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Alekhine's Parrot
TheParrot
Says…Welcome
to the archive of the weekly leader of chess events around the world. Chessville
welcomes your Feedback to TheParrot on this week’s news by
writing to
TheParrot@Chessville.com where selected letters will be
featured.
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3-31-2007
|
 |
Chess News
USA and Canada |
 |

Canada explains thinking on Canadian Ratings Rise –
Official!
In the past ten years a large increase in the participation levels of
junior players in key Canadian markets has led to pronounced rating
deflation. The talented juniors have been rapidly taking points
out of the system as their own strengths and ratings have improved.
A National Rating Committee was established to review the rating
system and decided to take two measures. The first was a
retroactive rating increase for all members who had been active in the
past few years. T he second is the impending introduction of an ongoing
review process for ensuring rating stability.
Essentially, the retroactive boon applied to all games played between
July 1, 2004 and September 1, 2006. Players below 2200 were
awarded 1 point per game; players below 2400 1/2 point; and players
above 2400 1/4 point. Source: Chess Canada.
Local
Chess Traffic, Cincinnati: Susan Polgar, Maurice Ashley, and Gregory
Kaidanov, will kick off the Queen City Classic at Paul Brown Stadium's
Club West Friday evening March 30 when they each play 40 chess matches
simultaneously and play a blindfolded game of chess. The next
morning, the sixth annual Queen City Classic Chess Tournament will begin
at 9 a.m. Students will play five rounds of chess, say
Cincinnati.com.
Local Chess Traffic, New York: The Parrot picked up a
local tournament a few weeks ago, here are the final results: 2007
Dutchess County Championship. Congratulations to the trophy
winners for this year’s Championship:
First Place: Ernie Johnson
Second Place: Scott Strattner
Top A&B Class: Jim Lynch
Top C Class: Tom Marvullo
Top D Class: Aidan Hite
Top E and Below: Aaron J. Stokes
2007 Dutchess County Championship such an exciting event.
1 Ernie Johnson...............1994 W 10 W 14 W 12 D 2 W 6 4.5 12.5
14.5 14.5
2 Scott Strattner.............1678 D 11 W 13 W 7 D 1 W 8 4.0 12.5 14.5
14.5
Next up: SATURDAY, April 28 is our annual Memorial Tournament at
MARIST COLLEGE, Room 125 of the Lowell Thomas Building. For those
who would enjoy a day, instead of an evening, of chess, and especially
those who find Monday nights difficult for any reason, put this date
firmly on your calendar. It is a 4 round Swiss, Game 50.
Information courtesy: Michael O’Connor.
Other Local Traffic:
US
Championship, Correction? The Parrot has been challenged in
Chessville’s Forum by ‘ALPHETA’ concerning
the list of players entered for the US Championship – and a more careful
look at the USCF website says that the list show here last week are ‘qualified
so far’.
Source.
Further investigation of what this statement means, and who has signed
up reveals… nothing! The page
http://www.uschess.org/index1.php lists events after the
Championship, but not the championship itself. Therefore: Good
Challenge! ‘qualified so far’ does not mean the listed players
intend to take part – and may even have said ‘no!’
The same reader also challenged the Parrot to obtain
first-hand news of participants, independently of USCF if possible,
but three weeks ago a list of questions was received by USCF’s
Executive Director, who readily agreed to answer them. Then Bill
Hall missed three deadlines [his own] and did not answer at all – We can
suppose that instead he is dealing with hundreds of letters which are
appearing in every chess forum on the three subjects put to him by
Chessville: (1) The Championship, (2) Current Finances,
(3) The USCF Forum.
Chess Press:
An
e-magazine Womens’ E News picked up a chess story reported by Angeli
Rasbury, WeNews correspondent:
“Last year Darrian represented the United States at the World
Youth Chess Tournament in 2006 in the Democratic Republic of Georgia.
She was the only African American from the United States. It is
common for her to be the only black competitor. At nationals, boys can
outnumber girls 15 or 20-to-1. At invitational's, such as the
World Youth Chess Tournament, girls and boys are equally represented.”
Read the whole thing at
http://www.womensenews.org/article.cfm?aid=3109 and continues to
talk about barriers in the chess world which may be invisible to white
males but not black females! It is well written, worth the
attention of any coach or any father of daughters.
The 12 year old subject of the interview is from Brooklyn, currently
rating 1771, and wants to be a grandmaster. Someone else from
Brooklyn did quite well. You Go Girl!
The Parrot has incidentally asked Darrian via journalist Angeli
Rasberry, if she would like to annotate one of her own games for
Chessville.
|
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Chess News WORLDWIDE |

The 16th Amber Blindfold and Rapid Tournament
Organizers have ensured small photographic news of their event by
ensuring that photos can’t be copied from the site. But here are
the full results for perhaps the most demanding chess engagement on the
entire calendar.
Final Standings Blindfold:
1 Kramnik - 9.0
2-3 Morozevich, Gelfand - 7.0
4-5 Svidler, Ivanchuk - 6.5
6 Aronian - 6.0
7-8 Radjabov, Anand - 5.0
9-10 Carlsen, Leko - 4.0
11 Van Wely - 3.5
12 Vallejo Pons - 2.5 |
Final Standings Rapid:
1 Anand - 8.5
2-5 Kramnik, Carlsen, Leko, Ivanchuk - 6.5
6 Aronian - 6.0
7 Svidler - 5.5
8-9 Gelfand, Morozevich - 4.5
10-11 Radjabov. Vallejo Pons - 3.5
12 Van Wely - 3.0
|
While Kramnik won the blindfold 2 points clear, and Anand did the
same in the Rapid, the combined scores demonstrate just how strong
Kramnik’s overall performance was at this year’s event – 2 points clear
in this company is a handsome winning margin.
Official website
Combined
Final Standings:
1 Kramnik - 15.5
2 Anand - 13.5
3 Ivanchuk - 13.0
4-5 Svidler, Aronian - 12.0
6-7 Morozevich, Gelfand - 11.5
8-9 Carlsen, Leko - 10.5
10 Radjabov - 9.0
11-12 Vallejo Pons, Van Wely - 6.5
The 8th A. Karpov tournament took place 14th-25th March in
Poikovsky (Russia). US Participant and current US Champion Alex
Onischuk did particularly well. Caption is of Dmitri Jakovenko, who did
even better.
Final
standings:
1 Jakovenko - 6.0
2-4 Onischuk, Alekseev, Bologan - 5.0
5-6 Istratescu, Rublevsky - 4.5
7-8 Dreev, Sutovsky - 4.0
9-10 Tkachiev, Zhang Pengxiang - 3.5
 
The 1st Ruy Lopez International Festival took place in Zafra,
birthplace of Ruy Lopez, from 16th to 25th March. What a great result
for Sargissian finishing way above the rest, and beating out Pono
and Soko! As well as this picture of the winner from the difficult to
negotiate web-site, here is a handsome snap of Felipe II (who I think
chess players have to thank for his early patronage of the game) as well
as this truly handsome illustrated page on the origins of the modern
game.
Final
standings:
1 Sargissian - 6.5
2-3 Granda Zuniga, Ponomariov - 4.0
4 Sokolov - 3.5
5 Perez Candelario - 3.0
6-7 Sasikiran, Stefanova - 2.5
8 Hou Yifan - 2.0
Official
site |
3-24-2007
|
 |
Chess News
USA and Canada |
 |
Canadian ratings debate; which way to
go, towards USCF or Fide? Here is a summary conversation from a
chess newsgroup:
Ø
But *over the years* the USCF, for instance, has
deliberately manipulated their ratings pool up or back down, and this is
what I was referring to, not "normal" attempts to keep things smooth and
steady. Essentially, my barb was directed specifically at the ridiculous
USCF, at its long history of tinkering with members' ratings like a cat
with a play toy.
Ø
Canada is in the middle of this right now. CFC has
started to increase ratings based on how many games a person has played.
The CFC seems to think that Canadian ratings should mirror the USCF
ratings and not FIDE ratings. I’ve heard many people complain of this
at the last couple of Tournaments I’ve been to.
The
previously named US National Championship,
now the
Frank K. Berry US Championship
will go ahead.
A 9-round
swiss with at least 34 players, 31 qualifiers plus 3 sponsor's
exemptions at a time control of G/150 with 30 seconds/move increment
starting on move 1. Prizes: $12000, 8000, 5000, 4000, 3500, 3000
down to 500 for last place. If a tie for 1st, money is split
evenly and the top two on tiebreaks play two G/10 for the title. Five
players qualify for FIDE World Cup with ties broken by computer
tiebreaks. All players are required to use the MonRoi electronic
scoresheet.
Frank K. Berry has
contributed $50,000 and may raise or donate more, and USCF has committed
to raising or donating $15,000. Presumably the 3 ‘sponsor players’
contributed money to enter the tournament witch will be held at a
‘Quality Inn’ in Stillwater Oklahoma.
Though… USCF’s website
adds “If enough money is available, it is possible that the top two
players in the Swiss will qualify for a match to be played in Stillwater
several months later to decide the US Champion. Whether or not this
format will be used has not yet been decided.”
We hope that’s clear to
Chessville’s readers, since is as clear as mud to the Parrot.
Interestingly two top US
Women players will take part: Susan Polgar, New York and Irina Krush,
also of New York. The defending champion is Alex Onishuk of
Maryland, as will Gata Kamsky, New York, and the new US #1, Hikaru
Nakamura, of New York.
Reaction to the current
buy-in Championship has been ‘mixed’ to say the least! – but to give
USCF credit they have published negative reactions to their new scheme,
which is led by this one, which seems typical, while other commentators
do not like the buy-in arrangement:
Wow!
$65,0000 Total Prize fund for the Chess Championship of the richest
country in the World?!!!!!!
The USCF board should resign immediately and let more capable people run
the show if the board is unable to secure corporate sponsorship for the
main US tournament of the year. Then we wonder why our most talented kid
turned away from the game when they have so many other options.
At the very least the USCF should match the $50,000 private donation.
Local Chess Traffic:
Chess in Connecticut – Yale are sponsoring a big chess event this
weekend, though sadly detail of what is going on is scarce according to
either website:
http://www.edutechchess.com/ or
http://www.ctchess.com/.
Red
Ink Report: After a good February USCF is only $163,000 in the hole, and
if things continue well will finish the year at ‘only’ -$50,000. That is
the unofficial official report, and the most optimistic cited anywhere.
In order to investigate the truth Chessville asked USCF’s Executive
Director to reply – and though he agreed to do so, he did not. Meanwhile
one board member has publicly suggested that the red number is actually
-$300,000.
That is an alarming number to follow the original Alarie Red Ink
report, and perhaps it is no more than an alarmist number to speculate
on? But why is it a secret number? The answer for keeping it secret is
according to our investigations of both board and executive director,
also a secret.
Other Chess Traffic:
Paul
Troung, candidate board member for USCF, recently told Jack LeMoine in
an interview:
http://jacklemoine.blogspot.com/search/label/Chess
JL: 5) What assistance in local club promotion
can the promoter presently expect from the United States Chess
Federation (USCF)? And/or what assistance should the promoter
expect in the future?
PT:
Right now, he or she can expect very little if anything from the USCF.
The USCF has no such department and no such person who can devote time
to help him in this aspect.
Chess Press:
Documentary
on Chess from India, SHRIKANT BARVE
(shri8131@yahoo.com) has sent
me this note:
We are making a Documentary on "Chess as Educational Tool". This
documentary will be ready by April 30 and CD's of this documentary will
be given to over 1200 Educational Institutions in Goa. It will be
played at First Parent Teachers Association (PTA) meet for Academic year
07/08 in all the schools of Goa. Documentary will include debate on
"Chess in Education" by (to be recorded on April 20th)
1. Prominent Educationist Prof. Ramesh Sapre, (Ex.Headmaster of
Mustifund High School)
2. Goa State Chess Association Executive Member Prof. Augusto Pinto, (Dempo
College of Commerce & Economics
3. Clinical Phycologist I.P.H.B. Bambolim Dr. Mita Majumdar,
4. Senior Session Judge Anuja Prabhudesai,
5. NIO Scientist Sujata Kaisary and many others.
Other activities is support of Chess as learning tool like one act
play etc. will be included in this documentary. Note: The
gentleman says that if anyone has a CD of Knights of the South Bronx –
he would like one. Write directly, or to the Parrot.
Letter from Budapest: [this is from a correspondent who has
run norm-tournaments for players across the world for the past 10 years
to the Parrot’s knowledge]. “Hi, Chessfriends, We have every month
GM-IM-FM closed tournaments in Budapest. The next one will be from 7th
until 19th of April. Who does wish to come to play chess this time?”
Regards: N a g y , L a s z l o, E-mail:
firstsat@hu.inter.net
http://www.firstsaturday.hu.
|
 |
Chess News WORLDWIDE |
The 16th Amber Blindfold and Rapid Tournament
takes place in Monaco March 17th-29th. The participants are Visvanathan
Anand IND 2779 (born 1969), Vladimir Kramnik RUS 2766 (1975), Vasily
Ivanchuk UKR 2750 (1969), Peter Leko HUN 2749 (1979), Levon Aronian ARM
2744 (1982), Alexander Morozevich RUS 2741 (1977), Boris Gelfand ISR
2733 (1968), Teimour Radjabov AZE 2729 (1987), Peter Svidler RUS 2728
(1976), Magnus Carlsen NOR 2690 (1990), Loek van Wely NED 2683 (1972)
and Francisco Vallejo Pons ESP 2679 (1982). The total prize-fund is
216,000 euro.
BLINDFOLD
Round 5 standings:
1 Kramnik - 4.5
2-4 Gelfand, Svidler, Ivanchuk - 3.5
5 Aronian - 3.0
6 Leko - 2.5
7-9 Morozevich, Radjabov, Anand - 2.0
10 Carlsen - 1.5
11-12 Van Wely, Vallejo Pons - 1.0
RAPID Round 5 standings:
1-2 Aronian, Anand - 4.0
3 Ivanchuk - 3.5
4-8 Kramnik, Morozevich, Carlsen, Leko, Svidler - 2.5
9 Vallejo Pons - 2.0
10-11 Gelfand, Radjabov - 1.5
12 Van Wely - 1.0
The
8th A.Karpov tournament
takes place 14th-25th March in Poikovsky (Russia). Participants: Dmitry
Jakovenko RUS 2691, Sergei Rublevsky RUS 2677, Alexander Onischuk USA
2663, Evgeny Alekseev RUS 2661, Alexey Dreev RUS 2658, Viorel Bologan
MLD 2658, Vladislav Tkachiev FRA 2649, Chzhan Pansjan CHN 2643, Emil
Sutovsky ISR 2629, Andrei Istratescu ROM 2619.
Round 7 standings:
1 Jakovenko - 5.0
2-3 Onischuk, Rublevsky - 4.0
4-6 Bologan, Istratescu, Alekseev - 3.5
7-9 Dreev, Tkachiev, Sutovsky - 3.0
10 Zhang Pengxiang - 2.5
US
Interest
lies with Alex Onishuk who is hanging in there, one point short
of the lead, having scored 4/7, and whose improved rating will rival
current the new US #1 … the very active GM Nakamura! Media interest in
this event is very strong, and daily press and TV sessions are held.
The 1st Ruy Lopez International
Festival takes place in Zafra, birthplace of Ruy Lopez, from 16th to
25th March.
Round 6 standings:
1 Sargissian - 5.5
2 Granda Zuniga - 4.0
3 Ponomariov - 3.5
4 Perez Candelario - 3.0
5-6 Sasikiran, Sokolov - 2.5
7 Stefanova - 2.0
8 Hou Yifan - 1.0
Caption of Concentration: Hou Youfen [or
Yifan] trails the table, but not by want of attention.
Official
site |
3-17-2007
|
 |
Chess News
USA and Canada |
 |
In
order to clarify many current and contentious issues the USCF
Executive Director, Mr. Bill Hall, agreed to be interviewed, and
published next week here at Chessville. Topics were to be (a)
Red
Ink,
(b)The US Championship?
and [at his own request] resolutions about communication ‘issues’ at
(c) the USCF forum.
BUT! Mr. Hall had said he would deliver on
Tuesday, On Tuesday he said Wednesday, and on Thursday, in order to
inquire what was up after 5 calls to USCF in the middle of the business
day revealed no operator was available… zzzzzz
Since Mr. Hall wanted to discuss USCF’s
communications as his own topic, I suppose this is an answer of a sort.
What is unknown is if it his own answer, or someone has squashed his
reply.
Meanwhile, the red ink
issue above is thought to be more of a concern than previously
<yikes> and while current politicos wonder what the new board will do
with ‘all the money’ they will inherit, the new board might be wondering
if there will be any, and how could you tell?
Local
Traffic:
Trouble in the Windy City.
Chicago Public Schools City Chess
Championships walk-out of meeting with organizer. Then school teams
leave the tournament during the second round. Read both sides of the
story here:
http://blog.chess4chicago.com/2007/03/tom_larson_cps_.html
and for other news on what’s good and what isn’t in the Chicago area as
viewed by Lamarr Wilson.
Caption, a ‘good’ Tournament at Normal, Il.
Chess Press:
I have never done this before – started writing a
review of any book after a 30 minute look – so after politely accepting
a review titled How To Fool Fritz, I feared it was going to
contain poor writing, and a triumphing-of-the-machine approach. How good
it is to be wrong! The book’s subtitle is “Explorations in Man
Assisted Machine Chess [MAMS]” and its author is Albert H. Alberts.
I suggest it deserves serious attention from the chess community, and
while I will properly review it for Chessville, serious investigators
should immediately get hold of a copy of the 256 page title.
After beginning with an Essay on the Traxler
gambit, and ending with strategic advice on beating computer opponents,
there is a special appendix on Kramnik/Fritz matches. Particularly
insightful are comments everywhere between, and just to give one example
J. Polgar - Berkes, Budapest 2003, where GM insight is compared
with Fritz. Utterly fascinating is Polgar's choice of a move [14. h4]
compared with Fritz's own high evaluation [a 14. g4 move], but when
Fritz is shown Polgar's continuation it changes its mind! Since in
effect she winds up the game by move 18 but Fritz couldn't see it.
It is also good to read an analytical person who
can write in respectful colorful and human terms of what it took from a
human perspective - so that of this game Alberts comments:
In comes the Grandmaster old school handcrafted
magic move full of courage 19. Rad1 !!
Another 30 minutes into the book and I have not
scratched much below the surface, but since well written titles are
rare, and this one addresses highly topical interest – the reader will
excuse this glossing. It might be hard to obtain this Jan 2007
copyrighted title – interested readers contact the Parrot. Keyword =
MAMS
Fide Talks about World
Championship: – In a follow
up to the ACP proposals cited here last week, they don’t matter – its
off! In official parlance “The proposal is to terminate the World
Championship Tournament and keep the World Cup as a Candidates
tournament to find a challenger for a World Championship match.” And
this means that the World Cup will play the World Champion in 2008,
2010, etc. The challenger will emerge from Cup events in “November and
/or December of each even year for the first 6 players according to the
rating list (Double Round Robin system), with the minimum prize fund of
500,000 (five hundred thousand) USD.”
Newsbriefs:
Chessville
Candidate Interviews for USCFG board positions have been widely
discussed, and the blogsite
http://susanpolgar.blogspot.com/ offers one specific set of
responses to one of the questions about short and long-term goals for
Chess in the USA, from 4 candidate board members, Randy Bauer, Paul
Truong, Dr. Mikhail Korenman, and Susan Polgar.
Meanwhile, an existing board member has declined to
be interviewed in writing on the same questions! –
(adapted only for what has been achieved during his tenure) – and
Chessville has elsewhere been called “anti-USCF” for asking! This is a
rather odd opposition, since Chessville has given more air-time to past
USCF President Marinello than ChessLife ever did – and also currently
extends its pages to interviewing the Executive Director, which CL has
never done. Though perhaps I now understand better why Polgar
Foundation is all over mainstream media, to the tune of about 100
articles per year, and USCF manages 2. They answer the phone or do what
they say they will do.
|
 |
Chess News WORLDWIDE |
Linares
is over for another year, and while Vishy absolutely deserves the top
spot, a star was born, or at least continued to rise up to the
stratospheric realms of chess and to hold his own up there against the
current active best players in the world. Chessbase reported
about this photo, that the Fide President ‘knows a winner when he sees
one’. From the look on his face, so does Magnus.
Photo Credit:
Nadja Woisin for Chessbase.
A slow week to report on
world chess, but here are some big annual tournaments coming up, with
many strong Linares contestants taking part in this year’s Amber
Blindfold:
The 16th Amber Blindfold and Rapid Tournament
takes place in Monaco March 17th-29th. The participants are Visvanathan
Anand IND 2779 (born 1969), Vladimir Kramnik RUS 2766 (1975), Vasily
Ivanchuk UKR 2750 (1969), Peter Leko HUN 2749 (1979), Levon Aronian ARM
2744 (1982), Alexander Morozevich RUS 2741 (1977), Boris Gelfand ISR
2733 (1968), Teimour Radjabov AZE 2729 (1987), Peter Svidler RUS 2728
(1976), Magnus Carlsen NOR 2690 (1990), Loek van Wely NED 2683 (1972)
and Francisco Vallejo Pons ESP 2679 (1982). The total prize-fund is
216,000 euro.
The 8th A.Karpov tournament
takes place 14th-25th March in Poikovsky (Russia). Participants: Dmitry
Jakovenko RUS 2691, Sergei Rublevsky RUS 2677, Alexander Onischuk USA
2663, Evgeny Alekseev RUS 2661, Alexey Dreev RUS 2658, Viorel Bologan
MLD 2658, Vladislav Tkachiev FRA 2649, Chzhan Pansjan CHN 2643, Emil
Sutovsky ISR 2629, Andrei Istratescu ROM 2619.
The Cappelle la Grande open took place
3rd-10th March 2007 with more than 600 players: 87 GMs, 81 IMs and 465
fide rated players from 56 countries. Final leading standings were
1-6 WANG Yue, MIROSHNICHENKO, GASHIMOV, ARUTINIAN, DROZDOVSKIJ, YEMELIN
- 7.0
Official site
Friends
of the Parrot
Chess-cop
doing his rounds uncovered… in Duchess County, New York, after
three Rounds, sometimes correspondent to the Parrot, Ernie
Johnson [hello Ernie! surprise!] with sole lead of 3-0 at the
Vassar-Chadwick CC. Tied for 2nd-4th are Scott Strattner, Tom
Marvullo and Angelo Limardo all at 2.5-0.5. The club meets Monday nights
at 7PM with most tournaments starting between 7:15 and 7:30 PM. From
Labor Day to Memorial Day the club meets in rooms 101 and 104 of
Rockefeller Hall on Vassar College Campus. From Memorial Day to Labor
Day the club meets in room LT125 of the Lowell Thomas building on
beautiful Marist College campus. www.vassar-chadwick.com
Ernie Johnson recently remarked that if Morozevich can do it, [at last!]
so he can he! |
3-10-2007
|
 |
Chess News
USA and Canada |
 |
In order to clarify many current and contentious issues the USCF
Executive Director, Mr. Bill Hall, has agreed to be interviewed, and
published next week here at Chessville. Topics will be (a)
Red Ink, (b) The US Championship?
and [at his own request] resolutions about ‘issues’ at (c) the USCF
forum.
More
US Chess in the shade.
I thought this was a joke when I read it at a chess newsgroup, and
immediately referenced USCF’s official site to confirm it – and yes,
it’s the US Championship for sale. Check your rating, then check how
much USCF ask from you for taking part, depending on your rating:
Rating/Entry Fee Structure:
2500 & up $5,000
2400-2499 $10,000
2300-2399 $15,000
2200-2299 $20,000
2100-2199 $30,000
2000-2099 $40,000
Under 2000 $50,000
The event which used to be called the US Championship, but is now, in
USCF’s own words, “… the Frank K. Berry 2007 US Championship” to
be held May 15-23 in Stillwater, Oklahoma. The latest news is that this
measure did not go before USCF’s board, was not voted on,
and some board members first read about it on a news forum.
Read all about the new ‘patron-chess’ at
http://beta.uschess.org/frontend/news_7_289.php
Candidates for 3 board positions with 4-year terms in the
forthcoming USCF elections [plus one candidate for 2 years to
replace Robert. Tanner, resigned] in the order in which they will appear
on the ballot, are:
Susan Polgar
Randy Bauer
Mike Goodall
Joe Lux
Sam Sloan
Stephen Jones
Paul Truong
Jim Berry
Don Schultz
Mikhail Korenman
Chess Press:
A
new book, The Kings of New York, A year among the Geeks,
Oddballs, and Geniuses who make up America’s Top High School Chess Team,
by Michael Weinreb, was reviewed in last week’s NY Times Review of Books
by James Kaplan. It follows ‘a year with a Brooklyn high school chess
team’, and the Edward R. Murrow HS. Reviewer Kaplan can be forgiven for
mentioning Fischer 3 times in the first 4 paragraphs, since this is
Brooklyn after all, and continues to mention the typical remote and
nerdy image chess has. He then says, “the author has a gift for getting
into the skin of his characters – moving in with them in effect – and
making them completely sympathetic”. It’s a good appreciation of a
strong scholastic team, heartbreaks and all. Illustrated, 288 pages,
Gotham Books, $26.

And here is another ‘new’ title, probably for collectors only. The book
Match-tournament 1941 will be re-published next month. It
has been out of print since 1951. The circulation is just 200 copies and
available from the Russian Chess Publisher
http://www.ruschess.com/index.php
Garry is in the news again, but for old people, only? Perhaps
the strongest chess player of all time is unknown to young people in
Russia according to this report. "Kasparov's problem," a St Petersburg
journalist tells me, "is that no-one under the age of 30 really knows
who he is." Apparently he is better known in the West than the East, and
the same journalist reports, that one Russian commentator argues that
Kasparov has had his day: "Chess always was an elite sport and a lot of
ordinary people never cared that much about it, even in Soviet times,"
he says, "His fate was not that interesting to people in chess and it's
even less interesting in politics." Reports the editorial of an outfit
called
FirstPost.
Chess Analysis: Surprise statistics about most popular
correspondence chess openings:
This information is derived from statistics compiled at
www.letsplaychess.com for all
players, which also shows as comparison the mainline Ruy Lopez with only
about 5,000 games and main Sicilian variations with about 4,000 each.
[Presumably the King’s Pawn game above is not a Ruy, but irregular.]
Newsbriefs:
(1)
ACP to FIDE, Fix cheating! The Association of Chess
professionals ask Fide to do something about increasing reports of
cheating in chess, since the reputation of the game suffers. (2) In
another message from ACP to FIDE the player’s organisation
doesn’t like Fide’s plans for the world championship, in fact, they do
not like it in 7 different major respects.
Rybka Chess Program offering Pawn-Odds to GMs!
A unique match of 8 games between leading Grandmaster Jaan Ehlvest (ELO
2607) and the strongest playing program, Rybka 2.3. Playing White in all
8 games, Rybka will be giving pawn odds - with a different pawn missing
in every game!
After the first three games Rybka was ahead 3-0! But, ah! It drew the
fourth.
Friday
was Fischer’s birthday, he is 64. Here is a blast from the past of
perhaps the strongest Blitz tournament of the C20th:
Herceg Novi Blitz Tournament (5-Minute Chess)
1. Fischer 19
2. Tal 14½
3. Korchnoi 14
4. Petrosian 13½
5. Bronstein 13
6. Hort 12
7. Matulovic 10½
8. Smyslov 9½
9. Reshevsky 8½
10. Uhlmann 8
11. Ivkov 7½
12. Ostojic 2
One might wish RJF the same success he achieved at chess in his personal
life, which, I think it is fair comment to note, has some ways to go. At
least there are biblical precedents. I mean, for both us and him. Thou…
|
 |
Chess News WORLDWIDE |
 Linares
super-tournament Round 12 standings haven’t changed much since
last week, the drama with one round to go was Anand maintaining his
lead, and Carlsen hanging in there at second place, after a good round
12 win with the black bits against Ivanchuk, and Peter Svidler who also
won with black against Peter Leko
to emerg as clear 3rd place, with just two more rounds to go:
1 Anand - 7.5, 2 Carlsen - 7.0, 3 Svidler - 6.5, 4 Aronian - 6.0, 5-7
Morozevich, Topalov, Ivanchuk - 5.5, 8 Leko - 4.5
Pairing for the last round were Round 13 (9th March) Aronian v
Ivanchuk, Carlsen v Svidler, Morozevich v Topalov, Anand v Leko; so if
Anand slipped, then the result of Carlsen or Svidler would be paramount.
AND… they were all draws except Moro beat Toppy!
Therefore, the top 3 remain unchanged and at time of going to press, on
Saturday it will be Anand’s to hold.
Official site
Here is a new tournament: The 1st Ruy Lopez International
Festival takes place in Zafra, birthplace of Ruy Lopez, from
16th to 25th March. The Festival is planned around the following three
activities: a top class Tournament with the participation of Ponomariov,
Sargissian, Sokolov, Granda, Manuel Perez Candelario, Hou Yifan and
Antoaneta Stefanova (from 17th to 23rd March). The Children's Tournament
and "Linex" Youth in the active chess class will have three laptop
computers as prizes for the winners in the following categories: Under
18s, Under 14s, and Under 10s (17th and 18th March). The Ruy Lopez Open
active chess where all the games will be played in this order: 1.e4 e5
2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 will have a total of 12,000 Euros in prizes (24th and
25th March.)
Official
site
The
Cappelle la Grande Open takes place 3rd-10th March 2007 with more
than 600 players: 87 GMs, 81 IMs and 465 fide rated players from 56
country.
Round 7 leading standings
1 BOCHAROV - 6
2-10 WANG Yue, MIROSHNICHENKO, VOROBIOV, BOBRAS, POSTNY, DROZDOVSKIJ,
ARUTINIAN, DVOIRYS, NINOV - 5,5
Official site
Friends of the Parrot
You
read it here first, now GM Joel Benjamin agrees. It was
about the ‘new rule’ forbidding writing down your move before you make
it. International arbiter Guert Gijssen proposed this rule,
which Fide
adopted,
and USCF rubber-stamped into US Rules – though… apparently without
adequate discussion. So, if GM Benjamin says:
“The one thing I am quite sure about is that the rule change is
disastrous for scholastic chess. I can’t be sure that all scholastic
organizers will be wise enough to eschew the new rule. Given that
scholastic chess represents a significant portion of rated play in
America, I would still favor going back to letting everyone write the
move down first.”
...at USCF’s own site, how about at least discussing the issue with
strong players and chess educators? I know this has never happened
before, but it’s the twenty-first century already! |
3-3-2007
|
 |
Chess News
USA and Canada |
 |

UTD honor MacEnulty
UTD's annual ChessFest, Feb. 27-28, will feature a talk by chess
educator David MacEnulty, who will receive the "Chess Educator of the
Year" award at the festival.
MacEnulty is currently head of the Dalton Chess Academy and will be
speaking of "Chess and Emotional Development: Helping the Child," 7 p.m.
on Feb. 27 in the library's McDermott Suite. His effort to improve the
lives of children through the game of chess was showcased in the 2005
A&E Network movie "Knights of the South Bronx."
"David MacEnulty's knowledge is born out of many years of actual
classroom
experience of teaching chess to children," UTD Chess program Director
James Stallings said. "His ideas are down to earth and practical."
The annual festival, which is in its sixth year, is organized by the
McDermott Library and the UTD Chess program. Readers who would like to
see the movie based on MacEnulty, who is played by Ted Danson, should
read: Knights of the
South Bronx.
O! Oklahoma!
Strange
sort-of official news about the 2007 US Championship has ‘been
leaked’ by one board member before the final vote is in. [quote="chessoffice"
is USCF President Bill Goichberg] The vote is currently 3-1 in favor of
Frank Berry's bid, with two Board members yet to vote, but I do expect
this bid to be approved and will post further details when this
happens.[/quote]
Although… another board members writes “Unfortunately, the board was
never informed of this deal until this past Sunday, February 25, 2007,
and we still have not received a copy of the contract.”
Maybe we’ll see the 2007 national Championship produced as a
farce-musical? How there can already be a vote without review of the
contract, is of course, known best to half of USCF’s board.
Already promised by personal, rather than board approval, for
inclusion are players rated 21xx whereas a glance at the top 10 list in
the US shows that these players are all 2600+, who will all,
incidentally, have to pay their own expenses for a total prize fund of
$50,000.
2007 Junior Chess Congress complete. Sorry, can’t find
any pictures. Results are posted by section at the
official site, and
additional text coverage is at
http://beta.uschess.org/frontend/press_33_59.php
A slightly sour note is recent USATE results and Round 1
scores by eventual winners, The Passed Pawns, might not stand up
to scrutiny! Since this will not effect their final placement –
any gentlemen out there want to correct the record?
US
Chess in the shade: This report looks at Jennifer Shahade’s
report on top US players, but instead of a concentration on rating
changes, this report emphasizes activity. In short, 2 of the 3 top
players in the country have been inactive since last Summer, and 4 of
the top 10 haven’t played in at least 9 months. While the huge emphasis
is on Nakamura, whose very energetic schedule results in his now being
only 4 points behind the #1 spot.
|
Player |
Rank |
Rating |
Last Game |
|
Kamsky |
1 |
2752 |
July 06 |
|
Nakamura |
2 |
2748 |
Very Active |
|
Onishuk |
3 |
2712 |
June 06 |
|
Kaidanov |
4 |
2686 |
Gibraltar Open |
|
Ibragimov |
5 |
2676 |
N. Am Open |
|
Ehlvest |
6 |
2674 |
Very Active |
|
Christiansen |
7 |
2663 |
March 06 |
|
Shulman |
8 |
2662 |
UTD GM |
|
Gulko |
9 |
2661 |
June 06 |
|
Shabalov |
10 |
2659 |
Very Active |
Read the full article:
http://beta.uschess.org/frontend/news_7_268.php
Chess Press: New Fischer title announced
from Lawrence Totaro.
The following site will tell you more about it:
www.fischingforforgeries.com. It also offers readers a
graphologists' opinion on Fischer's handwriting from Sheila Lowe
www.sheilalowe.com. Intro
written by GM Larry Evans. Chessville is currently obtaining
review copies.
Squawwwk
Back to the Parrot (continued…) :
Here is a blast from the past – from a chess
newsgroup, which follows Quigley’s Marshall bust. Last week
the Parrot asked in anyone can address this Marshall-bust question
which emerged from the newsgroups rec.games.chess.misc and rec.games
chess.analysis circa march 1998? It was all about a poster called
Quigley and his line 19. axb5. The key move proves to be Spassky’s
intervention with 17. …Qh5.
A good mail-bag produced this contribution
from Pete Tamburro: historically both
Marshall and Milner-Barry came up with c6 in the Marshall apparently
independently, and then Alexander gave it all publicity with his game
vs. Dulanto at the Buenos Aires Olympiad in 1939. Here is the game with
notes from British Chess Magazine in 1939 (p. 436):
Harry Golombek's notes
except for the "--PT"
A.
Dulanto--C.H. O'D. Alexander, Ruy Lopez. 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 a6
4.Ba4 Nf6 5.0-0 Be7 6.Re1 b5 7.Bb3 0-0 8.c3 d5 9.exd5 Nxd5 10.Nxe5 Nxe5
11.Rxe5 c6 A recent improvement by Marshall on his own attack.
12.Bxd5 cxd5 13.d4 Bd6 14.Re1 If 14.Re3 then f5 with a strong
attack. 14...Qh4 15.g3 Qh3 16.Qf3 If 16.Be3 Bg4 17.f3 Bxg3 wins.
16...Bf5! 17.Qg2 White cannot capture the Pawn at once for after
[17.Qxd5 Rae8 18.Re3 (18.Bd2! Bd3 19.Na3 Bxa3 20.bxa3 Bc4 21.Qb7 Rd8
22.Re5 f6 23.Rc5 Rfe8 24.Qg2 Qg4= --PT) 18...Qh5 19.Qxd6 Bh3
he is quite lost.] 17...Qh5 18.Qxd5 Rad8 In order to release the
pin on the queen bishop. 19.Qg2 Rde8 An alternative is 19...Bh3
and if 20Qh1 Bg4 21Nd2 Rde8. or if 20.Qc6 Be6 21Rxe6 fxe6 22Nd2Qd1+
followed by Qc2. 20.Be3 Bh3? An error which allows White to
consolidate his position. Correct was: [20...Be4 21.f3 Bxf3 22.Qf2 Bc6
23.Nd2 Qd5 24.Kf1 Re6 25.Bf4 Bxf4 26.gxf4 Rg6 winning.] 21.Qh1 Be6
Black had intended [21...f5 22.Nd2 f4 with a winning attack; but he
now observes that after 21...f5 22.Qd5+ Kh8 23.Nd2 Qg6 24.f4 his attack
completely disappears.] 22.Nd2 Bd5 23.f3 f5 24.Bf2 g5 25.Qg2 g4
26.Rxe8 [If 26.fxg4 fxg4 and (i) 27.Qf1 Bxg3 and wins or (ii) 27Ne4
and now not Qf5 because of 28Nf6+ but 27...Rxf2] 26...Qxe8 Not
now 26...RxR because of 27.fxg4 27.Re1 Qg6 28.b3 gxf3 29.Qh3 [If
29.Nxf3 Qh5 30.Re3 Kh8 followed by 31...f4] 29...Bf4 30.Nf1 Kh8
31.Be3 If [31.Kh1 Bh6 followed by f4.] 31...Bxe3+ 32.Nxe3
32Rxe3 loses after f4 Rook moves and f2 32...f4 33.Nxd5 fxg3 34.Rc1??
[Throwing away the fruits of his previous excellent defence. Correct
is 34.Rf1 gxh2+ 35.Kxh2 (35.Kh1 Qg1+! (Must be a typo. Had to
mean: 35...Qg2+ ) ) 35...Qd6+ 36.Qg3 Qxd5 37.Qe5+ with a draw.]
34...f2+ 35.Kh1 [If 35.Kf1 g2+ 36.Qxg2 Qd3#] 35...Qe4+
Resigns.
|
 |
Chess News WORLDWIDE |
Russia
elects new chess politicos: VIII congress of chess players
of Russia took place on February 24th 2007 in Moscow’s in Izmailovo
hotel. The agenda - election of the President, Vice-presidents,
members of Executive committee and Presidium. After ballot Alexander
Zhukov has been elected as president of Russian Chess Federation for
the next four years with votes from 75 of 79 electors. The first
vice-president became Arcady Dvorkovich. Vice-presidents - Vyacheslav
Beresnev, Valery Bovaev, Alexander Kryukov and Alexander Bakh.
The Parrot has learned that as well as his duties in the Dumas
parliament, where he is the first vice-President to leader Putin,
Gospodin Zhukov likes to play blitz chess during his lunchtimes.
The
Linares super-tournament took place in 2 stages like last year:
in Morelia (Mexico) 16th-25th February and in Linares (Spain)
2nd-11th March. Results for the Mexico-based first half:
Round 7 standings:
1-2
Anand, Carlsen - 4.5
3 Ivanchuk - 4.0
4-5 Aronian, Svidler - 3.5
6-7 Leko, Topalov - 3.0
8 Morozevich - 2.0
Of course, the big news is seeing 16 year-old Carlsen up there with
Vishy, and both of them ahead of Topalov who Carlsen scalped after Toppy
resigned in a drawn position, but good marks for showing up, since all
players are ahead of World Champion Kramnik who didn’t. Last year Toppy
also
had a miserable first half, and then in Linares played perhaps the most
devastating sequence of games seen anywhere in 2006. The
tournament now resumes in Spain on March 4th.
Also completed is the Polish Championship which took place in
Opole 9th-22nd February 2007. Participants: Final standings:
1 Markowski - 10.0
2 Socko - 9.5
3 Bartel - 8.5
4 Wojtaszek - 7.5
5-6 Bobras, Macieja - 7.0
7-9 Kempinski, Cyborowski, Heberla - 6.5
10 Bobula - 6.0
11-12 Grabarczyk, Tomczak - 4.5
13-14 Lubczynski, Grabarczyk - 3.5 |
2-24-2007
|
 |
Chess News
USA and Canada |
 |
| Chess in the bright-lights: The Susan
Polgar National Open Championship for Girls and the Susan Polgar
National Chess Challenge for boys in Corpus Christi, Texas went
over very well. The media could not get enough of chess today in
Lubbock, Texas. Local networks and print media were
competing to interview Susan and her children. Some of them
hung around from 1 PM to 9 PM. |

Susan with the local NBC affiliate. |
|
Hundreds of kids and parents showed up for
the tandem simul with Susan and her elder son Tommy. Once
again, her day started at 7 AM with various Deans, the President
of the University, and many other important people. The
Polgar tandem won all their games.
Thanks to Paul Truong for this
report.
http://susanpolgar.blogspot.com/ |

Tommy getting used to media attention. |
USATE 2007 Special Coverage Report by Ernie Johnson
(who the Parrot previously featured as a player when he drew a very
tough fight with a GM lat year). The USATE is a team event, with
1,100 players, held annually in New Jersey – this year there were 276
teams.
This years winning team overall went to Beavis And Butt-Vinnik
with a perfect 6-0 match score. They defeated Feds-Up in the last Round
2.5-1.5. Winning team members were 1.James Critelli (2311) 2.Evan Turtel
(2206 3.Evan Rabin (2076 4.Nick Ponico (2022) Alt. Alan Kantor (2000).
Feds Up, Beavis and Butt-Vinnik and UTD Orange were all
tied at 5-0 going into the last Round Beavis defeated Feds Up with the
4th Board player securing the only win. UTD Orange was beat by
Bennets Fellows (1-3) who went into the round with a fine 4.5-0.5 score.
Feds Up Beavis And Butt-Vinnik
1.John Fedorowicz 1/2-1/2
1.James Critelli
2.Mark Arnold
1/2-1/2 2.Evan Turtel
3.Thomas Riccardi 1/2-1/2
3.Evan Rabin
4.Linda Diaz
0 -1 4.Nick Ponico
Going into Round 6 the leading teams (Class Prizes) and
not all sections.
Under 2100 1.Britneys Exposed Center Hole,Guys and Girls
Looking For Mate,BU Baku each with 4 (there were multiple teams with 4 )
but these teams had the best tie breaks going into Round 6
Under 2000 1.Anands Knights (4) (in sole possession of
1st) closely followed by West Orange Krush,MMAD,Hanging Pawns Sadaam's
Shame 3.5 each
Under 1900 Mr Kramnik's Harmony 3.5 followed by SMF's
United and Schenectady CC "A" with 3
I could not get the other sections but at least you have
a little something. My team (with 2 no shows) went 2.5-3.5. As for me I
went 5-1 with 2 draws but the level of competition due to our poor team
performance had me paired down each round. There is always next year.
Ernie! Thanks for this report. I wish more
people would do it, and we want to see more GM bashing from you
before next year. Cordially, The Parrot.
USCF is having a membership sale: From
October 1st, 2006, through March 31st, 2007, a regular adult membership
(normally $49) will be available for just $39 if purchased online.
Chess
in the shade: This report is dated 18 February 2007.
USCF is announcing its objective of holding the 2007
US Championship over the dates of May 15-23. Any dates after
June would not allow a Zonal, and June is undesirable because some top
players are committed to teach at chess camps, and because of the
National Open.
Potential bidders have been asked to tentatively hold
space for the dates of May 15-23, and qualified players are advised to
avoid making other commitments then. There are at least three
serious likely bidders, and USCF hopes to be able to place the
tournament within a few weeks.
It is likely that the 2007 US Women's Championship will
be held later in the year, probably in the summer.
Special
Report: Chess and Education
 Perhaps
the most important ever chess and education conference is still calling
for papers. The
Parrot
was pleased earlier this week to link a PhD thesis in chess from India
with the Scottish organizers, and now understands that some 1,100
educators will attend. For more information visit the official site:
http://www.scottishjuniorchess.co.uk/cisccon/cisccon.html.
Chess
Press: Gary Kasparov is not active in chess as a player
anymore, though… In addition to his work with the Other
Russia, Mr. Kasparov continues to write books about chess--he's up to
Volume Six in a series about his great predecessors--and he has a
mass-market book coming out this year called "How Life Imitates Chess,"
about the decision-making process in chess, business, politics and
history. But at least for now, politics has taken the place of chess as
the big game in his life: "I just don't see any other choice for me," he
says. "As I
used
to say for 25 years, I am defending the colors of my country. I'm still
doing the same, just not at the chessboard. At a much larger board."
Here he is addressing US foreign policy experts in New York. Read what
else Gary is up to, and who is
taking notice written by Brian Santhumayor who seems to like
the game very much:
“My brother and I used to
be huddled in front of the TV watching Kasparov win yet another
Grandmaster Chess title. Kasparov was an inspiration to all budding
chess enthusiasts in India and all over the word.”
Chess Press, Archive:
Here is
a blast from the past – from a chess newsgroup, which follows
Quigley’s Marshall bust. Can anyone answer our Marshall-bust
questions from r.g.c.m.? Its all about Quigley's line with 19.axb5
---
> Speaking of the Marshall, does anyone know if Quigley's refutation
ever
> got much in the way of high-level tests.
>
> (The line, for those who don't remember it, is: 1 e4 e5 2
> Nf3 Nc6 3 Bb5 a6 4 Ba4 Nf6 5 0-0 Be7 6 Re1 b5 7 Bb3 0-0 8 c3 d5 9
> exd5 Nxd5 10 Nxe5 Nxe5 11 Rxe5 c6 12 d4 Bd6 13 Re1 Qh4 14 g3 Qh3
> 15 Be3 Bg4 16 Qd3 Rae8 17 Nd2 Re6 18 a4 f5 19.axb5)
> -Ron
Here's some history of the variation, Ron:
FOLLOWING: 1 e4 e5 2 Nf3 Nc6 3 Bb5 a6 4 Ba4 Nf6 5 0-0 Be7 6 Re1 b5 7 Bb3
0-0 8 c3 d5 9 exd5 Nxd5
9. ... Nxd5 is now common and the Steiner var, 9. ...e4 doesn't seem to
offer black enough.
11. ...c6 was introduced in 1956! - by Shamkovitch, and Wade eg, thought
it might be good enough for a draw. In 1918 the original Marshall had
11. ... Nf6, which is decidedly weaker - see Hansson v Westerinen,
Esbjerg, and as late as 1983 ! [with 20. Rf2! as Byrne-Mednis]
Therefore, the 'new' move for white is 12. d4, and the old alternate was
12. Re1. [although Kevitz analysed 12. Bxd5 to white's advantage, and
this found an outing in I. Ivanov v Hebden NY 1984, not sharp but fully
playable.
Subsequent main branching comes at move 16. alternatives are 16. ...f5
which is 'complex', and 'inexplicably fallen from favour' according to
Shamkovitch. On 17. f4 black choses either 17. ... g5 [25. Bf3! Fischer,
eg, and on 24. ... Bh3 Boleslavski's 27. Qxe3 does the trick] or 17. ...
Rae8 which Tal tried Leningrad 1962, but Boleslavsky was already better
at 22.
And this brings us back to the line in question above, and follows 17.
... Re6!?!
[in passing, the reason for all this is White's other try: 18. c4 which
can be met by 18. ... Bf4 as Byrne-Geller, Las Palmas 1976. And then
lovely fireworks!
19. Qf1! Nxe3! 20. Qxf3 Bxh3 21. cb Nc2! 22. Bxe6! fe 23. gf Nxa1 24.
Rxa1 Rxf4,
Now, says Samarian after 25 ba White has nothing better than perpetual
and after 25. ...Rg4+ 26. Kh1 Bg2+ etc, is a sequence white loses. And
after the interim move 25 f3! Rxd4, 26. Ne4, cb 27. Kf2 black according
to Shamkovitch still "stands slightly better, but there are drawing
chances."]
All this is a necessary preamble, since unusually the onus is on White
to come up with a decent game against the @pain@ of the Marshall, hence
the current line 18. a4
18. a4... f5
19. ***axb5***, Quigley’s new move, and the only move, since all
other moves prove unsatisfactory - though, in 1986 not entirely
explored.
Shamkovitch and Schiller didn't analyze it at all in their1986
Spanish Gambits title, and give the mainline response as 19. Qf1
[while rejecting 19. f4 as dubious with analysis by Henken and
Boleslavsky].
This has us arriving back at the start position of Ron's reference and
stem game above. If readers here can bust White's play they will be
famous for more than a day! :)
|
 |
Chess News WORLDWIDE |
VIII
congress of chess players of Russia takes place on February 24th 2007 in
Moscow in a hotel complex "Izmailovo". In the agenda - election of the
President, Vice-presidents, members of Executive committee and
Presidium. On behalf of Presidium RCF on a post of the President of RCF
the nominee of present President of RCF Zhukov A.D., the vice-president
of the Government of the Russian Federation is offered.
The Linares super-tournament takes place in 2 stages like last year: in
Morelia (Mexico) 16th-25th February and in Linares (Spain) 2nd-11th
March.
I’m
getting used to this picture, with Anand out in front, but Carlsen 2nd!
Peter Svidler and Leko like to hide in the middle, Topo of course is near
the bottom just like last year, and Moro last. The odd-man out is
Carlsen who already lost a game to Vishy, but is still only half a point
behind. Official
site
Round 4 standings:
1 Anand - 3.0
2 Carlsen - 2.5
3-6 Ivanchuk, Svidler, Leko, Aronian - 2.0
7 Topalov - 1.5
8 Morozevich - 1.0
 The
International Chess Festival "Aeroflot Open 2007" took place in
Moscow 14th-22nd February 2007. Congrats to Petersburgher Evgeny
Alekseev for taking the tile in Group A.
Final leading standings
1 Alekseev - 7.0
2 Tomashevsky - 6.5
3
Jakovenko - 6.5
4 Wang Yue - 6.5
5 Ni Hua - 6.5
6 Almasi - 6.0
7 Jobava - 6.0
8 Sutovsky - 6.0
9 Volkov - 6.0
Noteworthy and worth a visit are hundreds of great chess pictures from the
Official site.
|
2-17-2007
|
 |
Chess News
USA and Canada |
 |
The
Susan Polgar National Open Championship for Girls and the
Susan Polgar National Chess Challenge for Boys begin today in Corpus
Christi, Texas. The main event will begin this Saturday at 10 AM
with the Grand Opening Ceremony and a LIVE concert! The blog site says
Susan will post some video feeds from the event in the next few days –
http://susanpolgar.blogspot.com/.
The Parrot hopes to feature the progress of this
4-month tournament, with leader scores and feature-games. Serious
Tournament chess is good for you! And perhaps a sample will
encourage players to get back into it.
Registration for the Hackettstown, NJ Chess Club's
Spring Round Robin begins on Monday, February 26, at 7 PM in the
Hackettstown Community Center , Hackettstown, NJ. E.F. = $14.
Prizes (from USCF Catalog) awarded to 30% of the field. Time limit is
40/90 and 40/60 thereafter (or G/60 by mutual agreement). Equipment is
provided. We play one game each Monday night until Memorial Day.
Hackettstown is easy to reach from Route 80 or Route 46 in NJ:
http://www.google.com/maps?q=Hackettstown,+NJ&sa=X&oi=map&ct=image.
Email questions to Angelo DePalma
angelodp@gmail.com or TD Harold
Darst at darst111@comcast(net), or call 908-852-5925.
Special Report: Chess and
Education
 Chessville
has offered the organizers of a huge International Conference on
Chess in the Schools and Community whatever publicity they need on
an on-going basis. Stay tuned for further reports. Talking with a NY GM
this week she mentioned 1,000 educators would attend:
University
of Aberdeen – Scotland, August 30th - September 1st 2007
CURRENT MAJOR THEMES:
THE GAME OF
CHESS: HISTORY, EVOLUTION AND ART
CRITICAL THINKING
EMOTIONAL AND ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
POVERTY AND SOCIAL INCLUSION
GENDER
COACHING
MENTORING
CULTURAL CAPITAL
SOCIAL CAPITAL
What are the effects of chess in the
school and community programmes on teaching (informal and formal),
emotion and social inclusion of children and young people?
How do chess development programmes
assist new methods of formal teaching and informal education?
What is the relationship between chess
play, chess coaching and mentoring?
How can the lessons from chess in the
schools and communities help to generate social and cultural capital?
Currently calling for papers, read
more at
http://www.scottishjuniorchess.co.uk/cisccon/cisccon.html
Chess Press And when
they were bad they were awful…
Look for a forthcoming report on Chess Journalists of
America, to be published soon by Chessville, by ‘someone who knows’.
The editorial question posed the writer was, “what effect does the
current internal conflict at CJA have on the chess public?”
Chess Press, Archive:
The Parrot goes to the (Bill) Wall once again on the
occupations of chess players.
Boxers include Arnold Denker (Golden Gloves) and Max
Euwe. And here he is again; Arnold Denker was a businessman in the
meat packing industry and became a millionaire. Painters include
Samuel Boden, Marcel Duchamp, Henry Grob, Bernhard Horwitz. Editor of
early MCOs, Walter Korn directed the U.N. Relief and Rehabilitation
Administration after World War II, helping relocate concentration camp
survivors.
Read
the whole thing here.
|
 |
Chess News WORLDWIDE |
VIII
congress of chess players of Russia takes place on February 24th
2007 in Moscow in a hotel complex "Izmailovo". In the agenda - election
of the President, Vice-presidents, members of Executive committee and
Presidium. On behalf of Presidium RCF on a post of the President of RCF
the nominee of present President of RCF Zhukov A.D., the vice-president
of the Government of the Russian Federation is offered.
 |
 |
The Linares super-tournament takes place in 2
stages as well as the last year: in Morelia (Mexico) 16th-25th
February and in Linares (Spain) 2nd-11th March. Participants: Veselin
Topalov BUL 2783, Vishvanatan Anand IND 2779, Peter Leko HUN 2749, Levon
Aronian ARM 2744, Alexander Morozevich RUS 2741, Teimur Radjabov AZE
2729, Peter Svidler RUS 2728, Magnus Carlsen NOR 2690. Playing
days are 17th-19th, 21st, 22nd, 24th, 25th February, 2nd-4th, 6th, 7th,
9th and 10th March. The total prize fund is 314000 euro (1st place -
100000, 2nd - 75000, 3rd - 50000, 4th - 30000, 5th - 20000, 6th - 15000,
7th - 13000, 8th - 11000).
Unfortunately
Teimour Radjabov, one of the top players, has withdrawn
after visiting Mexico – he made a statement:
“The Mexican Organizers of Morelia/Linares 2007
instructed the participants to acclimatize from travel in the small city
of Patzcuaro, Mexico. I came very well prepared and completely
ready to play in this tournament for first prize. Unknown to my
father-coach or me, Patzcuaro is a very high crime rated town.”
He and his father were robbed in what seemed to him like
a planned professional job.
“We immediately asked for assistance and reported the
crime, but received absolutely no help at all from the local
authorities, not even a police investigation.”
Continued his press release, and:
“The Mexican Morelia/Linares Organizers have refused
my request for fair compensation of incurred damages and I have been
forced to withdraw from participating in this tournament due to the
complete lack of any support and emotional reasons. I have
provided them several options and time to come to a reasonable decision,
but to no avail."
|
 |
The
International Chess Festival "Aeroflot Open 2007" takes
place in Moscow 14th-22nd February 2007. The festival
consists of four tournaments. Each tournament is a nine
rounds Swiss Tournament. The total prize fund of the four
tournaments is 200 000 USD. The Tournament A for
chessplayers with FIDE
rating
higher than 2549, total prize fund is 100 000 USD with 1st prize
30 000 USD.The top participants of Tournament A: Vladimir
Akopian ARM 2700, Krishnan Sasikiran IND 2700, Dmitry Jakovenko
RUS 2691, Francisco Vallejo Pons ESP 2679, |
Pentala Harikrishna IND 2673, Zoltan Almashi HUN 2669,
Artyom Timofeev RUS 2663, Arkadij Naiditsch GER 2663, Evgeny Alekseev
RUS 2661, Viorel Bologan MDA 2658, Alexey Dreev RUS 2658, Gabriel
Sargissian ARM 2658, Ilia Smirin ISR 2654, Baadur Jobava GEO 2650,
Andrei Volokitin UKR 2645, Alexander Areschenko UKR 2644, Yue Wang CHN
2644, Sergei Movsesian SVK 2637, Vugar Gashimov AZE 2637, Sergey Volkov
RUS 2636, Karen Asrian ARM 2634, Hua Ni CHN 2632, Emil Sutovsky ISR
2629, Alexander Riazantsev RUS 2629, Alexander Moiseenko UKR 2627,
Evgeny Tomashevsky RUS 2624, Hao Wang CHN 2619, Alexander Khalifman
2619, Zahar Efimenko UKR 2616, Csaba Balogh HUN 2616, Alexey Korotylev
RUS 2615, Darmen Sadvakasov KAZ 2615, Jaan Ehlvest USA 2610, Evgeniy
Najer RUS 2605, Dmitry Bocharov RUS 2602, Vladimir Belov RUS 2600.
Time control for Tournament A is 40 moves in 2 hours, then 20 moves in 1
hour, finally 15 minutes for the remaining moves with an increment of 30
seconds per move in the last period.
Round 2 leading standings:
1-7 Predojevic, Areshchenko, Tomashevsky, Ganguly, Novikov, Minasian,
Hou - 2.0
8-32 Jakovenko, Ehlvest, Akopian, Almashi, Aleksandrov, Najer, Naiditsch,
Timofeev, Jussupow, Bocharov, Dreev, Gashimov, Svetushkin, Belov, Jobava,
Movsesian, Laznicka, Ni, Lysyj, Popov, Khalifman, Wang, Harika,
Sadvakasov, Maslak - 1.5
Official site:
www.aeroflotchess.com.
|
2-10-2007
|

|
Chess News
USA and Canada |
 |
The 2007 Canadian Youth Chess Championships
will be held in Ottawa, ON. July 3-6, immediately prior to the Canadian
Open. Details of CYCC at
http://www.chess.ca/cycc.htm and the Open is Date: July 7 - 16,
2007. Venue: Carleton University. Details at
http://cocycc.pbwiki.com/.

News is that Super-Grandmaster Nigel Short has
confirmed his participation, and joked: "I look forward to coming," said
the amiable 41-year-old British chess legend. "I noticed in the
wikipedia entry for Ottawa that there are even some cricket clubs in the
city -- so it is obviously a very civilised place,"
The Millennium Chess Festival is back for
2007. The tournament started in 2000 and continued for another
five years before missing 2006. Despite an accidental
non-appearance in Chess Life TLA, it is back for 2007 on the weekend of
March 1-3 at Virginia Beach.
This year's GM Exhibition match will be GM John
Fedorowicz taking on GM Nick De Firmian. See
http://ramadaplazavabeach.com
for details.
USCF
Financials are out for 2006 so far, and the interim picture is
grim. $131,858 spent in ‘Professional fees’, and $38,000 lost
on the World Youth tournament, and the Pan Am is showing a loss of
$18,807 – again. A loss of $20,000 for the National Open?
And then the Olympiad for a $20,000 loss? Chess Life Advertising
was under budget by $32,422. Royalties - under budget by $14k
to-date. Salaries over budget by $27k and Professional Fees over
budget by $10k. Building improvements $13k over budget.
Miscellaneous Expenses are $26k over budget. Balance Sheet bottom
line as of December 31, 2006:
Net Loss: $344,225.
This interim analysis was conducted by Donna Alarie, Massachusetts
Delegate.
Chess Press Archive
More mining with Bill Wall on the occupations of
chess players:
Insurance salesmen include Al Horowitz, Issac
Kashdan, Miguel Najdorf, and William Napier (vice-president of Scranton
Life Insurance).
Mathematicians and chess players include C.H.O'D
Alexander, Adolf Anderssen, Magdy Assem, George Atwood, Christoph
Bandelow, John Beasley, Otto Blathy, Hans Boumeester, Nathan Divinsky,
Noam Elkies, Arpad Elo, Max Euwe, Ed Formanek, William Hartston, Paul
Keres, Martin Kreuzer, Emanuel Lasker, Anatoly Lein, Lev Loshinksi,
Vladimir Makogonov, Geza Maroczy, Vania Mascioni, J. Mauldon, Jonathan
Mestel, Walter Morris, John Nunn, Nick Patterson, Miodrag Petkovic, Ken
Regan, Hans-Peter Rehm, Ken Rogoff, and Duncan Suttles.
And as everybody knows Miguel Najdorf was a
porcelain importer.
Read
the whole thing here.
|

|
Chess News WORLDWIDE |
Chess Press: And when
they were bad they were awful…
Special
Report on the State of World Chess: Bill Kelleher, Vice President
FIDE, has issued a report on the FIDE Presidential Board Meeting,
Antalya Turkey, January 26-28 2007 – Mr. Kelleher is a FIDE-fan, and
while his report is bad enough, it is still designed for American
consumption by a pro-Fide fan.
Move to Lausanne: FIDE's office will not be moving to Singapore, as
was proposed at the last Presidential Board meeting. Kirsan has a new
"bee in his bonnet". He wants to move the office back to Lausanne
and into a building owned by the IOC. He is intent on making a new
effort to join the Olympics. To this end he suggested that FIDE
rent a 200 sq meter office in the IOC building. The Board balked
at moving the entire office back to Lausanne, and we suggested opening a
small liaison office instead. Kirsan did not like this approach,
and announced that he personally would rent the space at the IOC.
He is obviously hoping to ram this idea through the board at a later
meeting.
On February 1st after the PB meeting he traveled to Lausanne to meet
with IOC president, Jacques Rogge. It's difficult do understand
what he hopes to accomplish since Rogge is on record as saying that the
Olympic Games are currently too unwieldy, and that he wants to reduce
the number of sports participating in the games and not increase them.
Zonal Realignment: The initiative to realign the FIDE zones is dead,
at least for the moment. It was basically the idea of Deputy
President Makropoulos, but since the rapprochement between Kirsan and
Bessel Kok, and the consequent alienation between Kirsan and Makro, the
steam has been taken out of the initiative.
Friends tell me that Makro has not been in the FIDE office in Athens
since the Elista World Championship Match, even though the headquarters
of the Greek Chess Federation, of which he is president, is located only
200 yards away from FIDE.
Topalov Challenge: Veselin Topalov submitted a challenge to Vladimir
Kramnik for a revenge match. He found sponsors who were willing to
guarantee a $2 million dollar prize fund with match taking place in
Sofia, Bulgaria. Topalov was taking advantage of a recently
introduced FIDE rule stating that any player rated over 2700 who can
find at least $1 million in prize money can challenge the world champion
to match.
However the fine print of the FIDE rule states that the challenge is
subject to the approval of FIDE. After a lengthy debate we decided
to reject the challenge. The following excerpt from a FIDE press
release summarizes our reasoning:
Global Chess: Negotiation between Global Chess, Bessel Kok's company,
and FIDE are ongoing and have so far been successful. However
Kirsan failed to make a payment to Global Chess of $1.9 million which
was due on January 26th. Needless to say, the sunny FIDE press
release about relations between the two entities made no mention of this
fact.
|

The Moscow Open
 |

Najer wins group A with a fantastic performance, but the
position shown won applause for Smirnov, as the most impressive
move of the tournament. |
|
But
this isn’t the news! At least Najer’s great performance in
group A was matched by that of Illya Nyzhnyk who won Group
B. And Illya is 10 years old!! Here he is from his
Fide card pictured in 1996, and also as pictured last year. |
 |
|
 |
Final leading standings:
1 Najer - 7.5
2 Yemelin - 7.5
3-9 Svetushkin, Malakhov, Smirnov, Vorobiov, Kazhgaleyev,
Dobrov, Aleksandrov - 7.0
10-19 Askarov, Riazantsev, Amonatov, Ulko, Yakovich,
Korotylev, Zvjaginsev, Ionov, Chuprov, Lastin - 6.5
20-41 Bocharov, Dreev, Gareev, Chernyshov, Grachev, Novikov,
Krapivin, Balashov, Burmakin, Khismatullin, Deviatkin, Andreikin,
Yandemirov, Zinchenko, Oleksienko, Shipov, Romanov, Sergienko,
Moiseenko, Iljin, Orlinkov, Prokopchuk - 6.0 |
|
|
The Linares super-tournament takes place in
the same 2 stages as last year: First in Morelia (Mexico)
16th-25th February and in Linares (Spain) 2nd-11th March.
Participants: Veselin Topalov BUL 2783, Vishavanatan Anand IND
2779, Peter Leko HUN 2749, Levon Aronian ARM 2744, Alexander
Morozevich RUS 2741, Teimur Radjabov AZE 2729, Peter Svidler RUS
2728, Magnus Carlsen NOR 2690. |
The
first stage of the French team championship takes place 9th-11th
February 2007 in the town of Chalons (in Champagne). In this preliminary
contest four teams will compete : Paris Chess 15, Clichy, Montpellier
and Drancy.

Here is the list of the best players expected to play at Chalons:
Shakhriyar Mamedyarov (Paris Chess 15), Michael Adams (Paris Chess 15),
Peter Svidler (Paris Chess 15), Alexander Grischuk (Paris Chess 15),
Etienne Bacrot (Paris Chess 15), Dmitry Jakovenko (Clichy), Liviu-Dieter
Nisipeanu (Clichy), Sergei Tiviakov (Paris Chess 15), Arkadij Naiditsch
(Clichy), Joel Lautier (Paris Chess 15), Laurent Fressinet (Clichy),
Christian Bauer (Paris Chess 15), Oleg Korneev (Montpelllier).
Official site. |
2-3-2007
|

|
Chess News
USA and Canada |
 |
 
Go Canada! MonRoi company of Quebec have announced the
world's premier International Woman's Grand-Prix. The
International Woman Grand-Prix Finale will be held July 21-28, 2007 in
Montreal, Canada.
The company also announced The Chess’n
Math Association, Andre Langlois (Tournament Organizer and Sponsor of
Montreal International) and the Quebec Chess Federation, have put their
experience and enthusiasm together with MonRoi to create the Montreal
Chess
Festival
in July 2007. In addition to the International Woman’s Grand-Prix
Finale, the Montreal Chess Festival also features the Quebec Open Chess
Tournament with a projected prize fund of $40,000 (min 22,000), the
Montreal International organized by Andre Langlois (Category 17!), and
the Scholastic Chess event organized by Larry Bevand, President of the
Chess’n Math Association. For more information
click here.
Meanwhile, down here in the States USCF have still
made no announcements about the US 2007 Championship, except that they
welcome bids. CJA, the Association of Chess Journalists are currently
imploding with legal letters flying about among members and resolutions
being made about, primarily –you guessed it! – ethics and fair and
transparent procedures. CJA haven’t seemed to notice the lack of chess
from USCF, as such, but some officers are on both boards :(
Other US news is egg on Kasparov Foundations’ face
as reported in the NY Times in respect of Mr. Michael Khodarkovsky. No
one can think who is responsible for checking anything, even titled
players – even following a resignation from the current USCF board for
the very same thing.
Chess Press (Archive)
While researching Google records, I encountered an
interesting article at Chessville [!] written by Bill Wall, listing many
famous players and their occupations. Among other occupations there are
Cryptographers; C.H.O'D Alexander, Reuben Fine, Harry Golombek, and
Stuart Milner-Barry. Taxi drivers include Victor Frias and Nicolas
Rossolimo. Members of the clergy include Bill Lombardy (former Catholic
priest), George MacDonnell, Ruy Lopez, John Owen, Domenico Ponziani,
Charles Ranken, Arthur Skipworth, and William Wayte. Read
the whole thing here.
|

|
Chess News WORLDWIDE |
 Next
up is a big Russian tournament The Moscow Open which is well
covered by mainstream Russian media, ITAR-TASS press conference devoted
to the international chess festival was overcrowded. Many central and
specialized editions, 4 TV channels sent their journalists.
Reading the English from the official site is often amusing, and
includes this, no doubt unintended, gem on the benefit of playing chess
compared with some other things:
“Even Bologan didn’t join “+2” group. That’s not strange:
because of small amount of participants, Grandmasters had to “grab”
points from each other, not from lovers, whose level of playing is
lower.”
| The international chess festival Moscow Open
2007 takes place January 27 - 4 February 2007 in Moscow. There
are 3 tournaments: Open A, Tournament B and children's tournament
C. There is Swiss system in 9 rounds in each event. The total
prize fund of A and B tournaments is 1,500,000 rubles (about
$50,000). Take a look at these characters, and ... |
 |

...yes, a keyword is intense!
Top participants of Open A: Malakhov,V 2663, Zvjaginsev,V 2658,
Dreev,A 2658, Riazantsev,A 2629, Moiseenko,A 2627, Fedorov,A 2624,
Smirnov,P 2621, Korotylev,A 2615, Najer,E 2605, Malakhatko,V 2604,
Bocharov,D 2602, Aleksandrov,A 2601, Belov, V 2600, Khismatullin, D
2599, Shipov,S 2591, Svetushkin,D 2588, Rychagov,A 2586, Lastin,A 2583,
Kornev,A 2582, Kazhgaleyev,M 2579, Yakovich,Y 2577, Burmakin,V 2568,
Vorobiov,E 2563, Amonatov,F 2559, Chernyshov,K 2556.
Eugeny Najer [pictured top, in Orange shirt] takes off into an
astounding lead scoring a maximum 6 out of 6!
Round 6 leading standings:
1 Najer - 6.0
2-9 Askarov, Svetushkin, Amonatov, Yemelin, Malakhov, Chernyshov,
Yakovich, Smirnov - 5.0
10-29 Riazantsev, Ulko, Chudinovskikh, Gareev, Turov, Dreev, Zvjaginsev,
Fedorov, Grachev, Chuprov, Chadaev, Korotylev, Novikov, Yandemirov,
Vorobiov, Rychagov, Oleksienko, Kazhgaleyev, Dobrov, Gabrielian - 4.5
Official site:
www.moscowopen2007.ru/main/index.html
|
 |
Corus Results, Group A:
1-3 Topalov, Aronian, Radjabov - 8.5
4 Kramnik - 8.0
5 Anand - 7.5
6 Svidler - 7.0
7-8 Karjakin, Navara - 6.5
9 Ponomariov - 6.0
10-12 Van Wely, Tiviakov, Motylev - 5.0
13-14 Shirov, Carlsen - 4.5
|
Results, Group B:
1 Eljanov - 9.0
2-5 Sargissian, Bu Xiangzhi, Vachier-Lagrave, Jakovenko - 8.0
6 L'Ami - 7.5
7-8 Bologan, Stellwagen - 7.0
9 Smeets - 6.0
10 Nijboer - 5.5
11-12 Atalik, Werle - 4.5
13-14 Kosintseva, Georgiev - 4.0 |

Chess
is also being played in Gibraltar at the Gibtele.com Chess
Festival
where
going into the final round Ivan Sokolov re-took sole lead again with 7
points. Another big performance was from the American Hikaru
Nakamura – pictured right, who dropped a point in an early round, then
came storming back to join an incredibly close finish – and surprise
surprise – Here are the round 9 pairings and dramatic results, success
going to Vladimir Akopian – but read on!
|
Bd |
White |
|
|
Result |
Black |
|
|
|
1 |
Akopian, Vladimir |
2700 |
(6½) |
1 - 0 |
Kuzubov, Yuriy |
2554 |
(6½) |
|
2 |
Adams, Michael |
2735 |
(6) |
½ - ½ |
Al-Modiahki, Mohamed |
2556 |
(6) |
|
3 |
Sutovsky, Emil |
2629 |
(6) |
1 - 0 |
Georgiev, Kiril |
2661 |
(6) |
|
4 |
Sokolov, Ivan |
2652 |
(6) |
½ - ½ |
Efimenko, Zahar |
2616 |
(6) |
|
5 |
Nakamura, Hikaru |
2651 |
(6) |
1 - 0 |
Sulskis, Sarunas |
2525 |
(6) |
|
6 |
Sengupta, Deep |
2416 |
(6) |
0 - 1 |
Areshchenko, Alexander |
2644 |
(6) |
|
7 |
Rendle, Thomas |
2366 |
(6) |
½ - ½ |
Gurevich, Mikhail |
2635 |
(6) |
American
Irina Krush
gave the
eventual winner a shock when she defeated him in the first round! Jen
Shahade says in her CL on-line column that Akopian is the highest ever
rated player Irina has defeated. In the background of this round-1 photo
by Cathy Rogers is
U.S. Senior Champ Joseph Bradford.
Play over
The Krush-Akopian 53 move game
here.
Novelty
Chess? But how interesting! Susan Polgar first mentioned
this form of chess to me almost 2 years ago, and Chessbase have issued a
good report on an actual event this week, as performed by former world
champion Rustam Kasimdzhanov.
“Clock simuls are something special:
the master has the same time as each of his opponents, to whom he has to
attend individually. They can move whenever they want. Under such
circumstances to face a team of five players, including a bevy of
grandmasters, is a daunting task.”
Read the entire article at
www.chessbase.com. |
1-27-2007
|

|
Chess News
USA |
Regional
Focus:
Chess Action in Canada. The upcoming Victoria B.C. Canada
Social
will take place in
the Maple Room
of the Strathcona Hotel in downtown Victoria
http://www.strathconahotel.com on Feb. 10, 2007 between noon
and midnight. Rooms are available right at the hotel at off season
rates. $59.00-69.00 single or double. The reservation manager is Steve
McColeman. Bancroftkid will be our Chessworld contact person.
To
compare
Chess USA with activities in other countries the
Parrot
is asking for readers’ reports on chess organization and their health
from correspondents around the world. This week features a letter from
India, plus this comment by
GM Ray Keene
on the evolution of the game in England:
"Wade was struck by the phenomenal ability of
USSR training methods to produce seemingly endless legions of world
class Grandmasters. He took it upon himself to distil the essence of
Soviet methods and to implement what he could in the UK environment."
Chess Press Worldwide
New York Times DYLAN LOEB McCLAIN has
featured another ratings scandal in his chess column, this time
naming names and citing the status of a questionable IM title.
Somewhat embarrassing for US Chess entities, Michael Khodarkovsky also
has associations with the Kasparov Chess Foundation and with the
previous US Olympiad team – which seemed to oust top-board Susan Polgar
from the selection process, and in consequence the US team could not
defend its Silver medal. It is of course more complicated than
that, though these bald facts might save the viewer from
scandal-fatigue.
|

|
Chess News WORLDWIDE |
First
, very good news for chess and a view of a high level series of
studies in this Letter from India - sent by a gentleman who is
undertaking a PhD in chess studies, after already achieving a
masters degree in robotics in the USA:
Delighted to get a mail from you. I understand
that Christmas should be busy for people in the west.
Yes! The projects are going fine. Hopefully if
things are moving as planned, I would be successfully organizing an
exclusive tournament for blind students post April- with psychologist,
teachers, Doctors, Professors, Software Engineers and Engineering
undergraduates as observers for the chess -tournament to propose
on measurements. Some time in end of Feb will be a proposed date to
send circulars for different schools around Southern India, calling
for students to participate.
In India, High-school examinations are over by
April and Hence I wish: there will be good interest for my event. Post
this Event. [Editorial note: we will!]
The second chess tournament will be an all
category event, which will have a similar measurement taken. From
these tournaments, Awareness of chess to academic world will be
created. From there, I hope, things will see its beginning
I am just looking for attractive funding
opportunity from local companies: so that I can completely video
tape all the events. I have spoken to one such sponsor, who is willing
to fund this event.
The chief Arbiter of the World Blind Chess
Championship, V. Kameshwaran, also from my home town, should be able
to help me out in this regard. We share good amount thought for chess.
Although, I am also a National Chess Arbiter, I wish his experience
will definitely make a difference to the goals of Chess reaching
Universities.
Today, I had an opportunity to interact with some
student community, which goes to blind schools to teach. They have
promised me to extend their help in converting normal teaching
activity to research based activity - like documenting their stimulus
and response in learning and related activities.
I hope these chaotic effort freeze to a level,
where I have more control on activities.
The good news is that I am being accepted by
people and I owe the thanks to Chessville for your complete support.
Should any reader here
be willing to participate in chess studies in support of these doctoral
studies, or wish to write about the infrastructure and chess health in
their own country, drop
TheParrot
a line.
The
Corus tournament continues to be the biggest international event
on the scene, and at round 10 Topalov had not only joined the
lead, but steamed out into a clear 1 point lead. This is how the
tournament looked at that stage:
Group A Round 10
standings:
1 Topalov - 7.5
2 Radjabov - 6.5
3-6 Anand, Aronian, Svidler, Kramnik - 6.0
7-8 Ponomariov, Karjakin - 5.0
9 Navara - 4.5
10-11 Motylev, Tiviakov - 4.0
12 Van Wely - 3.5
13-14 Shirov, Carlsen - 3.0 |
 |
Group B Round 10
standings
1-3 Bologan, Eljanov, Vachier-Lagrave - 6.5
4-5 Bu Xiangzhi, Jakovenko - 6.0
6-8 Stellwagen, L'Ami, Sargissian - 5.5
9-10 Nijboer, Smeets - 4.5
11 Kosintseva - 4.0
12 Werle - 3.5
13 Atalik - 3.0
14 Georgiev - 2.5 |
 |
The Parrot’s Group A and Group B
Decisive Game Analysis over 11 rounds:
White-wins Draws Black-wins analysis
Group A = W16 D46 B12 Ratio Decisive : Draw = 28:46
Group B = W30 D32 B14 Ratio Decisive : Draw = 44:32
It must be said that the drama of the
entire tournament has been provided by Veselin Topalov, taking over the
front running from Radjabov, when Toppy hit his form and shot ahead of
the entire group to the extent that Chessbase ran an article saying he
was unstoppable.
But…Round 11 gave Topalov the
black pieces against the formidable and super-solid Peter Svidler, and
indeed, Toppy managed to contrive a very strong initiative. But once
more he indulged in complications too deep even for himself, gambled
unnecessarily in a won position, and lost! Probably his 35… f5 was the
critical turning point which allowed Svidler the relatively
straightforward response of pushing his passed-pawn down the board to
achieve a resignation.
With one day to go [Round 11 standings]
Group A leaders looks like this: 1 Topalov - 7.5. 2-4 Aronian,
Svidler, Radjabov - 7.0 5-6 Anand, Kramnik - 6.5 and Group B 1
Eljanov - 7.5. 2-8 Bologan, Sargissian, Vachier-Lagrave, Bu Xiangzhi,
Jakovenko, Stellwagen, L'Ami - 6.5
Photographs: Fred Lucas; Official site:
www.coruschess.com
 Chess
is also being played in Gibraltar at the Gibtele.com Chess
Festival where world #9 2735-rated Michael Adams is doing well, and
2651-rated Hikaru Nakamura is also taking part. Live games are
being broacast by the
MonRoi
company. At Press time round 3 had just been completed in a 9
round event. Adams shares the lead with 3 players at 3 points, and
Nakamura has 2 points and so does the formidable Victor Korchnoi!
The Parrot would have made a broader
report, but there is none at the official site, including no bulletins.
From scanning games in progress Ivan Sokolov seem to be leading with 4.0
points, then five players following with 3.5. One feature game
to replay is Nakamura’s 4th round demonstration against Ramesh in a
currently hot line of the English. Somewhere in this giant
slug-fest there has to be a more direct win rather than what I take to
be a resignation on time. Games are still in progress, and at
press-time, Adams seems to be ahead a [passed] pawn, and have the two
bishops against Epishin. |
1-20-2007
|

|
Chess News
USA |
Chess
in the shade? Suggestions that USCF is going bankrupt are being
strenuously ignored. Look-aheads to future obligations and income
sources are similarly scarcely attended. This raises questions
about what will happen to US Chess if the 30 salaried USCF staff in
Crossville, TN, goes as belly up as the national championship. The
USCF site is currently advertising for a sponsor for the national
Championship:
Those interested in
bidding should contact Executive Director Bill Hall at (931) 787-1234
or bhall@uschess.org. There is no bidding deadline, as USCF reserves
the right to accept a bid at any time.
The Parrot
suspects that a bid that establishes a championship for 2007 so that
participants can clear their calendars and plan to actually attend, will
be the actual participants ‘deadline’. Otherwise chess USA will
remain in the national shadow, even for the most active and strongest
chess players in the country.
USCF are known to have long mortgage obligations
and no cash reserves or other substantial assets. Rich-uncles
should call Mr. Hall, or contact the Parrot, since running
a round robin for the country’s top players is not rocket science, does
not require 30 staff members for a year; instead it needs a legitimate
TD plus a staff of locals chess players to hold the doors open.
USCF Members express their own opinions in response
to the Championship appeal above, including this extract:
I am not in the US
championship obviously, but I have strong feelings for where the USCF
is going, as a member because I want to live my life and play chess
and not have to worry about it folding because of poor sponsorship and
management.
http://beta.uschess.org/frontend/news_7_236.php
Meanwhile, market raiding is on – Kasparov Chess
Foundation [KCF] rolled out its chess curriculum for school last Oct
11, and Fide are also interested in USCF’s bread and butter chess
market, scholastics, and have announced new Fide ratings down to 1000.
USCF are arguing with
themselves and too busy banning each other’s board comments and
political aspirations at their own forum [!] and have not deemed to
publicly notice either factor.
Whoever suceeds to
4 available board positions
better have more plans than personality ‘issues’. That’s my
opinion, and one shared by John Adams, who spoke of an empire of laws,
not of men.
Chess Press Worldwide
The
CJA (Chess Journalists of America) might soon gain unwonted
attention, since it does not seem to have presented its financial books
for inspection after it was requested to do so by its own vice
president. That gentleman was subsequently removed from office in
a way mysterious to him. CJA have also declined to examine ethical
issues by non-members. Well! While that is not logical, it
is consistent.
Even
though CJA by-laws require annual reports there have been none for 5
years. What a surprise that the treasurer is a member of the
ethically-challenged current USCF board.
|

|
Chess News WORLDWIDE |
Bad
weather to interrupt Corus? Perhaps the only big chess event
going on round the world is being hard hit. Stormy weather has now
passed to the East, and another system is about to hit. Weather is
so bad that spectators making it to the tournament are assured of good
seats!
AP Reports: Storms in Europe kill 46, disrupt travel.
Europeans labored Friday to restore services across the continent after
hurricane-force winds toppled trees, brought down power lines and
damaged buildings, killing at least 46 people and disrupting travel for
tens of thousands.
The
Parrot reports Group A and Group B with a round 4 Win, Draw, Loss
analysis for White and Black, and also a Decisive Game vs Draw
analysis. The ACP are also concerned over the number of
draws, and if you are a member the official site states that
voting on this issue is still open until the end of the month.
For those readers not familiar with the work of the Association of Chess
Professionals the Parrot refers them to
an article with their past president GM Joel Lautier. There is
also online
analysis of games on video by Loek van Wely, in English!
The Corus Tournament is taking place 12th-28th
January 2007 in Wijk aan Zee. There are two groups:
A Group: Veselin Topalov g BUL 2783, Viswanathan
Anand g IND 2779, Vladimir Kramnik g RUS 2766, Levon Aronian g ARM 2744,
Teymour Radjabov g AZE 2729, Peter Svidler g RUS 2728, Ruslan Ponomariov
g UKR 2723, David Navara g CZE 2719, Alexei Shirov g ESP 2715, Magnus
Carlsen g NOR 2690, Loek van Wely g NED 2683, Sergey Tiviakov g NED
2682, Sergey Karjakin g UKR 2678, Alexander Motylev g RUS 2647.
B Group: Dmitry Jakovenko g RUS 2691, Pavel
Eljanov g UKR 2675, Viorel Bologan g MDA 2658, Gabriel Sargissian g ARM
2658, Bu Xiangzhi g CHN 2644, Friso Nijboer g NED 2638, Erwin L'Ami g
NED 2594, Suat Atalik g TUR 2586, Daniel Stellwagen g NED 2585, Maxime
Vachier-Lagrave g FRA 2573, Jan Werle g NED 2566, Jan Smeets g NED 2538,
Vladimir Georgiev g MKD 2525, Tatiana Kosintseva m RUS 2474.
|
Group A Round 6 standings:
1 Radjabov - 5.0 [captioned, top]
2-3 Kramnik, Topalov - 4.0
4-6 Aronian, Anand, Karjakin - 3.5
7-9 Ponomariov, Navara, Svidler - 3.0
10-11 Motylev, Van Wely - 2.5
12-13 Tiviakov, Carlsen - 2.0
14 Shirov - 0.5
The Parrot’s Round 4 White-win Draw Black-win
analysis = W7 D17 B4
Decisive to Draws ratio 11:17
Group B Round 6 standings
1 Eljanov - 4.5
2-3 Vachier-Lagrave, Smeets - 4.0
4-7 Bu Xiangzhi, Bologan, Jakovenko, Kosintseva - 3.5
8-9 Nijboer, Stellwagen - 3.0
10-11 Sargissian, L'Ami - 2.5
12 Georgiev - 2.0
13 Werle - 1.5
14 Atalik - 1.0
The Parrot’s Round 4 White-win Draw Black-win
analysis = W9 D14 B5
Decisive to Draws ratio 14:14 |

 |
While Radjabov is on fire, Shirov fizzled, things are
otherwise damp in Holland, and the organisers, Corus, posted this
message: Due to the extreme weather conditions in Wijk aan Zee,
the commentary session in the Corus Chess pavilion is cancelled today...
A look at the pictures looks like Vishy is glad to get indoors!
The latest games in Group A Round 6 have 2 decisive
results, both scoring the white bits, with Karjakin beating a completely
out of form Shirov, and Kramnik beating Anand. Radjabov is now an
entire point clear in the lead with 5 points, followed by Kramnik and
Topalov together in 2nd 3rd with 4 points. More coverage here next
week. Official site |
1-13-2007
|

|
Chess News
USA |
Regional focus: Chess in Nashville

MLK Day Chess Camp with TN State Champ
- January 15 -Nashville
Chess Center
This will
be a fun-filled day of chess activities designed to help young chess
players improve. There will also be competitions and lunch and snacks
will be provided. This camp is great for anyone planning on playing in
the regional and state scholastic tournaments. This camp will be
taught by Todd Andrews and more instructors may be added as needed. Call
the instructor for more info: (615) 586–7254 or email:
MusicCityMasters@yahoo.com. Entry Fee: $40.00 ($30 entry for
NCC Members or students in NCC programs) Half price for those students
that only wish to stay a half day Download flyer/entry form
here.
Regional focus: Chess on New
York TV and the web
Chess Now
is a new chess show broadcast out of Manhattan, NYC on local public
access TV and available for live streaming through the Internet.
More
details are at the website,
www.fractal-interval.com/chessnow

At the national level many this
Parrot’s SPECIAL FOCUS Report observes what the attention to
Chess Issues in the USA, from chess political levels, Sponsors
and players perspectives.
National Discussion: Secrecy
Rules
USCF’s forum banned 2 board members from
posting there. Not, it seems, for stating anything untrue or uncoothly,
but because ‘the matter’ was confidential to the board. But this matter
of the US Championship was itself highly contested. Board member
Marinello put it this way:
“(b)
All Board members have the right to be involved in the determination of
all Board decisions. A Board majority has no authority except as a
majority vote within the context of a properly called Board meeting.
Board decisions must result from discussions in which all Board members
have had the opportunity to participate.”
Bill Goichberg instead of accepting
that he violated the code of conducts react harshly by giving the
moderator authority to move forward.”
USCF’s president Goichberg then posted the
following regarding the suspension of Beatriz Marinello from posting:
DECISION MADE BY MIKE NOLAN, SERVING AS A MODERATOR OF THE USCF
FORUM;BILL HALL, USCF EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR; AND BILL GOICHBERG, PRESIDENT
OF THE USCF.
I was not aware of the above headline in advance and do not agree with
it. I expressed my personal opinion (that the info was confidential)
before any other Board member commented, and I did not claim that my
opinion was necessarily that of the whole Board. //Bill Goichberg
Meanwhile USCF Executive Director denies being
involved with the bannings and AF4C don’t want to be involved either.
They have withdrawn from sponsoring the 2007 US Championship
Past-President Tim Redman joked that what we need
is not a moderator at USCF’s forum, since it has become so evidently a
political forum, instead we need a political commissar.
National focus: Chess in The
Future
In
an interview the North American Open Champion 2006 GM Hikaru Nakamura
said of chess in the USA:
HN: If
I may be very blunt about this, I would say that I'm quite concerned
about the state of chess in America right now. We have a
federation, which, it seems, is not exactly being very successful in
publicizing chess. You never see articles in the mainstream media;
you just never see any publicity outside of the chess world.
JH: We
do have some promising young players…
HN: Well, the truth is, I simply don't think any of them are
going to be as good as I am.
Read the whole interview
Hanken/Nakamura
http://beta.uschess.org/frontend/news_7_232.php
National focus: Core Chess
Business?
While this hoo-hah had been
diverting the board, 2 issues have gone neglected: the announcement of
world wide Fide ratings
for players 1000 and up,
which some view as a raid on national rating markets, and the
US Championship.
The Fide President says he will implement the world-wide ratings plan
‘soon’,
and the USCF President says he will announce the US Championship details
‘soon’.
A little later the announcement emerged; AF4C withdrew from sponsorship
of the 2007 championship.
Chess Press Worldwide
Boy
David by Raymond Keene, The Spectator, UK.
Sixteen-year-old
David Howell from Seaford in Sussex has become the UK ’s youngest
grandmaster as a result of his outstanding performance in
the Rilton Cup in Sweden over the winter holiday. David first seized
national headlines at the age of eight when he defeated the experienced
grandmaster Dr John Nunn in a timed tournament game. Photo of
David and GK from David’s
website.
Read GM
Keene’s full article at
http://www.spectator.co.uk/the-magazine/diversions/
|

|
Chess News WORLDWIDE |

The
Hastings Congress is taking place 28th December 2006 - 7 January
2007. Among participants there are Gagunashvili Merab g GEO 2611,
Ikonnikov Vyacheslav g RUS 2587, Hebden Mark g ENG 2545, Tahirov Farhad
g AZE 2545, Neverov Valeriy g UKR 2538, Gofshtein Zvulon g ISR 2509,
Pavlovic Milos g SCG 2507, Pert Nicholas g ENG 2502.
Photo: Valerij Neverov of Ukraine, about to open his defense of the
championship he won last year.
Final leading standings:
1-2 Gagunashvili, Neverov - 7.0
3-8 Ikonnikov, Gofshtein, Pavlovic, Pert, Lalic, Cherniaev - 6.5
Live games were available at the
official site.

The
49th edition of the Reggio Emilia Torneo di Capodanno takes place
30 December 2006 - 7 January 2007. A round robin tournament with
classical time control. Players: Igor Khenkin g GER 2620, Konstantin
Landa g RUS g 2570, Viorel Iordachescu g MDA 2564, Oleg Romanishin g UKR
2542, Sabino Brunello m ITA 2460, Giulio Borgo m ITA 2420, Luca Shytaj m
ITA 2441, Federico Manca m 2425, Roberto Mogranzini m ITA 2401, Denis
Rombaldoni f ITA 2377.
Official site
Final standings
1 Iordachescu - 7.0
2-3 Landa, Khenkin - 6.5
4-5 Shytaj, Romanishin - 4.5
6-7 Brunello, Mogranzini - 4.0
8 Rombaldoni - 3.0
9-10 Manca, Borgo - 2.5

Result of the First ACP Rapid cup
GM Mikahil Golubev write to the Parrot from Odessa:
For
the first time the tournament of the Bank PIVDENNY had live Internet
relay of the games. The official website worldcup.pivdenny.com was
attended by users from more than 100 countries. Famous grandmasters
headed by Victor Korchnoi commented the games for hundreds of spectators
in the hall of Londonskaya hotel.
The
last day of the tournament was not limited to solving the sporting
intrigue. Charity fund ‘Victor’ organized a meeting between young chess
players and the World Cup participants: autographs, questions and
answers, and, of course, the play! At the closing press conference the
tournament winner Peter Leko noted that the main common interest of the
world’s strongest players is carrying out tournaments similar to the
World Rapid Cup in caliber and level of organization.
Final Result
Leko-Ivanchuk 1/2,1/2,1/2,1-0
Semi-finals
Gelfand-Leko 1/2,1/2,0-1,1-0,0-1
Ivanchuk-Radjabov 1-0,1-0
Quater-finals:
Leko-Rublevsky 1-0,1-0
Shirov-Gelfand 0-1,1/2
Morozevich-Radjabov 0-1,1/2
Bacrot-Ivanchuk 1/2,0-1
The
Corus tournament takes place 12th-28th January 2007 in Wijk aan
Zee. There are two groups:
A
Group: Veselin Topalov g BUL 2783, Viswanathan Anand g IND 2779,
Vladimir Kramnik g RUS 2766, Levon Aronian g ARM 2744, Teymour Radjabov
g AZE 2729, Peter Svidler g RUS 2728, Ruslan Ponomariov g UKR 2723,
David Navara g CZE 2719, Alexei Shirov g ESP 2715, Magnus Carlsen g NOR
2690, Loek van Wely g NED 2683, Sergey Tiviakov g NED 2682, Sergey
Karjakin g UKR 2678, Alexander Motylev g RUS 2647.
B
Group: Dmitry Jakovenko g RUS 2691, Pavel Eljanov g UKR 2675, Viorel
Bologan g MDA 2658, Gabriel Sargissian g ARM 2658, Bu Xiangzhi g CHN
2644, Friso Nijboer g NED 2638, Erwin L'Ami g NED 2594, Suat Atalik g
TUR 2586, Daniel Stellwagen g NED 2585, Maxime Vachier-Lagrave g FRA
2573, Jan Werle g NED 2566, Jan Smeets g NED 2538, Vladimir Georgiev g
MKD 2525, Tatiana Kosintseva m RUS 2474.
Official site |
1-6-2007
|

|
Chess News
USA |
An
interesting US chess statistic this week is that 20,000 of the
50,000 scholastic members of USCF have an average rating of 500.
What seem less known is the annual frequency rate of games
played for adults and especially for all scholastic players: of the
30,000 adult members of USCF we know by estimate [!] that some 18,000
of them did not play even ONE rated game in a 12 months period, so
how many of the remaining 12,000 played 12 or more games? Pictured
are the Fernandez brothers of Greenwich Village.
Pace, GM Benjamin's recent on-line comments on the paucity of
native-born US GMs, [last week’s Parrot] the situation with scholastics
may be similarly blighted to that of adults.
To plan and administer a system for ‘player-generation’ would require
some knowledge of scholastic activity, and surely someone can say in
round numbers what quantity of the 50,000 kids played 12+ games, or in
effect, have real rather than provisional ratings?
In
investigating these activity ratings a USCF spokesperson made this
response to the Parrot’s question:
While regular adults appear to be 6:5. Yet there are
counted 30,000 adult members and this accounts for only 10,000 of
them. Am I not understanding your figures - so that the missing
members played no games at all?
Yes, roughly half of the regular adult members did not play
even ONE rated game in 2006. That appears to have been the case
for as far back as I can analyze the numbers. Tournament
participation rates are even lower among other adult membership classes,
especially life members.
But this is not the whole picture! A newsgroup correspondent
says of Washington State: “You would be making a big mistake
taking USCF activity numbers as representative of US chess activity.
In Washington State, e.g., doing that would overlook 90% of what is
going on in the scholastic realm. Per capita, Washington's rates
are over 5x the USCF levels, which would be food for thought if
the USCF permitted thinking.”
|
Collegiate teams vie for cash prizes from
$250 to $2,000, with the top four teams moving on to the national
tournament in March in Dallas. The top prize for the
scholastic tournament pitting elementary and secondary students is
a $69,416 scholarship to UMBC. And the winners are:
COLLEGE SECTION 1st place: Univ. of Texas
Dallas - B, Univ. of Texas Dallas - A,
CLOSED SECTION 1st place: IM Stanislav
Smetankin
SCHOLASTIC SECTION 1st place: A
Balasubramanian
Unfortunately the e-board broadcaster Monroi
company list both photos as Univ of Texas Dallas - B, so one of
these teams won! |
 |
Chess Press Worldwide
After
the first ACP Rapid tournament the president of FIDE gave a
sort-of press conference and said nothing. Perhaps the most
pointed question, if that term can be employed, was about Topalov’s
challenge for the world title, which gained this response: “Upon
receiving the guarantee, we will consider our future steps.”
Neither could the president comment on the cheating issues since ‘tearing
down bathroom walls’ did not seem practical to him. The
president did say that FIDE will lower ratings to 1000, “something”
he said, “they are going to do really soon.”
Since this was not actually news or even information as
we know it, and he didn’t say what “consider future steps” there were to
take [since of course there must be some future steps], and did
not elaborate why “really soon” could not be really specific, the
audience ended.
In the chess competition: First ACP World Rapid
Cup saw Leko, Rublevsky, Shirov, Gelfand and Morozevich win, and go
forward to the next event:
Sokolov - Leko 1/2,0-1
Rublevsky - Naiditsch 1/2,1-0
Smirin - Shirov 0-1,1/2
Gelfand - Nakamura 1-0,1-0
Harikrishna - Morozevich 0-1,1-0
Meanwhile in London, the Guardian newspaper’s
columnist ‘Nicky Campbell’ has this to say: “The next move for chess in
Britain is to gain official recognition as a sport and thereby receive
the concomitant status and funding. The IOC says it's a sport, as do 150
countries worldwide. The World Chess Federation is the second-largest
sporting association in the world, behind FIFA, but can anything be so
termed if a computer can whoop your skinny ass at it? I love my Apple
Mac but fancy my chances against it over 6k, or in a frame of snooker.
Isn't sport about physical action and reaction? But, goes the argument,
why not include the axons, dendrites and synapses of the brain within
that definition? Give it some mental muscle, son.”
And also:
“Malcolm Pein from the London Chess Centre told me that,
of course, chess is a sport. "The only thing going against it is the
rather stupid drug-testing that we have to adhere to."
It's a point. If there was a drug to make you
cleverer, where was it when I took my finals? A vague acquaintance
swears blind that "a bit of spliff" is perfect for chess.”
The Guardian was once, a member of the ‘quality
press,’ but now this is what the public is reading about the royal game;
which is not a game but a sport, we are told, and presumably if they
takes drugs in sports, then … like this reporter’s ‘vague acquaintance’
…Source.
|

|
Chess News WORLDWIDE |

|
 |
The Hastings Congress is taking place 28th
December 2006 - 7 January 2007. Among participants there are
Gagunashvili Merab g GEO 2611, Ikonnikov Vyacheslav g RUS 2587,
Hebden Mark g ENG 2545, Tahirov Farhad g AZE 2545, Neverov Valeriy
g UKR 2538, Gofshtein Zvulon g ISR 2509, Pavlovic Milos g SCG
2507, Pert Nicholas g ENG 2502. Round 7 leading standings:
1-4 Pavlovic, Gofshtein, Cherniaev, Gagunashvili - 5.0
Photos: GM Colin McNab and Bernard Caffety. Srinath Narayanan
from India. Latiffa Messam-Sparks and Aly Wilson.
A highly recommended game, and a great fight is Jones, G.
(2430) and Neverov, V. (2538)
Live games are available, at the
official site. |
The
49th edition of the Reggio Emilia Torneo di Capodanno takes place
30 December 2006 - 7 January 2007. A round robin tournament with
classical time control. Players: Igor Khenkin g GER 2620,
Konstantin Landa g RUS g 2570, Viorel Iordachescu g MDA 2564, Oleg
Romanishin g UKR 2542, Sabino Brunello m ITA 2460, Giulio Borgo m ITA
2420, Luca Shytaj m ITA 2441, Federico Manca m 2425, Roberto Mogranzini
m ITA 2401, Denis Rombaldoni f ITA 2377.
Official site
Round 5 standings:
1 Iordachescu - 4.5
2 Khenkin - 3.5
3-4 Shytaj, Landa - 3.0
5 Brunello - 2.5
6-7 Manca, Borgo - 2.0
8-10 Romanishin, Rombaldoni, Mogranzini - 1.5
|
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