The Daily Update: Women's World Championship, Russian Championship

Game 1 of the final match in the Women's World Championship was a draw. Hou Yifan had White and seemed to have the better of the play, but Ruan Lufei, her countrywoman, managed to hold in a long game. Note: the final match goes four games and not just two. It's still short, but considering how many games they played to reach this point, I'm sure they feel it's long enough.

In the Russian Championship, one leader has been replaced and the other nearly dropped off as well. Ian Nepomniachtchi won an impressive game against Peter Svidler with White in the Scotch, taking the latter's place in a first-place tie with Sergey Karjakin. Karjakin was in a little trouble himself. He played a very unimpressive sideline against Jakovenko's Berlin, and the result was a sort of Exchange French position where he could do nothing but passively and patiently hold for the draw, which he eventually achieved. All the other games were drawn, so after nine rounds Karjakin and Nepomniachtchi are tied for first with 6, with Svidler and Alexander Grischuk half a point behind. Two rounds remain.

The Daily Update: Russian Championship, European Blitz and Rapid Championships

The women finally got a day off (or rather, a guaranteed day off; there were days off already for winners when they finished their matches without tiebreaks), but there was action at the Russian Championship. Only two of the seven games had a winner, but one was very important in the race for first. Sergey Karjakin defeated Igor Kurnosov with Black in a Berlin, and thereby caught up with Peter Svidler in first place with 5.5/8; Alexander Grischuk and Ian Nepomniachtchi are half a point behind.

Surprisingly, given the previous figures, the Live Top List has Karjakin in 7th, behind Grischuk and Veselin Topalov. As I had interpreted the last standings given there, it seemed that Karjakin was in fifth two rounds ago, and since then has scored 1.5/2 against players rated about 100-110 points lower rated than he is. That should be a net rating gain, but he seems to have lost a point or two on the list. Whatever the story, his general trend for the year has been very good - living in Russia and working with Yuri Dokhoian seems to be agreeing with him - and perhaps the battle for the top 1990er will be rejoined in full.

Another big, recent event - or pair of events - that flew under my radar (and apparently that of [most of?] the other "usual suspects" as well until after it finished) took place in Warsaw, Poland over this past weekend. On Friday the 17th the European Blitz Championship was played; Maxime Vachier-Lagrave won with 22/26, Vassily Ivanchuk came in second with 20 and Ruslan Ponomariov finished third with 19.5. Then on Saturday and Sunday it was time for the European Rapid Championship, and it finished in a six-way tie for first. On tiebreaks, the top three were Zoltan Almasi, Ivanchuk (again!) and Vugar Gashimov.

There were plenty of stars in the two events, and I'd expect to find many beautiful games and interesting opening ideas in the database files. The tournament site is here, while easy access to the results and both events' games can be found here.

This Week's ChessVideos Show: Viewer Games & Questions

It's a combined show this week, which you can view here. Topics range across the board from openings (including slightly askew versions of the Blackmar-Diemer Gambit and the Poisoned Pawn Najdorf) to middlegames (some fascinating attacking chess makes an appearance) and endgames (including the old instructive classic pitting a good knight against a bad bishop).

As always, the show is free (free registration is required) and available on-demand for the next month or so.

An Update With Games: Women's World Championship, Russian Championship, and the Bundesliga

We start with the Women's World Championship, which just finished the semifinals. The first one to finish was perhaps the de facto final, and in it Hou Yifan defeated Humpy Koneru, just as she did in 2008 (before losing to Alexandra Kosteniuk in the finals). Hou is still just 16, and if (as strongly expected) she wins in the finals she'll be the youngest women's world champion ever, breaking Maia Chiburdanidze's long-lasting record of becoming champion at 17.

Both of the Hou Yifan-Humpy Koneru games had their eye-catching moments - at least they caught mine! We start with the winning breakthrough in game one. After 73...Bf2, this position arose.

 

Hou finished elegantly: 74.h5 gxh5 75.f5 exf5 76.e6 Bg3 77.e7 Kd7 78.a7 (Just in time!) 1-0

In their second game, this position arose after seven moves:

You might wonder what's so interesting about this position. It looks like an ordinary open Sicilian, though a slightly unusual one. If it were a normal Najdorf, White would almost definitely have played 7.f4 rather than 7.Qd2. White's position looks like the Rauzer Variation of the Classical, but the problem is that Black's knight isn't on c6. Okay, maybe a Schevningen? Not impossible, but it's at best very unusual for White to handle it this way.

The answer? It's a Torre Attack: 1.d4 e6 2.Nf3 Nf6 3.Bg5. This is nothing like an open Sicilian, to put it mildly, but watch: 3...c5 4.Nc3 (very unusual) cxd4 5.Nxd4 Be7 (also rare) 6.e4 d6 7.Qd2 a6 and we've reached the diagram position. After a sharp fight very much in keeping with a traditional Sicilian, the game finished in a draw.

I haven't so much as mentioned the other match, so I'll repair that omission now. Ruan Lufei and Zhao Xue drew their classical games, and then Ruan won in tiebreaks.

In the Russian Championship Friday was the one and only rest day; and it found Peter Svidler in the lead. His 4.5/6 had him half a point clear of new world #5 Sergey Karjakin and a point ahead of Alexander Grischuk and Ian Nepomniachtchi. In round 7, Grischuk and Nepomniachtchi both won while Svidler and Karjakin drew, so now there's a three way tie for second half a point behind Svidler. Also, Grischuk will leapfrog Karjakin (and Topalov [remember him?] in the process) to take over the #5 spot again.

Finally, last weekend was a Bundesliga weekend, and while I'll leave you to look up the results for yourself, to see which team of mostly non-Germans is ahead of which other teams of mostly non-Germans, I will present a spectacular game from that weekend. Unsurprisingly, the victor was Alexei Shirov, whose novelty and subsequent attacking play overwhelmed poor David Baramidze. You can replay that game, along with the two Hou Yifan-Humpy Koneru games, here.

A Chess Dream

Sometimes I remember my dreams, sometimes not, but as far as I can tell they're rarely about chess. This morning was an exception, as I had a long and vivid dream, the centerpiece of which was my defeating Viswanathan Anand in an unofficial rapid game. (Might as well dream big!) I had recorded the game, people had witnessed it, taken pictures, and near the end even made a cake with the final position. Anand was very good-natured about it and everything was wonderful...

And then I woke up. My immediate reaction, while my eyes were still closed and my head still on the pillow: "Oh no! It wasn't real!!" I have to say that the frustration was more amusement than anything else, a bit like almost catching a giant fish or successfully hitting a hole-in-one and not having anyone around to see it. In fact there was so much glee from the dream itself that it kept me in a good mood for quite a while after that.

Funny enough, I was able to remember much of the game's score, and almost immediately set about reconstructing it. After 2-3 minutes, I realized that what I was remembering may or may not have been my game with "Anand", but bore an overwhelming resemblance to a blitz game I had played the night before. That was "also" a game I won, against a good opponent, but not quite against the world champion. It's a little odd that I remembered that game and that it might have reappeared in my dream, as I hadn't played it right before bed and while it was a decent game it wasn't really anything special.

Readers, do you have any good chess dreams to relate? The late, great David Bronstein sometimes invented entertaining games in his sleep - does he have any rivals among you?

Carlsen-Short, With Notes

It did decide the tournament, after all, so it seems apt to present Magnus Carlsen's last round win over Nigel Short (with commentary). Have a look!

Final Four in the Women's World Championship (Plus Some News); All Draws in the Russian Championship

With the notable exception of Malakhov-Nepomniachtchi, which went 108 moves, round 5 of the Russian Championship was a fairly easygoing affair. All the games were drawn, so Karjakin and Svidler continue to lead; their 3.5 points keeps them half a point ahead of Grischuk and Nepomniachtchi.

There wasn't so much action in the Women's World Championship today, as only one of the quarterfinal matches required a tiebreak. The result was Ruan Lufei's defeat of Harika Dronavalli, and in the semi-finals we have the following pairings: Hou Yifan-Humpy Koneru and Ruan Lufei-Zhao Xue. The first pairing is rather unfortunate, as it pits the top two seeds in the semi-finals. This is the result of the decision to make the defending (and now outgoing) champion Alexandra Kosteniuk the top seed in spite of her rating. It might be flattering to Kosteniuk, but the likeliest result in the real world is that one of the two best players will lose some prestige and a lot of money by being eliminated one round sooner than necessary.

Returning to a topic discussed in earlier rounds, regular commenter Thomas passes along info from mishanp about the non-participation of Nadezhda Kosintseva. He (Thomas) writes:

- She missed both qualifying events, one due to her university studies, one because of illness. Apparently this year's European championship - which I had mentioned in the comments - is a qualifier for the next WCh in 2012 !!??

- She then asked for a wildcard (IMO logical given several special circumstances) but the organizing country Turkey insisted on two wildcards - one is normal - and got both. Yaznici is a close buddy of Ilyumzhinov and supported his FIDE presidential campaign ... .

This info, based on Russian sources, is from "mishanp" (owner of the Chessintranslation site and regularly commenting on Dailydirt).

Thank you, Thomas!

Carlsen Wins London (Again)

Magnus Carlsen entered the last round tied for first, but with the best possible pairing: White against tailender Nigel Short. Unsurprisingly, Carlsen dispatched him most efficiently. That assured Carlsen of first on tiebreaks no matter what happened with Viswanathan Anand and Luke McShane (the other co-leaders going into the round), but as they drew their games (with Vladimir Kramnik and David Howell, respectively) Carlsen finished in clear first. Finally, Hikaru Nakamura battled to bare kings against Mickey Adams, but that game too was drawn.

Final Standings:

1. Carlsen 13 (+4 -2 =1)

2-3. Anand, McShane 11 (+2 =5)

4-5. Nakamura, Kramnik 10 (+2 -1 =4)

6. Adams 8 (+1 -1 =5)

7. Howell 4 (-3 =4)

8. Short 2 (-5 =2)

Tournament site here; games later.

London, Round 6: Four Draws, Or Santa Claus is Coming to Town

Three players - Carlsen, Anand and McShane - entered the round with the lead, and the same three players left it the same way. They were lucky, though, as both Nakamura and especially Kramnik could have led by day's end.

Kramnik outplayed Carlsen from start to finish...or rather, almost the finish. Carlsen hung on like a barnacle, and Kramnik failed to overcome the final hurdle. (That said, his technique even prior to the final error hadn't been stellar, though it should have been good enough to win.) Nakamura's opportunity wasn't quite as clear-cut and was only there for a moment, but he too had an excellent chance to beat McShane. Unlike his co-leaders, Anand was never at death's door, but he did have to neutralize Adams' long-term pressure.

In the battle to avoid last place, Short blundered a pawn on move 2 (1.e4 e5 2.f4?) and came out of the opening much worse against Howell. He eventually managed to equalize and even achieve an advantage, but like Kramnik, Nakamura and Howell in the first half of the game, he failed to maintain it.

Standings After Round 6:

1-3. Carlsen, Anand, McShane 10

4-5. Nakamura, Kramnik 9

6. Adams 7

7. Howell 3

8. Short 2

Final Round Pairings:

Anand - Kramnik (I'm sure Anand will push hard; Kramnik, unless he has a bomb prepared in an opening other than the Petroff, will be playing for a draw and is thus out of the hunt.)

Nakamura - Adams (Nakamura must win to have a chance, obviously.)

Howell - McShane (A good chance for McShane, but it would be better if he had White.)

Carlsen - Short (Hopefully the Short of the 90s rather than the Short of the first 6 rounds will play.)

Note: The round starts two hours early, i.e. at noon London time (= 7 a.m. ET/1 p.m. CET).

Tournament site here; games (with my comments) here.

Women's World Championship: Down to the Final 5; Plus the Russian Championship

1. The quarter-finals of the Women's World Championship are over, with one exception, and here are the results:

Humpy Koneru beat Ju Wenju 1.5-.5

Hou Yifan beat Kateryna Lahno 1.5-.5

Zhao Xue beat Almira Skripchenko 1.5-.5

Ruan Lufei and Harika Dronavalli drew twice, and will face off in the tiebreaks tomorrow.

2. In the Russian Championship, Sergey Karjakin and Peter Svidler lead with 3/4; Alexander Grischuk and Ian Nepomniachtchi are half a point back.