Kiriakov tames the monster

by ChessBase
6/13/2004 – In his second game against the Dual Xeon 3.06 GHz Russian GM Petr Kiriakov showed the audience how to get a safe draw: close up the position, block any breakthrough chances and then simply do nothing! Opponent Shredder was reduced to shuffling its pieces around, wondering why nothing was happening in this game...

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Shredder 8 vs Petr Kiriakov

Former Russian junior champion Petr Kiriakov, Elo 2568, played a match against the program Deep Shredder on the Playchess server. The event was conducted by Martin Müller ("Smurskie" to the Playchess crowd), who is using an awe-inspiring Dual Xeon 3.06 GHz computer, with 2 GB RAM and 50 GB of Endgame Tablebases.


Pert Kiriakov

Martin Müller

While his colleague Zhu Chen was having real problems with a chess program, Kiriakov was giving people on the Playchess.com server a lesson on how to keep these monsters at bay. In the first game, with the black pieces, he quickly closed the position, while retaining tight control over the one open file. Shredder was unable to launch a kingside assault because it could not see clear results within its search horizon. Kiriakov simply shuffled around with his pieces until a draw was agreed.

The second game was even more drastic. In a classical King's Indian Kiriakov had already locked up the pawns in the middle by move 17. Shredder spent a lot of time trying to figure out how to make progress, but all constructive attempts were met by further consolidation and blockading by the human opponent. In the end the pawn structure was the one depicted on the right. After a trade-off of all pieces neither the king would have a way of entering the enemy position.

While the spectators watched incredulously Shredder moved its pieces around behind the pawn chain, mainly concerned with avoiding a draw by repetition. It had to be seen to be believed.

On the left you can see the shuffling of the white and black queens (many of the arrows are in reality multiple moves to and from the squares. On the right are the moves of the kings. At one stage Kiriakov marches his king across to the queenside, possibly considering some kind of an attack of the black a-pawn (which was still on a5). When it didn't work he moved it back to the center and, after a total of 95 moves, the game ended in a draw.

Replay both games of the Kiriakov-Shredder match

These are the results Martin has achieved with his computer:
Time controls 120 min + 10 min rest
26.12.01 Deep Junior 7 GM Pablo Zarnicki (ARG)
1-0
10.09.01 Deep Junior 7 GM Alexey Dreev (RUS)
draw
04.07.01 Deep Shredder 5 GM Alexey Dreev (RUS)
draw
30.05.01 Deep Fritz GM Pablo Zarnicki (ARG)
draw
05.08.01 Deep Fritz GM Alexey Dreev (RUS)
0-1
01.08.01 Shredder 5 GM Pablo Zarnicki (ARG)
draw
16.03.01 Shredder 5 GM Pablo Zarnicki (ARG)
1-0
04.03.01 Shredder 6 GM James Plaskett (ENG)
0-1
17.02.02 Shredder 5 GM Alexey Dreev (RUS)
0-1
21.02.02 Shredder 5 GM Alexey Dreev (RUS)
0-1
21.09.02 Shredder 6 GM Petr Kiriakov (RUS)
1-0
27.09.02 Shredder 6 GM Petr Kiriakov (RUS)
0-1
14.01.03 Shredder 7 GM Sergey Volkov (RUS)
1-0
15.01.03 Shredder 7 GM Sergey Volkov (RUS)
1-0
29.12.2003 Deep Fritz 8 GM Sergey Volkov (RUS)
1-0
30.12.2003 Deep Fritz 8 GM Sergey Volkov (RUS)
1-0
13.06.04 Shredder 8 GM Petr Kiriakov (RUS)
draw
13.06.04 Shredder 8 GM Petr Kiriakov (RUS)
draw

Time controls 60 min + 30 min rest
16.08.01 DF -GM Sergej Volkov (RUS) draw

Time controls 60 min + 0 min rest
26.05.01 Deep Fritz-GM Pablo Zarnicki(ARG) 1-0
26.05.01 Deep Fritz-GM Pablo Zarnicki(ARG) draw


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