loss on the project. Maybe eBay in lots and put the money into the NiPMiF? (How much for that cigarette butt?) Suggestions needed.

Since I'm frantically trying to pack while working and cleaning, a guest blogger today. Since she can't speak yet, and her typing left something to be desired, this is an open thread. I hope this will also cut down on hijacks in the daily topics. What's going on out there? Put up your best links! Short and Timman are rampaging, which sort of backs up what I was saying about the dearth of impressive young talent in their native lands. Azerbaijan is in talks about hosting the candidates matches, assuming they actually happen. Nice to see them addressing the potential conflict over Aronian's attendance early on.

Kramnik interview from mishanp.

We're moving house this week so blogging will continue to be spottier than a teenager's face. I'm just hoping the new internet installation is working by the time we start live ICC Chess.FM coverage of the NH tournament next week.

Peter Leko and Levon Aronian have picked up where they left off in the last Grand Prix tournament in Nalchik. There Aronian took clear first and relegated Leko to a share of second by beating the Hungarian in a clutch final round performance. (If you're looking way ahead, mark your calendar for their meeting in round 12.) After four rounds in Jermuk, on Aronian's home Armenian soil, they are leaders again on +2 after both notched wins today. Both were with white and quite one-sided. Leko got a pawn against Karjakin with a nice intermezzo capture 21.dxe6 and a queen infiltration that Black must have missed. By move White had material and position, though Karjakin held on until move 33.

Kamsky lasted a little longer against Aronian, if only in the move count and not on the board. Aronian's skill at Chess960 might have helped him today as he turned the position into a chaos very quickly and then went for a direct attack on the American's king. It's already hard to imagine Black defending after 13.Ng5. Kamsky tried to defuse the danger but gave up material without making his king any safer. Aronian's activity on the h-file was just too much and his attack raged on even when kings came off. His usual extreme time trouble probably explains how long Kamsky played on with little light at the end of the tunnel. The loss dropped Kamsky to -2 and last place along with Inarkiev. Speaking of, time trouble might also have been a factor in Inarkiev muffing another good position, this time against Cheparinov. He could have kept an extra pawn with 36.Qe3 instead of giving it up with 36.Qf2.

Cheparinov is tied with Ivanchuk on +1. The Ukrainian moved into plus territory with a spectacular win over Alekseev. A really fascinating game to go over, full of Ivanchuk's typically unusual moves. The 17.f4, 18.f5, 19.g4 sequence defies the laws of chess physics. Ivanchuk continued with a knight sacrifice that he followed up with wonderful calm with 23.Kh1. The threat of Nf5+ was too much for Alekseev and he blundered after Ivanchuk's quiet move. Getting one of Black's rim-dim knights back into the game with 23..Nc6, adding some defense to e7 and leaving the rook on the key f-file, was probably the best chance to hold, although White keeps many interesting attacking chances, such as 24.Nf5+ Kh8 25.Bh6. Ivanchuk smashed through with the lovely and thematic 24.g5!, the point being 24..fxg5 25.Qh5 with mate on the near horizon. The g-pawn continued its march of destruction a few moves later. Wonderful chess.

Bacrot got a passer against Eljanov but his technique wasn't up to the task in the heavy-piece endgame. 32.Qb7 looks weird, putting the queen in front of the passer and allowing Black to get active immediately with 32..Rc4. Akopian and Kasimjanov renewed their duel in the Petroff from the last GP, which was drawn. Akopian's improvement is the novelty 17.Qc1. White did get pressure, but the usual Petroff swapfest ensued. Kudos to Akopian for pushing hard for another hour, sacrificing a pawn to keep central pressure. But Kasimjanov defended well to split the point. They both have 4/4 draws in a slow-moving tournament so far, as do Eljanov, Bacrot, and Gelfand.

Cheparinov-Ivanchuk is the most important fifth round game for the standings. Leaders Leko and Aronian have black against Alekseev and Kasimjanov, respectively.

Someone just asked me about all of my intelligent, good-looking readers and I could only tell him that I was surprised there was such good internet connectivity in mental institutions and under bridges the world over. But just in case my impression is wrong, and because I'm always up for a good book chat, sound off. You have to click the vote button on each one. (There's a mirror of this poll in the message boards, where you can create your own polls as well.)

Thanks for playing. If we ever make any money around here it will go, as with all donations, to the general Ninja Prize and Mischief Fund (the NiPMiF), which is always looking for a good cause. Prizes for most pieces sacrificed during a tournament, most revealing outfit worn by male or female player, subscriptions to Playboy donated to a K-6 or the world blind championship, that sort of thing.

Of course advertisers really want to know your age, income, education level, and location, but I value my privacy and I assume you do, too. As for conversation, if this isn't enough, what's the last chess book you bought, or your last chess purchase in general? Some fine folks send me books for free, but I think I last shelled out my own hard-earned cash on Benjamin's "American Grandmaster." I'd further endorse my Chess.FM homeboy Joel but I have to admit I haven't read it yet. We're moving this week so it will be a good opportunity to count, maybe even organize and index, my chess books. I'm sure the number will be scary. Time for a sale?

Two rounds and fourteen games into the fifth grand prix tournament, in Jermuk, Armenia, there is a trio of leaders on +1. Cheparinov beat Jakovenko to start things off, though the Russian bounced back and beat Kamsky on day two. Leko beat Inarkiev in the first round and should have beaten Eljanov in the second. Aronian, winner of the last GP, joined the early leaders by beating Alekseev in a long queen and pawn endgame.

Leko came within a last-round loss to Aronian of winning the Nalchik GP and looks in good shape here so far. But if there's one move that symbolizes much of the criticism Leko gets, even from himself, it's his 34.Ne1 against Eljanov today. The retreat breaks the pin on the Rc4, but Rb7 isn't much of a threat yet. Then the other knight comes back to the first rank only to get shoved back. Eljanov responded to all this maneuvering with aggressive play in the center and equalized nicely. (The exchange sac 44.Rxc4!? would have been an interesting try to play for a win.) Now look at the position before 34.Ne1 again. With Black's queen and knight so far offsides, most will at least glance at a way to make a knight sac on f5 work. (g4 is quickly ruled out because the h-file is there for a black rook.) 34.Nh4 is a natural move, with a crushing threat of Nf5+.

So why did Leko reject it? He calculates as well as anyone in the world, but his knack for seeing ghosts makes you wonder if he's coached by Shaggy and Scooby. 34..Kh7 is the only move, but after 35.Nef5! -- a good example of an "anyway move" -- 35..gxf5 (Many options, none suffice.) 36.Bxh6 Rec8 (Sad, but nothing better. ..fxe4 Qe3) 37.Nxf5 and 1-0. My only guess, besides time trouble, is Leko saw something incredibly subtle for Black like 35..Bf8!?, after which Black really is threatening to take the knight. But both Qf3! and Qe3 destroy that plan. Okay, this has gone on far too long, but my basic point was that just about any strong player would play Nh4. It takes special 2750 talent to find something to worry about in that position and also to instead move the same knight back to the first rank!

Inarkiev continues to grasp obscurity from the jaws of victory against top opponents. He occasionally plays fantastic games but man, he just seems to be missing something. Today that something was forced win against Ivanchuk in a knight endgame with a single pawn. Ivanchuk grabbed at the last possible tactic in the position to force the draw. These positions are tricky, of course, and it takes total precision to find the right moves to wrong-hoof the defending knight. Still, a tough half-point to have to swallow for white.

Two of the leaders meet tomorrow in Cheparinov-Aronian. Ivanchuk played the Giuoco Piano against Aronian in the first round. It will be interesting to see what he'll try against Leko. Live here.

You know what they say, if you can make it in Jermuk you can make it anywhere! Well, for all we know they do say that somewhere. Somewhere even smaller than Jermuk, for example. Which is in Armenia. It's also the host of the fifth FIDE Grand Prix tournament, another powerful 14-player round-robin. It begins Sunday with live games starting at 1500 local Jermuk time (I just love saying that) or 6am here in Brooklyn. No, won't be doing any live coverage of that one, thanks.

The field, in order by estimated percentage of body covered by hair: Aronian, Akopian, Ivanchuk, Cheparinov, Kasimjanov, Inarkiev, Gelfand, Eljanov, Bacrot, Alekseev, Kamsky, Jakovenko, Karjakin, Leko (he waxes). Final round is the 16th. Off days are 14th and 19th. Aronian won the last GP event in Nalchik, beating Leko in a clutch game in the final round. Pairings aren't up yet with 5.5 hours to go. It's Jermuk Time!

A press release just came out saying world #1 Veselin Topalov has abandoned the Bilbao Grand Slam final beginning September 6. This is quite a piece of news since Topalov's manager, Silvio Danailov, is one of the prime movers behind the Grand Slam. I assume he/they are the ones who sent out the release saying:

For the Organizing Committee, along with institutions, sponsors and partners, the international economic situation has been a determining factor to decide that, in this Final, the budget and prizes must be tightened up in order to be sensitive to the social effects derived from the crisis. This approach doesn't meet the expectations of Veselin Topalov, who also has valued the hardness of the Final Masters. The World Championship that he will play is just around the corner, and these factors have led him to refuse the invitation of the Grand Slam.

I'm not sure what "valued the hardness" might mean, but the bottom line is clearly the bottom line. Less money, no Topalov. This late exit aside, I've always admired Topalov's blunt dedication to earning as much money as possible, and for speaking frankly about it. Chessplayers, even top stars like Topalov, have a limited peak earning lifespan. And changing the conditions of a tournament on late notice, especially a prestigious pro event like this one, is not acceptable. Still, this is a blow to the event and to the entire Grand Slam, which went admirably well in its first iteration last year. Perhaps the loss of big attractions like Anand and Carlsen had something to do with it? And maybe the second time around isn't quite as special for the sponsors. I haven't seen a revised prize fund yet. Hey, I know, maybe they can charge everyone five pounds to watch the games live, that always works.

And how do they know the Anand-Topalov WCh match is "just around the corner" when it hasn't been scheduled yet? I thought next April was about as early as could be imagined. Did I miss something? Anyway, Levon Aronian takes Topalov's place. He finished behind the Bulgarian at Pearl Spring and equal second behind Karjakin at Corus.

While simply trying to see the results at the Staunton Memorial I found this after clicking through the live page:

To view the 7th Howard Staunton Memorial Chess Tournament Live Webcast you are required to subscribe to 2 See It Live. A simple 'ONE OFF' payment of £5.00 subscription fee is required which will provide you full access to the live webcast during the 7th Howard Staunton Memorial Chess Tournament.

As far as can be told, this is simply to see the moves, no robust video coverage or anything like that. Hey, I hope it works out for them; it would be a first and a whole new business model. Getting people to pay for what they can get for free a few hours later -- the moves without adding any value by way of multimedia, commentary, etc. -- has never succeeded. Or maybe they plan to go with the hostage gamescore model and try to keep the scores secret? I believe Ray Keene is still involved in the organization, so perhaps they're working from the old Einstein/Braingames business plan. How did that end up again?

Maybe one of the, oh, I'd say 14 people who cough up the five quid will let us know how it's going. Intentionally or not, the one game that's on the live page now is "Short, J vs Timman, J". Not sure what that's about but if it's meant as a teaser it's not going to inspire much confidence since Timman and Short (N or J) aren't playing in the same event. Do they not have any sponsors who might appreciate some traffic, name recognition, and appreciation instead of making a few bucks that won't come close to covering the organizer's daily lunch tab? Again, it's not as if it's an unfair price, or even a bad idea on its merits, it's that you're trying to get people to pay for something they are used to getting for free without adding anything. But since some sites don't provide live coverage at all, it's not like the public is getting a raw deal. I just wish they'd try harder to innovate.

Lovely event and all, unless Rupert Murdoch is running things now it would be nice to learn from past mistakes. Put up something worth paying for (hint: exclusive and robust coverage), make it easy to pay for, and people will pay for it. ICC Chess.FM rings a bell here, and ChessBase seems to be paying the rent. I'm sure the sponsor list would appreciate a nice big banner that pops up for 10 seconds before the (free) live board appears, for example.

Used to be that a match between the top players of Britain versus the best the Netherlands had to offer would portend a battle of the highest caliber. The 7th Howard Staunton Memorial that begins tomorrow in London is such a match, but the caliber is distinctly lower bore these days. The wolves have aged and the pups' teeth aren't so sharp. Long-time top tenner Michael Adams has fallen under 2700 and out of the top 30. (FIDE's snazzy new rating interface seems to have dropped the handy chart that showed the player's ranking on each list going back to 2000.) Former world championship challenger Nigel Short is the happy-go-lucky terror of B groups everywhere. The man Short beat for the right to face Kasparov in 1993, Dutch legend Jan Timman, isn't doing much terrorizing at the board, though I'm sure he can still strike fear into the heart of more than a few sommeliers. The top seed for the Netherlands in the Staunton Memorial, Ivan Sokolov, represents Bosnia according to FIDE.

The much-heralded next generation of players from both countries has yet to have an impact at the top level. Sadler retired and McShane has gone amateur. van Wely may yet bounce back from his horrible 2008, but at 36 he may yet find higher heights as a travel writer. Dutch hopes Stellwagen, Smeets, Werle, and L'Ami, now all in their twenties, risk settling into lives of well-balanced home-cooked privilege. There's still David Howell, 18, whose website might like to know he just won his first British championship today. (At least it's more up-to-date than his blog.) And the Dutch may soon embrace 14-year-old Anish Giri, the Nepalese/Russian lad now playing with NED after his name. He was RUS at his tremendous Corus C this year. (He isn't playing in London.) I think Giri is the only player between the two countries born after 1990 and currently rated over 2400. The US, typically considered a backwater for chess prodigies beyond once in a generation, has four.

Most of the aforementioned players are in action over the next few weeks in London. The team event is missing Stellwagen for the Dutch, tipping the Elo balance a bit toward the Brits. There's also a Challenge event with Timman and Korchnoi signing autographs, I mean scoresheets, with eight others.

With apologies to Aerosmith. Was flipping around and noticed American 14-year-old Ray Robson has a share of the lead at the Arctic Chess Challenge open tournament in Tromsø, Norway. Wanting to see the day's results I went to the live page and saw he'd won again. And how! A piece sac for total domination leading to a decisive king walk from g8 to e1 with mate. (Game after the jump.) Maybe not an immortal, and not exactly zugzwang, but still a wonderful conception. Black could have bailed with the routine 23..Rc8. Hard to say if White, Danish GM Rasmussen, could have defended, but by the time the black king reaches g3 it's over. Even more enjoyable because computers take forever to get it. Great stuff. The Norwegian Chess Phantom is blogging the event.

The celebration of the 200th anniversary of the Schachgesellschaft Zürich spared no expense. The weekend of Aug. 22-23 will see Anand, Kramnik, Kasparov, Karpov, Spassky, Korchnoi, Topalov, Ponomariov, Khalifman, J.Polgar, and, well, Swiss veteran Werner Hug giving a 200-player simul and playing in a rapid event. (Garry, Spassky, and Korchnoi aren't playing in the rapid tournament.) Both events are open to the public, so get out your autograph books. It's a shame the winner of one of the most famous tournaments in chess history, Zurich 1953, Vassily Smyslov, won't be there. But the 88-year-old did share some comments on the website, as did a few other players.

But wait, there's more! There is also a Jubilee Open from Aug. 9-15, headlined by Alexander Morozevich. 600 players and nearly 50 GMs have signed up, including 17 of the over-2600 species. Top games will be broadcast live here.

From the random files. If you considered what would be the exact moves most indicative of a loss, what would you guess? From what I can tell, it's Na1 for white. In 400,000 games between 2400+ opponents, White scores 55%. Before I started looking, my bet for "losingest move" was on Nh1, but while it's "losing" with 48% for white, it's not nearly as bad as Na1. In games in which white plays Na1 before move 40, the normal percentages flip exactly, to just 45% for White. How about the winningest move? If white plays Qh8 (with or without capture) before move 40, white scores 68%. Can you and your database do better? Or worse? For black?

Moving house this month (just a few blocks, still Brooklyn of course) so a bit spotty on the coverage these days. But baby will have her own separate room soon, and more sleep means more coherent blogging. At least that's the theory.

Aronian lost his Chess960 title to Nakamura but just three days later took the Mainz rapid crown from Anand. Nice consolation prize! Aronian coasted to an easy win over Ian Nepomniachtchi in the final, winning the first two and drawing the third to lock up the title that Anand had held since 2000. He even passed up a win in the final game to force a draw. Of interest was Nepo's use of the old 4.Qe2 "anti-Berlin Wall" line to avoid the dreaded instant-endgame. History buffs might remember Howard Staunton and Mikhail Chigorin making use of it. Unfortunately, it and 4.d3 score worse for white than the endgame. (Much the way we might dream of the King's Gambit scoring better for white than 2.Nf3.)

You can't trivially blame the opening for Nepomniachtchi's loss to Aronian in the crucial second game, but it does seem to be the case that white has little more than the old "avoid theory and outplay the guy." Which ain't easy on the best of days, but when you're giving up 100+ points against the world #4 even the optimism of youth isn't going to be enough. Meanwhile, over at the paper plates and plastic forks table, world champ Anand and Naiditsch played for third place. Or better put, didn't play for third place. They phoned in four draws and the Mainz organizers mercifully don't bother to play off further than that.

Aronian will have Mamedyarov to deal with in the final next year. The Azerbaijani put up a record 10/11 score in the Ordix open to take clear first. It wasn't easy, but as the winner said, you need some luck to win such a strong open event. He got his full share against Nakamura in the critical 10th round encounter between leaders. (Clearly the new Chess960 champion does all right with his pieces on the usual squares.) Mamedyarov lost a piece but managed to keep some pressure with a very unusual pin on the 8th rank. Nakamura was unable to find the right configuration with his pieces and first missed the win and then blundered into a mate. (41.Nb3 was one way for White to start to unwind.) A bit of luck indeed, though you call it tenacity when you win the tournament. A quick draw in the final round was enough for clear first for Mamedyarov. Naiditsch, Akopian, and Gashimov tied a half-point back.

Lots of fun tactics as you'd expect in a rapid event of this caliber. Check out 31.Bxf5+ in Moiseenko-Potkin. Bologan missed a quick win against Guliyev and went on to lose in the 10th round. 30..Bh3! wins after 31.Rxd6 Bxg2 32.Nxg2 Rg4 or 31.Qd3 Bxg2 32.Qf5 Qg7. The last three moves of Zvjaginsev-Akopian are also good entertainment value.

Next On The Menu Dept.: In the "Learn the Geography of the Caucasus FIDE Grand Prix," Chessdom has info on the last-minute Armenian edition. It will be held in Jermuk, which apparently has nice scenery. It begins on Aug. 9. The organization of the GP has been a disaster and the replacement sites haven't exactly been household names, but the tournaments and the chess have been excellent. Thomas in the comments hints at some shenanigans about rescheduling the event to accommodate local hero Aronian, but all I know is that the event was originally scheduled to begin on Aug. 1. (And to take place in Elista, but Ilyumzhinov had to host the Doha event there in November.) That would have robbed Mainz of several players and much attention, so it seems like a legal j'adoube to me. Jakovenko, Leko, and Gelfand are the other rating favorites.

The Staunton Memorial starts in a few weeks, and then Svidler, Nakamura, and Caruana headline the NH "Pups vs Geezers" team tournament, which has revamped its formula to try to balance the fields a bit after last year's Massacre of the Ancients. Now Svidler, van Wely, and Nielsen are on the veteran squad, which is a little rough for such strapping young lads, all born after Woodstock. I mean, they only look old!

Vishy Anand's attempt to gain his 12th Chess Classic rapid world championship ended without much drama as he failed to even make it to the final match. He couldn't recover after losing his first two whites on the first day of group play to Aronian and Nepomniachtchi. This is bad for Anand and very bad for chess writers everywhere, who will now have to continue to type in Nepomniachtchi's name for another day. Aronian was the clear class of the group stage, coming close to beating Anand again on the second day and finishing with 4.5/6. He'll be the big favorite against the young Russian in today's final match. Anand will face Naiditsch for third place.

The end of an era or just a blip on the world champ's incredible rapid record? I think people started burying Kasparov the first time in 1998, when he was not yet 35 and finished 3rd at Linares. Soon afterward he went on an unprecedented supertournament run. Then again after London 2000, etc. Anand will turn 40 this year but has only played one (admittedly mediocre) classical event since beating Kramnik for the WCh last October. A match in which he played perhaps the best chess of his life. Anand has played rapid chess regularly this year, however, and has long been considered the undisputed master. Since he lost just a single game from around 30 at rapid this year until day one in Mainz, let's call it a fluke until further evidence comes in. (Topalov has also played sparingly this year. These guys are going to be incredibly well rested and prepared for their WCh match next year. Let's hope it actually happens.)

Meanwhile, the massive Ordix Open is well underway and eight players have perfect 5/5 scores just as the GMs began to clash. Favorites Grischuk, Mamedyarov, Naiditsch (!? Then hustling over to play in the GrenkeLeasing WCh!), Sargissian, and Navara are among the leaders. Newly crowned Chess960 champ Nakamura is a half-point off the pace with many, many others. Live and replay page.