Amber, Day 3: Ivanchuk Leads, Carlsen Closing
Tuesday, March 16, 2010 at 1:25AM Vassily Ivanchuk defeated his ex-countryman Sergey Karjakin today 1.5-.5, and that was good enough to keep him in first. In fact, it's a clear first, as former co-leader Ruslan Ponomariov only managed to draw both games with Leinier Dominguez. Ivanchuk is in clear first with 4.5/6, with Ponomariov, Vladimir Kramnik (who defeated Vugar Gashimov 1.5-.5) and the surging Magnus Carlsen (a 2-0 winner over Peter Svidler).
Once again, Carlsen's games sucked up most of the oxygen in the room. With Black in the blindfold game, he won, like yesterday, very quickly with an attack in a fianchetto opening. This time, however, it has to be said that Svidler's resignation was premature: he was worse, but Carlsen had mishandled his advantage and with accurate play the Russian could have resisted. In the rapid game, there was no resistance at all: Carlsen steamrolled his opponent. It was one of those old-fashioned games where one side plays and the other side applauds.
In other games of note, Kramnik's win in the rapid game over Gashimov was very exciting, but although Kramnik was pressing for a long, long time it should have been drawn. Despite Kramnik's extra queen, 51...Qf1+ and only next 52...Ne1 would have saved the day for Gashimov. Also, the rapid game Aronian-Smeets was entertaining from its gambit start to its checkmating finish. All four games can be replayed (with light notes) here.
Reader Comments (11)
Thanks for covering the games.
I keep wondering why there are zero comments on this blog, and 85 comments over at The Daily Dirt.
As far as I'm concerned, your comments are as insightful as the comments over there.
I guess there must be some historical reasons for it which I do not know about...
You'll notice the very low distasteful level of comments over there... Dennis has a taste for finer things in level than immature, childish fan rivalry.
Yes, lots of fanboyism over there.
There are other reasons too; I'll point out some that are neutral-to-pro-Mig. First, he has been more prominent in the public eye, both because he started publicly writing on chess 7 or 8 years before I did. Second, he knows lots of strong players personally, which has helped to raise his profile. Third (or the apotheosis of the second point), he has been working with Kasparov for many years, and that gives him some instant prestige, not to mention access to the occasional very cool scoop.
So while I don't think my blog ought to labor in obscurity, based on its merits, there are reasons that don't rely on fanboyism that help explain why his blog drums up more comments (and hits).
Do note, though, that while his comment numbers are certainly significantly higher than mine, 85-0 isn't exactly representative: many of my posts get a fair number of bites.
Also, Dennis, you are often critical of comments, and your criticisms have a certain bite to them. Often with justice, to be sure. But, as in a classroom, if you were to let a little more nonsense go by without snapping at it, you would get a livelier and more engaged discussion going. I mean this as an explanation, not a recommendation of any sort.
I mean, you might reasonably judge the trade-offs favor the status-quo, as far as comments go.
<holds up arms defensively to shield head from anticipated blows>
Ernst:
There is no short answer to your question. There are lots of regular posters at the Dirt who seem to have a compulsion to reply to
every subject. There are people who relish debate (over discussion). Dennis seems to moderate posts that are off-topic. He
doesn't appreciate a lot of redundancy, whereas the Dirt has endless and repetitive posts on subjects like chess rating systems.
Also, there is what might be called the quidnunc factor.
See? We're already between 1/8 and 1/9 of the way there. Only 75 comments to go. :) Moving on...
I'll add one more then. :)
I guess there are reasons for the difference in number of comments and hits.
Probably it also has to do with "momentum", in some kind of way. If a blog has gotten a reputation as a place for commenters to "hang out", it probably becomes a self strengthening trend in a way. I notice many commenters use the Dirt as a place to discuss games, even when there are no specific posts covering the games. I guess it's hard to pinpoint the exact reasons why a blog gains such a reputation... But some of the reasons given here probably help to explain it.
Anyway, i like both blogs. And I hope both will continue to exist. :)