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Bursa WTC: Nakamura beats Gelfand in round five
10.01.2010
– We single this round and this game in the World Team Championship in Bursa, Turkey, because of its sheer audacity. Hikaru Nakamura of the US, facing the world's number six, Boris Gelfan, with the black pieces, sacrificed a knight on move 23, left his queen hanging to a pawn and won in great style. After six rounds Russia and the US lead.
Illustrated report.
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Asian Indoor Games in Ha Long – pictorial impressions
09.01.2010
– In December we reported in detail on the Third Asian Indoor Games, where teams from 19 countries participated in the chess section. The story was so extensive that we were unable to include all the pictures sent in by our reporter. We bring you these impressions from a location that is a "New Seven Wonders of the World" candidate.
Mehrdad Pahlevanzadeh reports.
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Joueuse – Queen to Play
09.01.2010
– "Attention all nerds and former high-school science-club members: finally there is a movie that shares your belief that chess should be a magnet for hot babes and sex." Not our words, but those of the Miami Herald reviewer Rene Rodriguez. This film stars Sandrine Bonnaire and Kevin Kline (in his first French-speaking role), and premiered in Germany on Friday.
Trailers.
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World Team Championship in Bursa, Turkey
09.01.2010
– This event is held in a four-year cycle, and this year, in spite of the absence of China, it is fielding a dozen players rated 2700 or higher. After four rounds Armenia and USA lead, in match and board points, with Russia, Israel and India tied for 3-5 on match points. You can watch the games on the official site and on Playchess.
Illustrated report.
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The automatic recapture...
09.01.2010
– ... of the bishop was what White expected in this position after
25.Bxg7, yet immediately after his move he suddenly realised the possibility 25...Qxb3 26.axb3 Rba6. How would you assess the situation after that?
A) Black checkmates;
B) this eventually leads to a position with equal chances;
C) White gets the advantage.
The solution is here, but first ponder over it with a
larger version of the diagram.
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Kamsky catches Almasi, wins Reggio Emilia 2010
08.01.2010
– Before the final round of this prestigious Italian tournament seven-time Hungarian champion Zoltan Almasi was a full point ahead. But he had to face his main rival, Gata Kamsky, with the black pieces. The US grandmaster played a dashing exchange sacrifice on move 17 to take the game and the overall tournament victory. Second was Almasi, third Fabiano Caruana.
Final report.
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Grandmasters and Global Growth
07.01.2010
– Professor Kenneth Rogoff is a strong chess grandmaster, who also happens to
be one of the world's leading economists. In a Project
Syndicate article that appeared this week Ken sees the new decade as
one in which "artificial intelligence hits escape velocity," with
an economic impact on par with the emergence of India and China. He uses computer
chess to
illustrated the point.
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ChessBase Workshop: All about ChessBase Light
07.01.2010
– Did you know you can get the famous database program, that all the top professionals
use, free of charge? Immediately – like right now? Just download ChessBase
Light and start working with the latest version of our games management software.
How to use the program is explained in the latest ChessBase Workshop installment
by Steven Lopez in streaming
video.
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Karjakin: 'I don't consider Magnus my principal rival'
07.01.2010
– He became a grandmaster at the age of twelve years and seven months –
the youngest in
history. Sergey Karjakin, who turns twenty next Tuesday, is ten months older
than Magnus Carlsen, the current number one in the world rankings. In the magazine
Segodnja Sport the former Ukrainian,
who is lives in and plays for Russia, tells us about his chess programme, marriage
and
life in Moscow.
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Bishop sacrifice on h7 leads to spectacular victory
06.01.2010
– Whereas the main attention was focussed on Azerbaijan's victory over Armenia at
the start of the World Team Championship, the hosts Turkey had the joy of a
spectacular win: 19-year-old Emre Can defeated Yuri Shulman, almost 200 Elo points
stronger, in a Tarrasch French with the help of a bishop sacrifice
on h7. The 2008 USA champion, however, was not following the recommendations of
Hannes Langrock, whose four-part article in CBMs 126-129 presents the theory of
the 3...Be7 system in great detail and with a lot of original analysis. Here is
the game with brief notes.
Full analysis by Igor Stohl will follow, in February in CBM 134.
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Akiba Rubinstein – 99 years ago
06.01.2010
– In 1910 Emanuel Lasker was World Champion, but the arguably strongest player
in the world was the Polish master Akiba Kiwelowicz Rubinstein (1882–1961),
a dominant figure in tournament chess who was winning most events and in glorious
style. In this week's Playchess lecture
Dennis Monokroussos looks at a game or two of his from the 1911 tournament in
Karlsbad.
9 p.m. ET
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Hastings: Four players tie for first with 7.0/9
06.01.2010
– The 2009-10 Hastings Masters ended in a fourway tie for first place, between Mark Hebden of England, British Champion David Howell, Andrei Istratescu of Roumania, and Romain Edouard of France. In the final round Hebden and Istratescu halved out in 11 moves, but Howell had to fight for a black victory. Our report on the last two rounds includes a
big pictorial of lesser-known players.
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