The Daily Update: Biel Comes Alive! Plus Adams, Morozevich Roll On - and More

1. I doubt any of the competitors at Biel read my blog, but it's likely that the sorts of sentiments expressed here about their consistent non-play have been expressed by many others. Perhaps this weighed on their consciences or provoked the organizers to harangue them. Whatever the story, something happened and they FINALLY played some real chess today. It was excellent! All the games were hard-fought, four of the five games finished in a win, and the only draw was a real battle and the last game to finish.

Vachier-Lagrave - Rodshtein 1-0

Andreikin - Caruana 1/2-1/2

Giri - So 1-0

Tomashevsky - Nguyen 0-1

Howell - Negi 1-0

Vachier-Lagrave - Rodshtein was a Gruenfeld that generally saw things going White's way, but the game was decided after 35...Rxe6?? (35...Rg8! 36.Qxh7+ Kf8 favors White, but Black is very much alive). White could have won more easily than he did, but Black was never able to completely extricate himself.

Andreikin - Caruana was a quasi-Rossolimo turned Open Sicilian turned quasi-French, but through all the twists and turns the position remained fairly even. Caruana gradually obtained a slight initiative, but in the end it was only enough to force a draw by repetition.

Giri - So was decided in a queen ending. So's clever 19...Bxh3!? led to that ending, where White was slightly better but a draw looked the likeliest result. The game was decided when So chose 34...f4?! 35.Qh4 Qxh4?, voluntarily transposing into a lost king and pawn ending. No doubt So missed White's triangulation maneuver on moves 42 and 43, but it was a bad risk to enter the pawn ending in the first place. Live and learn.

Tomashevsky - Nguyen was bad for White almost from start to finish. The ending - from move 35 on, say - was quite interesting, in that White desperately wanted to eliminate Black's d4-pawn while Nguyen kept finding ways to keep the pawn alive and meaningful. Black succeeded, and in the end White's preoccupation with the pawn left him unable to cope with threats to his king.

Howell - Negi saw the "Botvinnik System" of the 2.c3 Sicilian. Black was doing fine, but his plan of doubling rooks on the d-file followed by 26...Rd3 ingeniously forced White to beat him. White had no choice but to sac the exchange, and the result was a position where Black had no meaningful active possibilities whatsoever while White could try this and that. Soon White's position was not only easier to play but simply winning, and Black forced him into it!

With eight rounds down and one to go, the standings look like this:

1-2. Vachier-Lagrave, Caruana 5

3-4. Nguyen, Andreikin 4.5

5-8. Giri, So, Tomashevsky, Rodshtein 4

9. Howell 3

10. Negi 2

The last-round pairings:

Rodshtein - Tomashevsky

Negi - Vachier-Lagrave

Caruana - Howell

So - Andreikin

Nguyen - Giri

It's not likely, as the leaders are playing tailenders, but it's possible to have half the field tie for first.

2. The British Championship: It had its first GM vs. GM pairing, with Adams taking on Summerscale. Of course, not all GMs are equally strong, and Adams outrated his opponent by more than 200 points and won quickly. Quite a few of his main rivals drew their games, so although it's still very early the tournament is shaping up nicely for him.

3. The 4th AD San Juan International in Pamplona is up to round 4 today, but only the games and results through round three are available as of this writing. Morozevich leads with 2.5/3.

4. Finally, the Houdini 1.03a - Stockfish 1.8 match continues, and after 22 games Houdini leads 12.5-9.5. Stockfish won game 1, Houdini games 2, 11, 12 and 17. The games have been more accessible, I think, to human eyes, thanks to the opening selection this time around, but the percentage of draws has been very high. Is the moral that the more theoretical the opening, the more objectively drawish the position? I'm not sure. After all, the Rybka 4 - Houdini match wasn't terribly theoretical in its opening selection, but the drawing percentage was high there as well. Maybe Houdini's "style" leads to a greater than average number of draws? Those with access to more data might have something more intelligent to say about this matter.

Comments

[Martin Thoresen]

Hello Dennis!

Thanks for the update. I just wanted to say that you should check out game 23, it is a beauty to my patzer eyes. Magnificent game, in my humble opinion.

[Event "Match 3"]
[Site "?"]
[Date "2010.07.27"]
[Round "23.1"]
[White "Stockfish 1.8 x64 4CPU"]
[Black "Houdini 1.03a x64 4CPU"]
[Result "1-0"]
[ECO "D85"]
[Annotator "0.28;0.13"]
[PlyCount "137"]
[EventDate "2010.07.22"]
[EventType "tourn"]
[Source "Martin Thoresen"]

{Intel(R) Core(TM) i7 CPU 920 @ 2.67GHz 4050 MHz W=30.0 plies; 8
176kN/s B=25.4 plies; 11 480kN/s} 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 g6 3.Nc3 d5 4.cxd5 Nxd5 5.Bd2 Bg7 6.e4 Nb6 7.Be3 O-O 8.Bb5 Be6 9.Nf3 Nc4 10.Bxc4 Bxc4 11.Qa4 Ba6 12.h4 h5 13.O-O-O Qd7 14.Qa3 Nc6 15.Kb1 Rfd8 16.Qa4 e5 17.d5 Ne7 18.Qb3 Nc8 19.Ng5 Nd6 20.f3 Nc4 21.Bc1 b5 22.g4 b4 23.Na4 Bb5 24.Nc5 Qe7 25.gxh5 Qxc5 26.hxg6 Na5 27.gxf7+ Kh8 28.Qc2 Qxc2+ 29.Kxc2 Rd7 30.b3 Nb7 31.Bb2 Nd6 32.Rhg1 Nxf7 33.Ne6 Bh6 34.f4 Re8 35.fxe5 Kh7 36.Rg2 a6 37.Rf2 Be3 38.Rf5 Rg8 39.a4 bxa3 40.Bxa3 Rg2+ 41.Kc3 Kg8 42.Bc5 Bxc5 43.Nxc5 Re7 44.Kd4 Rg4 45.Rh1 Rg2 46.Re1 Rg4 47.Rh5 Kg7 48.Rc1 Kg8 49.Rc2 Rg3 50.Rf2 Be8 51.Nxa6 Rg1 52.e6 Nd6 53.Rg5+ Rxg5 54.hxg5 Nb5+ 55.Ke5 Rg7 56.Rf5 Bg6 57.Rf6 Be8 58.Kf4 Re7 59.Nc5 Kg7 60.e5 Bg6 61.Ne4 Nd4 62.Ke3 Nf5+ 63.Kf2 Re8 64.d6 Rb8 65.d7 Kh7 66.Nc5 Ne7 67.Nb7 Nc6 68.e7 Nxe7 69.d8=Q 1-0

Best Regards,
Martin