Le Quang Liem and Nepomniachtchi Lead World Blitz Championship

The World Blitz Championship is a 30-round event, or if you prefer a 15-round event with two games per round against the same opponent. It is broken up into two days, with the first 16/8 rounds taking place on Sunday and the last 14/7 on Monday. Sunday's action is over, and Le Quang Liem and Ian Nepomniachtchi are tied for first with 12/16, with the former beating the latter 1.5-.5 in the final match of the day. Ruslan Ponomariov is half a point behind, and then there is a group of four players at 10.5: Ivan Cheparinov, Ngoc Truon Son Nguyen, newly crowned World Rapid Champion Shakhriyar Mamedyarov and Rauf Mamedov.

Some great players are present, but most of the world's absolute elite is unfortunately missing, probably due to the very crowded calendar of classical events. A pity, but this has been a very entertaining event all the same.

Mamedyarov Wins World Rapid Championship

Shakhriyard Mamedyarov trailed Ian Nepomniachtchi by 2.5 points entering the last day; that is, with five rounds to go, and besides that he lost in their individual game, which meant that if the two of them tied for first Nepomniachtchi would win the title of World Rapid Champion on tiebreak. With Nepomniachtchi "on fire" with 9/10 after the first two days, the idea that Mamedyarov could win seemed almost absurd...but win he did.

Whatever Nepomniachtchi had going those first days disappeared on Saturday. He drew his first two games with difficulty, while Mamedyarov won his first two to close to within a point and a half. Mamedyarov won his third game too, and in the meantime Nepomniachtchi lost with the white pieces to Alexander Grischuk. That put Mamedyarov just half a point back and Grischuk a point behind. In the penultimate round Nepomniachtchi drew - again with difficulty - while Mamedyarov won with Black against his countryman Gadir Guseinov and Grischuk beat Francisco Vallejo Pons. Mamedyarov's win was odd, as Guseinov self-destructed in a draw rook ending, succumbing perhaps to the deadly combination of too much ambition and too little time on the clock.

Going into the last round then, Nepomniachtchi and Mamedyarov were tied for first, with Nepo having in effect draw (or tie) odds, with Grischuk half a point back. If they finished in a three-way tie it would have been Grischuk who would triumph on tiebreaks, so amazingly there was still everything to play for. Nepomniachtchi had White against Alexander Riazantsev, but didn't gain an advantage and Black obtained a fairly easy draw. Grischuk couldn't win with Black against Nikita Vitiugov either, but Mamedyarov broke through once again, finishing the day 5/5 by defeating Ernesto Inarkiev.

That was a great result by Mamedyarov, and a startling collapse by Nepomniachtchi, though again in keeping with the recent trend of tournament leaders falling to pieces on the last day: Carlsen, Kramnik, Moiseenko, Kamsky, etc.

Leading Standings:

1. Mamedyarov 11.5/15
2. Nepomniachtchi 11
3. Grischuk 10.5
4. Le Quang Liem 10
5-14. Various players with 9

The World Blitz Championship starts tomorrow at the same site with (at least approximately if not exactly) the same cast of characters.

Rapid Events: Karjakin Wins Sberbank, Nepomniachtchi Running Away With The World Rapid Championship

Veselin Topalov was the early leader in the Sberbank Rapid tournament, but he was bludgeoned nicely on day 2 by Sergey Karjakin, who wound up winning the tournament with 6.5/9, half a point ahead of Topalov.

Meanwhile, over in Khanty-Mansyisk, the World Rapid Championship is turning into a runaway for Ian Nepomniachtchi, who has given up a single draw each of the first two days. He has 9/10 and leads his closest pursuers (Ivan Cheparinov and Ildar Khairullin) by two points going into the last day and the final five rounds. (The live commentary with GMs Alexander Khalifman and Efstratios Grivas is pretty good and available on-demand, so if you have a little free time for chess spectating you might enjoy that.) After this finishes, the World Blitz Championship will take place at the same site (and with the same players? I'm not sure) on Sunday and Monday.

Quick Events: Sberbank Rapid in Kiev and the World Rapid Championship in Khanty-Mansyisk

There's a little break before the next big classical event, but in the meantime a couple of entertaining rapid events are going on.

The smaller one, in terms of numbers, is going on in Kiev, Ukraine. The Sberbank Rapid is underway and Veselin Topalov leads with 3/3. Evgeny Tomashevsky is in clear second with 2.5 points, and then there's a group of five with a 50% score, including Sergey Karjakin and Peter Leko. Anatoly Karpov is making an appearance as well, and has 1/3.

That's a round-robin; in Khanty-Mansyisk the tournament is a Swiss. Alexander Grischuk is the top seed, and other stars like Ian Nepomniachtchi and Gata Kamsky are also playing. After day one (of three) Nepomniachtchi and Aleksey Dreev are tied for first with 4.5/5; Shakhriyar Mamedyarov and Ildar Khairullin are half a point behind.

HT: Chess Today.

Thessaloniki Grand Prix, Round 11: Dominguez Wins The Tournament

Surprise, surprise! In keeping with recent tradition (Carlsen & Kramnik in London, Moiseenko in the European Championship, etc.), the leader going into the last round, Gata Kamsky, stumbled over the final obstacle and lost. As a result of Kamsky's loss to Fabiano Caruana, Leinier Dominguez was given a chance to not only catch him but bypass him, and he did with a win over Veselin Topalov. Victory in this Grand Prix tournament is the greatest result of Dominguez's career to date - at least in classical chess, as he won the world blitz championship back in 2008.

Dominguez had White in that deciding game, but didn't get anything out of the opening; maybe he was even a little worse. A little at a time he obtained a small advantage, and when almost all of the pieces got vacuumed up towards the end of the first time control, the result was a rook ending where White had an outside passer and thus good practical chances. In fact, Dominguez was given two chances to win, and he took the second. The first came on move 53, when 53.b7 would have won: 53...Rb2+ 54.Kc3! Rb6 55.Rh7 h2 56.Rxh2 and Black is lost. If he doesn't take, White plays Rh7 and wins by scooping up the kingside pawns; if he does, then after 56...Rxb7 57.Rh8+ Kc7 58.Rh7+ White trades rooks and invades with the king. He missed it, and a few moves later Topalov could have held the draw with 58...Kb7. Instead, he missed that on 61...Rg3 62.Rg7 Rg4 the bad position of his king would cost him the game to the trick 63.Rxg6 Rxf4+ 65.Ke5+/Kg5+.

As for Caruana - Kamsky, Caruana may be the world's greatest expert in the Ruy Lopez, but he was only slightly better after 35.Qd1. Had Kamsky played 35...Qf6, that evaluation would have remained in place. Instead, Kamsky blundered with 35...Kh7. Maybe he only saw the funny non-tactic 36.Qh5+ Nh6 37.Qxh6+(??) Kxh6 38.Nf5+ (great, but illegal) and thought that all was well. Instead of 37.Qxh6+, Caruana played 37.Re6, which wins a piece on the spot and forced Kamsky's resignation. As a result, Caruana tied with Kamsky for second, half a point behind Dominguez.

The other two decisive games were rather odd. Nakamura was clearly worse against Svidler and Ivanchuk was clearly worse against Bacrot; naturally, Nakamura and Ivanchuk both won. Morozevich was also clearly worse in his game with Ponomariov, but he "only" managed to draw. Kasimdzhanov - Grischuk was the day's other draw, and a clean one.

Final Standings:

• 1. Dominguez 8 (of 11)
• 2-3. Caruana, Kamsky 7.5
• 4-5. Ponomariov, Grischuk 6
• 6. Kasimdzhanov 5.5
• 7. Nakamura 5
• 8-9. Topalov, Svidler 4.5
• 10-11. Bacrot, Morozevich 4
• 12. Ivanchuk 3.5

Thessaloniki Grand Prix, Round 10: Kamsky Leads Going Into The Last Round

One round remains in the ongoing Grand Prix event in Thessaloniki, and thanks to his win today Gata Kamsky enjoys a half point lead over Leinier Dominguez. Kamsky beat Alexander Morozevich, who managed three serious errors out of his 24 moves. (It seems that more and more of the games are being marred by serious errors, sometimes by both players, which suggests a degree of fatigue. Or maybe it's the beauty of Greece itself!) Kamsky won quickly and convincingly, but missed a chance to win even sooner. 17...Nxb2 was a real stinker, and Kamsky could have capitalized immediately with the natural and obvious 18.Nd5. (I'm sure he saw it; the question is what he overlooked in his analysis.) Anyway, he soon got a second chance, and Morozevich had to resign, faced with massive material loss and checkmate likely to come soon afterward.

If Dominguez had beaten Alexander Grischuk, he would have remained tied for first. With Black that would have been a tough order, and a draw was a very reasonable result. It was a very sharp, even crazy game with Dominguez sacrificing material and both players attacking. This accurately played game finished in a perpetual.

The third game with relevance to the first-place standings was a real mess, with Fabiano Caruana outlasting Veselin Topalov in a hard-fought and mistake-filled game. This was a very important result, as Caruana remains alive in the hunt for first place, and gets the white pieces against Kamsky in the last round, while Dominguez will have White against Topalov. Here are the full pairings:

• Kasimdzhanov (5) - Grischuk (5.5)
• Nakamura (4) - Svidler (4.5)
• Bacrot (4) - Ivanchuk (2.5)
• Morozevich (3.5) - Ponomariov (5.5)
• Caruana (6.5) - Kamsky (7.5)
• Dominguez (7) - Topalov (4.5)

Note to those of you who may want to watch the last round live: the games start two hours earlier than usual, at noon Greek time/11:00 a.m. CET/5 a.m. ET.

Three Queens: A Game and a Puzzle

It's not often that a player has three queens on the board simultaneously - at least if we're talking about serious chess. (If we're talking about scholastic chess, it's almost mandatory that there will be a game on the lower boards where a player has lots of extra queens. Of these about half will end in a draw by stalemate.) Nevertheless, it happened recently, in a game between Yannick Pelletier and Andreas Skytte Hagen. (HT: Marc, Chess Today.)

It's a very entertaining game, and fun to analyze too, but if you'd like something a bit simpler and still involving three queens, try this:

• White: Queens on b1, c1 and d1.
• Black: King on a8.

White to move and mate in 7 without moving any of the queens off the first rank.

I first learned about this puzzle around 30 years ago, maybe longer, and don't think I had the patience at the time to work it out. I dug it up again for this post, and this time managed to solve it in about five minutes, give or take, though with a little frustration before the joyous "aha" moment came. So do your best and hang in there, and if no one puts the answer in the comments by Monday I'll supply it then.

Thessaloniki Grand Prix, Round 9: Dominguez Catches Kamsky

Overall it was one of the least interesting rounds so far in Thessaloniki, and not just because there were only two wins out of six games. Fortunately, it turned out that one of the decisive games was also the most important game for the leaderboard.

The less important win was Veselin Topalov's victory over Alexander Morozevich on the black side of an Advance Caro-Kann. Morozevich had some nice ideas, but something was always a bit off. His pawn sac on move 23 was interesting, but he had a nice tactical opportunity with 23.Nc5, the point being that 23...Bxc5 24.Ra4! leads to a queen trap. Black will obtain sufficient material compensation, but White's position is superior. Later, the "sac" of his knight for three pawns beginning with 35.Nxf7 was an excellent chance, but he made a crucial - fatal - error in the follow-up. The idea of Bxf5 gxf5 d5 was completely correct - if properly timed. White absolutely needed to play 39.Rd3 first, keeping Black's nosy rook out of c3. If Black continued with 39...Be7, aiming to get both the bishop and the rook on h8 into the game, now White could take on f5 and play d5, with pretty fair compensation. As things went Morozevich was lost, and although he was given a bit of a chance with 41...Rxb3 (the unobvious 41...g5! was the winner), he gave the game away for good with 42.Rfe2?, allowing Topalov to force mate starting with 42...Rxg3+.

Now for the main event. Gata Kamsky drew pretty easily with Black against Etienne Bacrot, which meant that if either player won in the clash between Fabiano Caruana and Leinier Dominguez, that person would catch up to Kamsky in first place. Caruana had White, but it was Dominguez who dominated the game. I'm especially impressed by his exchange sacrifice on move 29, for which he received no pawns, no new passed pawns (at least not immediately) and no attacking chances. Queens were off the board and White had the bishop pair, too, so all the usual justifications were absent. Black's position was obviously pleasant - if one ignores the material - but I think most of us would expect White to slowly consolidate and make progress. Maybe Black would hold a draw, but not more than that unless White made some pretty big errors, right?

Wrong. Looking at the game as it happened, it's easy to agree with and internalize the logic of Dominguez's decision. Chances were even after the sacrifice, but Black's position was easier to play: more space, more active pieces, further advanced pawns, etc. As Dominguez pointed out after the game, Caruana probably should have bailed out on move 45 with 45.Rf1+ Ke5 46.Rxf6 Kxf6 47.Rxe4, with a draw. Caruana either missed this (unlikely) or trusted in his winning chances based on queenside counterplay, but that was a deeply mistaken decision. Dominguez may have made a couple of inaccuracies the rest of the way, but that only meant that Caruana might have had an outside shot at a "miracle" draw; the rest of the time Dominguez had a big enough advantage to win two or three games. It was a very impressive game by Dominguez, and he and Kamsky are very deserving leaders at this point.

Here are the pairings for the penultimate round, round 10:

• Grischuk (5) - Dominguez (6.5)
• Topalov (4.5) - Caruana (5.5)
• Kamsky (6.5) - Morozevich (3.5)
• Ponomariov (4.5) - Bacrot (4)
• Ivanchuk (2) - Nakamura (3.5)
• Svidler (4) - Kasimdzhanov (4.5)

And a look ahead: the critical last round pairings are Caruana - Kamsky and Dominguez - Topalov.

Reinfeld Revised(!?)

Fred Reinfeld, How to Be a Winner at Chess (Russell Enterprises 2013), 96 pp., $12.95; How to Play Chess Like a Champion (Russell Enterprises 2013), 136 pp., $14.95.

For those of you unfamiliar with Fred Reinfeld (1910-1964), he was a strong American master and an incredibly prolific author. He may have written as many as 200 books, and on a wide array of subjects. Many of his books were on chess, and many of those were written for kids and amateurs taking their first serious steps in the game.

For a long time, up through at least my teen years and early adulthood (i.e. into the 1980s), his books could often be found here in the United States in ordinary brick-and-mortar bookstores. Eventually they started to disappear, probably for two main reasons: first, they were written in descriptive notation, which has gone the way of the dinosaurs; second, because other, contemporary writers stepped up to take his (and I.A. Horowitz's and Irving Chernev's) place as the low-level club player's best friend. With respect to the second factor, some contemporary writers do a good job, but I'm inclined to think that most do not, and some are almost criminally bad. Nevertheless, the descriptive notation issue is a problem.

Enter Bruce Alberston and Russell Enterprises, who have issued a "21st Century Edition" of two of his Reinfeld's works, with two more on the way. (Those are his "1001" books: 1001 Brilliant Ways to Checkmate and 1001 Winning Sacrifices and Combinations. I don't think I had the Checkmate book, but I'm a fan of the latter work, which I've recommended to people who can stand descriptive notation. There are a number of errors in it though, which I hope they'll catch and note.) Now, while there are some works by Reinfeld that I like (see the previous, parenthetical sentence) and I enjoyed some of his books when I was a kid, my first reaction was to compare a new and improved edition of Reinfeld books to McDonald's cheeseburgers, now served on fine china! (Oooooh...ahhhh.)

It's a funny line - at least I'm inclined to think so - but it isn't really fair. One might eat fast food for pleasure - many do! - but to make it a regular part of your diet is to beg for health problems down the road, and not necessarily that far down the road, either. Most Reinfeld books, by contrast, are not going to make their intended audience weaker. They are simple and present chess with a wide-eyed excitement that might make experienced players roll their eyes, but that convey the right attitude towards newer chessplayers, especially kids. One should (quickly) graduate to more substantial books - instructive game collections would be my recommendation for the next step - but Reinfeld is a good guide for those taking the next steps after learning the rules, looking to understand how to conduct a decent game of chess.

The first book is the simpler one. How to Be a Winner at Chess hits the basics: how to give and recognize checkmate, the value of the pieces, the power of checks, captures, threats (especially double attacks), and promotion; how to play the opening in an intelligent way, simple middlegame and endgame tips, and so on. There's even a brief summary of the rules of chess.

The second book is more "inspirational" and more advanced. It includes some beautiful games and combinations that seem to me more designed to delight the reader than to instruct. This is okay! Part of becoming a chessplayer is falling in love with the game, and the sooner a player "catches" the aesthetic part of the game, the better. Even very strong players can find their own games getting stale from time to time, and when they do it's good to take time out to remind themselves of why they grew enthralled by chess in the first place. After the refresher, they - we - are ready to go back out there and try again, inspired by the beauty of the game.

The books have their flaws, and no one should confuse his book with a curriculum for mastery. If taken for what they are, however, and for the right audience, they are worthwhile.

Thessaloniki Grand Prix, Round 8: Kamsky Leads Alone

Gata Kamsky still intends to retire when he turns 40, unfortunately, but for now he's enjoying some fine performances. That he won the U.S. Championship wasn't much of a surprise - with Hikaru Nakamura gone he was a pretty significant favorite. After eight rounds there his score was 6-2, which was good but not a shock. He's also 6-2 thus far at the FIDE Grand Prix tournament in Thessaloniki, and that is a surprise. He has won three games in a row, and his latest victim was the aforementioned Nakamura. It was a remarkably easy win, more or less settled when Nakamura played 15...Qa3? White was already better, but that gave Kamsky a won position after 16.Bg6+ and 17.Bf7, picking up the e-pawn. Nakamura fought an additional 30+ moves, but the advantage was just too big.

Fabiano Caruana shared the lead going into the round, but he was fortunate to escape his game with Alexander Grischuk with half a point. (That was the only draw of the round.) Caruana was a bit worse for a long time, but it wasn't too worrisome until 40...Kh6, imperiling his king. Grischuk's 41.Rd1! revealed Black's trouble, but on move 44 he let Caruana slip away with 44.Rh1+; 44.Rd7 Rg7 45.e6 kept a probably winning bind.

Tied for second with Caruana is Leinier Dominguez, who had led or been tied for the lead after rounds 4-6. He outplayed Alexander Morozevich pretty smoothly. White's position looked pleasant after 23.Rfe1; after 23...Be6 it was probably winning. It's hard for me to understand that move; maybe Morozevich felt his position was bankrupt in any case and hoped to gain some compensation with the bishop pair in return for the pawn (and the space, and the e-file, and the dark squares...). He didn't.

Other games: Veselin Topalov played a very poor opening against Etienne Bacrot - especially unusual for Topalov with the White pieces. He must have missed Bacrot's nice tactical shot 14...Bxb4, after which he was in very bad shape. In fact, Bacrot may have been winning with 15...Nd4 rather than 15...Nxb4. Presumably White intended to give up the queen for three minor pieces with 16.Nxd4, but after 16...Bxe2 17.Nxe2 c6 White's d-pawn will drop, and his e-pawn may soon join his neighbor in the afterlife as well. So 15...Nxb4 may have been a bit of an amnesty, but when Topalov gave up the exchange with 20.Nd5 (rather than holding it with 20.Nc2 - 20...Bh3 21.Ne1 followed by Ng2 is the point) it became a matter of technique. The technical task was simplified by Topalov's 31.h4?; 31.Nf5 first would have kept some hope alive.

The two remaining games were also won by Black: in the battle of the Rus's (neither of whom is from Russia), Rustam Kasimdzhanov won a very nice ending over Ruslan Ponomariov, while Vassily Ivanchuk's tournament of implosion continued against Peter Svidler. In fact it was a good battle, not lost by the Ukranian on any single really bad move. (Perhaps the simplest and easiest improvement came on move 27, when 27.Rxh6 would have maintained the balance.)

Today (Friday) was the second and last rest day, and the last three rounds will be played on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Here are the pairings for round 9:

• Svidler (3.5) - Grischuk (4.5)
• Kasimdzhanov (4) - Ivanchuk (1.5)
• Nakamura (3) - Ponomariov (4)
• Bacrot (3.5) - Kamsky (6)
• Morozevich (3.5) - Topalov (3.5)
• Caruana (5.5) - Dominguez (5.5) (Probably the most important game of the round.)