This Week's ChessVideos Show: A Crazy Draw From Zurich 1953 (And A Plug)

Occasioned by my receipt of a new book (or rather, a new translation of an old book) on the great Candidates Tournament in 1953, I've been browsing anew the games from that incredible event. Many of us are very familiar with David Bronstein's excellent book on that event, but three other participants - Max Euwe, Miguel Najdorf and Gideon Stahlberg - also wrote books on that tournament.

It's Najdorf's book I just received (published by Russell Enterprises), and from what I've seen so far I think it's superior to Bronstein's. Bronstein spends more time in lyrical digressions, but Najdorf is certainly fond of explanatory prose but also seems to have taken more care in his analysis; indeed, Bronstein sometimes improved his second edition (the one we in the west see) by using Najdorf's analysis. So I heartily recommend Najdorf's work, even or maybe even especially if you have, know and love Bronstein's.

Anyway, among the great games in the event was the 11th round (of 30!) battle between Paul Keres and Samuel Reshevsky. Reshevsky played a provocative move with Black in a Saemisch King's Indian and came under a ferocious attack. Keres was probably winning, but it was always complicated and the players found themselves in harrowing time trouble by move 25 (and this despite the leisurely time control of those days of 40 moves in 2 and a half hours). Reshevsky not only managed to hold out, but even outplay Keres in what had almost turned into a bullet game. Fortunately for Keres, Reshevsky in turned missed a win, and when the time control had been made the game was again in approximate balance, and the draw was agreed.

There was a lot of content in the game, and even with great analysts like Keres, Bronstein, Najdorf and even Botvinnik examining it there's still more to be discovered. So it seemed a fine subject for a video! As always, it's free for you to watch (the site requires a one-time-only free registration) and will be available on-demand for the next month or so.

A New Book On Nakamura; Guess Who Doesn't Like It

Now that Hikaru Nakamura is well esconced in the world's top ten (currently number five), it's not surprising that someone would write a book on him - and someone has. Or rather, two someones: Fighting Chess With Hikaru Nakamura has been co-authored by GM Karsten Mueller and Raymond Stolze. The book isn't out yet, but already at least one critic is on the warpath:

It is truly disgusting that people are allowed to write books and profit off of our games without our permission.

I know what you're thinking: it was probably written by one of Nakamura's opponents, disgusted that he's not going to get a cut of the profits. But it turns out that the critique above was penned by someone else. Try again.

What's that? You say it was written by a retired player (let's call him RP) who received a large royalty check from Nakamura, speaking magisterially about players - or at least top players - in general? Why would he do that? Oh, of course. RP's games were taken and compiled into chess databases without giving him so much a single red cent. Nakamura, like practically everyone else, has benefited from having access to RP's games, so to do right by him Nakamura generously sent him a tidy sum out of gratitude and as a matter of principle. Well, that's a very clever guess and an ennobling thought! Its only shortcoming is that the quote wasn't from RP either.

There are doubtlessly hundreds if not thousands of players whose games have enriched and assisted Nakamura's chess in one way or another over the years, and I doubt that many received any special remuneration for those games from an intermediary (e.g. a publisher) and fewer still - if any - from Nakamura himself. But it must surely have been written by one of them, as it's unlikely that the book's hero would have felt free to benefit from the widely and inexpensively available history of our game for the 15 years or so he's been working at the game, only to protest when someone else benefits from his games. Right? Wrong.

But then, who could have written the quote? The mystery deepens....

One thing we can note is that this is a really troubling situation. I mean, what if this were to continue in other fields? You might have people other than Albert Einstein writing about relativity and journalists writing popular books on current scientific research done by Ph.D.s. That would be awful! Or perhaps someone might get the bright idea to write stories about other people's lives. (We need a word for that - maybe "nonautobiography" will do? It's kind of unwieldy, but I'm sure if that concept ever takes off some wordsmith will coin a happier term.) The prospects for this sort of disgusting practice seem almost unlimited.

Well, if any of my readers can figure out who wrote the quote above and would share it with all of us, it would be most appreciated.

World Championship, Game 11: One More Draw; Match Tied With A Game Left

This was Boris Gelfand's last chance to make something happen with the white pieces, but while he had been achieving success in his two previous white games he didn't get anything this time. Champion Viswanathan Anand varied from game 9 with the rare 8...Bd7, which came as a big surprise to Gelfand, who spent 38 minutes on his reply. After 9.a3 Ba5 10.Qe2 Bc6 11.Rd1 Anand produced the novelty 11...Bxc3, and a few moves later the players reached a middlegame where White's hanging pawns were under serious pressure. Given the time situation, Gelfand found it prudent to look for a safe way out, and he succeeded in doing so. The game only went 24 moves, but the challenger was already down to 14 minutes for the next 16 moves.

So the final classical game of the 2012 World Championship match will come on Monday, after another rest day, and if that game is also drawn they'll go to rapid and (if necessary) blitz tiebreaks on Wednesday, after another rest day.

Subscribers: Materials should be sent later today.

Karpov-Seirawan Coming in June

Perhaps this is so Yasser Seirawan can justify a second edition of Chess Duels? (Kidding.) Unfortunately, Anatoly Karpov and Yasser Seirawan are going to play a three-stage match in St. Louis from June 9-13.

First, a pair of classical games (40/90, SD/30+30") worth three points apiece. Second, two rapid games (25' + 5") worth two points apiece. Finally, ten blitz games (5' + 2") worth a point apiece. The winner (probably Seirawan, given that Karpov has been pretty much retired from serious chess for around a decade) gets $10k, the loser $7k. It's a nice payday for Seirawan, win or lose, but wholly unnecessary for Karpov, whose wealth is reportedly equivalent to at least hundreds of millions of US dollars and possibly in the BILLIONS.

As someone who grew up in the era of Karpov reign, it's painful for me to watch him playing at least 200 points below his peak, playing worse than he did as a teenager. It reminds me of watching Larry Holmes beat the snot out of a slow, aging, overweight, Muhammad Ali who had already gone through several hard fights too many. Watching Karpov play badly doesn't add to the luster of the game and tarnishes his legacy, especially with newer fans who don't know any better. (Note: It wouldn't bother me at all if he still worked at the game, like Korchnoi or - to mention a closer age peer - Beliavsky. But he isn't; he is very busy doing lots of other things, with the result that when he does pop out every once in a while the result is generally a disaster.)

The Highest Ratings Ever, Adjusted for Inflation

According to this German site, Bobby Fischer has the record: 2787, with Garry Kasparov #2 at 2759, Anatoly Karpov #3 with 2722, Mikhail Tal in fourth at 2700 and Viswanathan Anand and Vladimir Kramnik are tied for fifth-sixth at 2699. I'm not sure what their method is and am sure that Ken Regan would disagree with it, but it's at least an entertaining list.

Many, probably most of us do believe that there has been some rating inflation, but even so it's hard to believe that even the Viktor Korchnoi of the late 1970s was stronger - measurably stronger, at that! - than Magnus Carlsen. Korchnoi's peak rating was 2695, while Carlsen is 2835, and our understanding of the game has developed since then. (Even Korchnoi now must know a lot more than he did then, even if at the age of 81 he can longer play with the same strength and endurance that he used to.)

Robot Chess

Who needs Battle Bots when you can watch robots playing chess in the park? Alexander Grischuk was on the undercard, Sergey Shipov provided live commentary, and Anna Sharevich went around interviewing people (but not, thankfully, singing "Piano Man"). Looks like fun!

Anand-Gelfand: Game 10 Drawn Quickly, The Match Remains Tied With Two Games To Go

World champion Viswanathan Anand was unable to achieve much with the white pieces against Boris Gelfand in today's game 10. Anand decided to give the 3.f3 Gruenfeld a rest for the moment, and returned to 1.e4. Gelfand again offered the Sveshnikov rather than his erstwhile favorite, the Najdorf, but Anand varied from game 5 with 3.Bb5.

It was the challenger who got off the first surprise, however, with the almost new 5...e5. Anand achieved a better queenside pawn structure, but after trying for a little while and refusing a draw on move 21 offered one of his own after his 25th move. Gelfand accepted, and so their world championship match is tied at 5-5, with two games to go in "normal time". Tomorrow is a rest day, and then Gelfand will have his last white game on Saturday. Sunday will be another rest day, and then on Monday Anand will have his crack at making white work.

The match has been very even so far: both players have won a game and both players squandered an excellent winning chance. Gelfand has acquitted himself better than most of the prognosticators expected, but he may still be feeling a bit nervous at the prospect of a 6-6 tie, due to Anand's skill in rapid chess. On the other hand, Gelfand seems practically impossible to ruffle, and he has shown his mettle in high-pressure situations over the years - including in rapid tiebreaks - so while he must still be considered the underdog it would be a mistake to count him out.

My annotations and an accompanying video will be available to subscribers later today.

Game 9 Drawn: Gelfand Presses but Cannot Win; Match Tied 4.5-4.5

I may tidy this post up later today, but here's a quick recap: Gelfand got a nice advantage out of the opening (a Nimzo-Indian, Karpov Variation), but his 19.c5 was excessively academic. Rather than enjoying a clearly favorable middlegame, he hoped that in the resulting endgame with queen vs. rook, knight and pawn (plus more pawns for both sides) he'd be able to use the principle of two weaknesses to break down Anand's attempted fortress. His judgment proved mistaken, but he still had the better of play, and showed no ill effects from the disaster in game 8.

So the match is tied, game 10 is tomorrow, and - for subscribers - the materials will be available later tonight.

Anand Levels Gelfand and the Match, Winning Game 8 in 17 Moves

An odd world championship match just grew odder still. After 19 years without a win in classical chess against Viswanathan Anand, Boris Gelfand's patient, solid strategy paid off in game 7. He won and took the lead over the champion, 4-3, with just five games to go. At this point he could expect Anand to play more aggressively and to start throwing the kitchen sink at him, so it would have made sense to keep solid, weather the storm and maybe even give Anand the chance to overextend.

So what happened? Just the opposite. Perhaps dizzy from success, Gelfand played uncharacteristically risky chess, like a man who had completely lost his sense of danger. The game grew wild in a hurry, and then Gelfand badly miscalculated a short sequence and lost immediately. What's especially odd is that if Gelfand's normal sense of danger had been present, he would have been more suspicious - surely Anand wouldn't overlook something so simple, would he? He didn't.

The game was thus a disaster, but objectively Gelfand is still in reasonable shape in the match. It's tied at 4-4, with four games to go, and he can head into the rest day with the encouraging awareness that he can beat Anand. For Anand, today's game was an obvious positive, so if he can neutralize Gelfand's opening in game 9 he can look forward to the rest of the match with confidence.

My back allowing, subscribers can look forward to my annotations and video and later this evening.

Krush Wins Women's Title in a Ghoulish Tiebreak

Anna Zatonskih and Irina Krush were tied at the end of the U.S. Women's Championship round-robin, so today they played a tiebreaker. It would go to an Armageddon game if necessary, but first they played a pair of G/25 (plus 5 second increments per move) rapid games. In the first, Zatonskih got nothing with White, pressed anyway, and lost. In the rematch, however, she played very well and obtained a winning attack. To break the attack, Krush offered an exchange, but Zatonskih went for more. Krush's reply was a blunder, and with a simple two-mover her opponent would win a rook, equalize the scores, and go on to the Armageddon game.

Instead, after thinking for three minutes, Zatonskih missed it. By this point Krush had seen it and could be seen exhaling in relief, though even after this her position was awful. Zatonskih didn't handle the technical task to perfection, but was slowly but surely getting the job done. And then...she simply hung a rook. Maybe it was the sort of OTB equivalent of "pre-move": she expected that Krush was going to do something else, and simply carried out her intended move anyway, not noticing before reflexively executing what was now a blunder.

A horrific reminder, in case anyone needed it, that errare humanum est.