The Chess Mind

We started here, with this deceptively simple position; the task White to move and win:



I also requested that readers who attempted to solve it let me know their (attempted) solutions and their ratings. Between readers, friends and students, it seems that for players 2000 and up, it's pretty straightforward; around 1700-1800 most of the key ideas are spotted fairly quickly but some detail or other is usually missed; below that, only dogged effort will succeed (and occasionally did, as in the case of regular reader sbb1cpa).

So thanks to everyone for their feedback; I might try something like this in the future, too, to build up a collection of positions that can be more precisely ratings-indexed than "easy", "kinda tough", "migraine-inducing", etc.

And now, the solution - click here.

The elite eight concluded the Mexico half of the tournament tonight, and now have off until Friday, March 3 before they resume their labors in the event's traditional site of Linares, Spain. Despite the easy temptation to take an extra day off to prepare for the move, there were three battles in the four games.

The non-game was Vallejo-Ivanchuk, which started 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nf6 3.Nxe5 d6 4.Nf3 Nxe4 5.Qe2 and ended when the players fell asleep at the board 20 exceptionally boring moves later.

Leko-Topalov was an important game for both players: for Leko, because he wanted to at least maintain his lead on the field; for Topalov, to escape the cellar and scrape up some chances of a successful tournament. In the event Leko was always okay and generally maintained the initiative, but Topalov managed to keep things under control: draw.

Svidler-Radjabov was just about balanced from start to finish, though Svidler did have one opportunity, which he missed, to exploit a Radjabov error on move 23. Draw number three.

Finally, Aronian won a crazy game with Black against Bacrot. Early on Bacrot had a large advantage, but the position was extremely messy and Aronian did a better job of winding his way through the complications. His reward: clear second, just half a point behind Leko going into the second half of the double round robin.

Round 7 Results:

Leko-Topalov 1/2-1/2
Svidler-Radjabov 1/2-1/2
Bacrot-Aronian 0-1
Vallejo-Ivanchuk 1/2-1/2

Standings after Round 7:

Leko 5
Aronian 4.5
Svidler 4
Ivanchuk, Radjabov 3.5
Vallejo 3
Topalov 2.5
Bacrot 2

Pairings for Round 8 (Friday, March 3):

Leko-Vallejo
Radjabov-Aronian
Topalov-Svidler
Ivanchuk-Bacrot

Games, with brief comments, here.

It's not as bad as 2.Ba6, but 2.Qh5 against the double-king pawn isn't exactly good, either. Played by generations of schoolchildren hoping for the four-move mate, and "popularized" (ha ha) by Indiana father-and-son experts Bernie Parham (sr. and jr.), American GM Hikaru Nakamura has taken it out for the occasional spin this past year, sometimes even in serious games. (Actually, to remove the scare quotes around "popularized", I've heard it claimed that Nakamura was told about the line by (former) Indiana master Jason Doss, whose own familiarity with 2.Qh5? stemmed from the Parhams.)

In an earlier post, I proposed 2...Nf6 as the remedy, calling White's bluff. White grabs the pawn, but Black gets plenty of tempi in return. Computer analysis, my past experience and even a brutal Nakamura-Anonymous blitz game all confirmed its strength. Black wasn't just in good shape; I had a difficult time keeping Black's edge down to a clear advantage!

That's where we left off. I haven't noticed any subsequent Nakamura games in this variation where his opponents tried 2...Nf6 (and he seems to have given up the line in blitz, though he might just be waiting for people to forget about it before bringing it out again), and no one challenged the specifics of my analysis. So there's nothing left but for me to try to fix 2.Qh5? on my own.

So, one fine day I'm musing about the variation, and the Center Counter comes to mind: 1.e4 d5 2.exd5 Qxd5 3.Nc3 Qa5. The queen's moving around, sure, but it's not really that horrible on a5, and it's pretty tough for White to prove a meaningful advantage against this opening. Likewise, 1.e4 e5 2.d4 exd4 3.Qxd4 Nc6 4.Qa4 is a viable alternative to the usual 4.Qe3 in the Center Game. With those ideas in mind, I produced the obvious application 1.e4 e5 2.Qh5? Nf6 3.Qxe5+ Be7 4.Qd4(!) Nc6 5.Qa4.

In comparison with the Center Game variation, Black has already achieved ...Nf6 and ...Be7, but (a) Be7 doesn't seem like much of an achievement, while (b) in return for Black's two (one and a half?) extra tempi, White is a pawn up!

Nevertheless, these tempi matter, and while I don't see as clear a path to a big advantage for Black as I did in the earlier variations, it's still White who must do the scrambling.

Have a look, here.

From Stephen Davies, Themes in the Philosophy of Music:

We live in an age in which it is regarded both as offensive and as false to suggest there is not democratic equality among all kinds of music in their artistic value and among all listeners in their understandings of music. It seems also to be widely held that understanding comes simply as a result of one's giving oneself over to the music (as if there must be something wrong with a work that does not appeal at first hearing). The ideas that there are worthwhile degrees of musical understanding that might be attained only through years of hard work and that there are kinds of music that yield their richest rewards only to listeners prepared to undertake it smack of an intellectual elitism that has become unacceptable, not only in society at large but in the universities. 'Anti-democratic' ideas are rejected not just for music, of course, but across the social and political board, but the case for musical 'democracy' is especially strong, since almost everyone loves and enjoys some kind of music. Nevertheless, the arguments I have developed above suggest to me that many music lovers mistake the enjoyment they experience for the pleasure that would be afforded by deeper levels of understanding. (232)

The same goes for chess: there are ideas that anyone can appreciate, but there are those the neophyte tournament player can appreciate that the beginner can't, those accessible to the experienced club player that are lost on his less sophisticated counterparts, and so on up through master, "mere" grandmaster, (FIDE) 2700 player and so on. (An example: In ChessBase Magazine 109, Anand described what happened in the opening of one of his San Luis games as boring to most people, but the sort of thing that gets 2700 players excited.)

Note: this isn't a knock against lower-rated players (from beginner to "mere" GM) or their perceptions of beauty. It's a reminder that we shouldn't confuse what we appreciate in chess with the sum total of the beautiful, nor what we can understand with the set of all comprehensible positions. Instead, it should be encouraging: if we work at chess, we'll not only get stronger, we'll also have an increased capacity to enjoy the beauty of the game - both quantitatively and qualitatively. And that is something to look forward to!

Philidor's Defense (1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 d6) has long been a backwater of chess theory: ask the average player to name all the games in that opening they can think of, and their only answer is likely to be the Morphy vs. Count & Duke game. This is undoubtedly unfair, as many players, especially super-GM Etienne Bacrot, have really souped up the theory, proving it to be a legitimate opening.

That said, amateur interpretations of the Philidor don't often work out quite so well, and I've attached a recent case in point, from the recently completed Cappelle la Grande open tournament (won by Alexander Moiseenko with 7.5/9). Black essayed the iffy Philidor Counter-Gambit (3.d4 f5), and although White "fell for" one of Black's allegedly tricky lines, it didn't turn out so well.

Consider this your 2006 reminder to avoid junk openings.

My copy of ChessBase's disk on Bobby Fischer came in the mail a few weeks ago, and I've been browsing German GM Robert Huebner's comments on Fischer's My 60 Memorable Games. Naturally, the majority of his comments address Fischer's annotations, but one of his entries was rather odd:

Fischer-Steinmeyer, USA Championship 1963/64. It isn't clear to me why this game was included into the collection. To me, it does not seem be "memorable." 1.e4 c6 2.d4 d5 3.Nc3 dxe4 4.Nxe4 Bf5 5.Ng3 Bg6 6.Nf3 Nf6 7.h4 h6 8.Bd3 Bxd3 9.Qxd3 e6 10.Bd2 Nbd7 11.0-0-0 Qc7 12.c4 0-0-0 13.Bc3 Qf4+ 14.Kb1 Nc5 15.Qc2 Nce4 16.Ne5 Nxf2 17.Rdf1 1-0

I suppose the first question to ask concerns the memorability of the game: memorable for who? If Fischer is claiming the games in his book are objectively memorable, or at least objectively memorable to all chess fans, or to all reasonably sophisticated chess fans, then Huebner's comment is apropos. Steinmeyer was a relatively weak player, the game was easy and Fischer didn't have to do anything exceptional to reel in the point.

On the other hand, if the book consists of games Fischer found personally memorable, then the relevance; indeed, even the appropriateness of Huebner's remark becomes questionable.

So which is it? Fischer answers the question in the second paragraph of his preface (emphasis added):

All of the 60 [games] here offered contain, for me, something memorable--even the 3 losses.

Thus, since the games are supposed to be memorable for Fischer, the fact that Huebner doesn't find Fischer-Steinmeyer memorable suggests that he has either forgotten who the author is (i.e. not Huebner himself) or has neglected to read the preface.

Let's go the extra mile, though, and see if we can think of some reasons why it might have been memorable to Fischer. At least three come to my mind, though of course I'm only guessing here.

First, an anti-USSR motivation. Fischer-Steinmeyer followed the game Shamkovich-Goldberg, USSR 1961 all the way through Black's 15th move. Shamkovich played 16.Ba5? and won after inferior defense, but Fischer's move forced Steinmeyer's resignation on the very next move. Given Fischer's continual battles against the Soviets, and his poor record against them at the time, it's understandable that he might take some delight in outdoing one of their analysts.

Second, this game took place in a U.S. Championship Fischer won with a startling 11-0 score. This was his sixth consecutive win, and maybe it was at this point that he started to believe the perfect score was a possibility.

Third, how often does one win a game in a "real" event in just 17 moves, especially when it's not the result of a gross blunder? Many players have a special fondness for miniatures (games won in 25 moves or less), and it's possible that Fischer was no different in this respect.

So even though we should take Fischer at his word in any case, it seems to me there are understandable reasons why he might have considered the game memorable. Huebner's remark therefore strikes me as inapt, but let me close on a positive note: Huebner's annotations are typically excellent. Over the years he has achieved a deserved reputation as one of the deepest and most conscientious annotators in the business, and the quality of his work on this disk is evidenced by the fact that Kasparov regularly quotes his analysis in the My Great Predecessors volume on Fischer.

[N.B. You can replay the Fischer-Steinmeyer game, with the Shamkovich-Goldberg game incorporated into the notes, here.]

Here's our starting position, originally presented in this post:



It's Black to move and draw, from the game Golod-Seeman, Cappelle la Grande 2006. Think you've got it? Click here and find out!

Sometimes grandmasters say the darndest things.

Take, for example, our heroes du jour, Mssrs. Robert Huebner and Alexander Morozevich. Both are truly great players: Huebner was a Candidate many times, while Morozevich has been at least as high as number four in the world rankings. They're also both thoughtful individuals with a propensity to make interesting and provocative statements like the following:

First, GM Huebner:

Those who say they understand chess, understand nothing. (Robert Huebner, cited in Jonathan Rowson, Chess for Zebras, p. 79.)

And next, GM Morozevich:

Q: Who is the strongest player in the world right now? Perhaps it is still Kasparov, despite having recently left the stage?

A: There is no such a thing as the “stronger player”. No one understands chess as it is, there is simply a will to reach the highest possible result. Actually, Kasparov doesn’t understand anything in chess. (Morozevich, interviewed here.)

Let's call this the No one Understands Thesis or NUT for short. It sounds deep, even a bit subversive (as in the Morozevich example), right? On the one hand, it looks like a really profound claim: even Kasparov doesn't understand chess: wow! And on the other hand, one concludes upon further reflection that it's true: even Kasparov and the gang aren't always sure about what's happening and sometimes get things wrong, and the examples can be multiplied beyond measure throughout chess history.

So NUT at least seems both a remarkable and interesting on the one hand, and true on the other. Is it? To quote one of my undergraduate philosophy professors: "Well...er...um, you see...uh, um...uh...NO." The problem is that the claim is ambiguous (i.e. it can be understood in more than one way), and the process of disambiguating leaves us a choice: either the claim is true but trivial, or it's interesting but false. Truth and interestingness don't go together here. Either the NUT is true but boring, or interesting but baloney.

Interpretation 1:

Let's think about the claim that Kasparov doesn't understand anything in chess. Does he not understand that KQk is a trivial win with the Q side to move? That seems a bit harsh; even kids who have known the game for a few hours have grasped that. (Maybe Kasparov's a little slow? Re-read my ex-prof's profundity.) It seems to me there are wide swaths of the endgame Kasparov understands perfectly well. Further, there are plenty of positions of a non-technical nature he understands completely as well, that he can flawlessly carry through to the full point. In fact, there are plenty of positions where I can do that, so again, the NUT is preposterous, bordering on the insane. It would be quite interesting if NUT were true, but it's dazzlingly false.

Interpretation 2:

But perhaps H & M mean something much more subtle. Maybe they're expressing a statement about the tremendous depth of chess. Maybe NUT really means something like this:

No one is able to fully comprehend the positional complexities of the game.

I think an interpretation of this sort is what gives NUT whatever plausibility it actually has, and it has the added virtue of being true. What it also has is the property of being staggeringly obvious: other than a few cranks, perhaps, who has ever thought the game of chess was completely figured out? Certainly not Kasparov himself, nor Karpov, nor any of the world's current top players. Granted, there was a fear of the "draw death" in chess in Capablanca's time (Alekhine put an end to that nonsense), and there are some worries in our day about the effects of computers on opening theory, but even so, even on the bleakest picture, no non-crank claimed the game was in fact completely understood. (Certainly not in our day.)

Interpretation 3?:

Is there another way to understand the NUT? Kasparov has (in)famously divided the chess world into those he considers "real" players and those who aren't, while Karpov said - pre-San Luis - that Topalov would not win the title because he "did not understand chess", implying that someone else in the field did.

Maybe there's some common thread between Huebner and Morozevich's NUT on the one hand, and the Kasparov/Karpov SUT (the someone understands [chess] thesis) on the other. But until and unless one of the first pair offers some further clarification, it seems to me NUT should provoke either scorn (on the first interpretation) or boredom (on the second).

As you might have noticed, I've been fairly busy the past few hours generating new posts. It's quite a ways back now, but I wanted to make sure that those of you plowing through the new material (starting from "Hope Chess" and Solving Studies) don't unintentionally overlook my update to Thursday's recap of Round 4 of the Morelia/Linares tournament - the annotated games are up.

Happy reading!

My favorite player of all time, bar none, is the Latvian great Mikhail Tal. To my mind, there neither was nor is another player more in love with the game than he, and it showed. There is a joy to his chess that is evident to even the casual fan, manifested in an almost feral aggression at the chess board.

This joyous aggression was particularly pronounced in the first part of his career, when he was racing to the top of the chess Olympus, and we'll take a look at a typical game from this period. Playing against Ukranian great Efim Geller in the 1958 USSR Championship, Tal continually increased the tension: first by "normal" means, then with the sacrifice of the exchange and then an entire rook. Geller, as befits one of the greatest players never to become world champion, went blow for blow with Tal until the end was just about in sight. Unfortunately for Geller - and this happened to many of Tal's opponents - a sort of punch-drunkness set in and he finally fell for one of the simpler traps in the position.

Nevertheless, the game is one of the masterpieces of Tal's early career, and I think you'll be very glad you tuned in on the playchess.com server this Monday night at 9 pm ET, as I do my best to share some of the ins and outs of this magnificent tactical struggle. If you're a first-timer to the show or haven't watched in a while, you can find directions for watching (either live or archived shows) here; if you're curious about the contents of the previous 100+ shows I've done, then check here.

Nothing restores my pleasure in chess more than spending time with Tal's games, and even if - somehow! - he isn't your favorite player, I hope you will experience at least a taste of the beauty and exuberance I find there.

Another great round for the fans, as for the fourth time in six rounds, there were three decisive games!

The one draw was Aronian-Leko, a "correct" game with Aronian trying to make something of a microscopic edge without success. This left Leko in clear first and elevated Aronian into a tie for second, as Svidler suffered a second straight defeat in a 25-move massacre to Ivanchuk. Radjabov won convincingly against Bacrot to continue his move up the crosstable, while Topalov lost his third game in this event, exchanging places with the previously last-placed Vallejo.

Round 6 Results:

Aronian-Leko 1/2-1/2
Ivanchuk-Svidler 1-0
Radjabov-Bacrot 1-0
Topalov-Vallejo 0-1

Standings after Round 6:

Leko 4.5
Aronian, Svidler 3.5
Ivanchuk, Radjabov 3
Vallejo 2.5
Bacrot, Topalov 2

Pairings for Round 7:

Leko-Topalov
Svidler-Radjabov
Bacrot-Aronian
Vallejo-Ivanchuk

Games, with comments, here.

Another exciting round, and an important one in the battle for first place. Leko drew quickly with Black against Bacrot, but that put him in clear first when Svidler lost to Aronian. That left Aronian in clear third, as Ivanchuk lost to the hitherto winless Topalov, renewing the latter's hopes for a successful result. Finally, Radjabov and Vallejo threw everything they had at each other, only ceasing when the board was down to bare kings.

Round 5 Results:

Bacrot-Leko 1/2-1/2
Aronian-Svidler 1-0
Ivanchuk-Topalov 0-1
Radjabov-Vallejo 1/2-1/2

Standings after Round 5:

Leko 4
Svidler 3.5
Aronian 3
Bacrot, Ivanchuk, Radjabov, Topalov 2
Vallejo 1.5

Pairings for Round 6:

Aronian-Leko
Ivanchuk-Svidler
Radjabov-Bacrot
Topalov-Vallejo

Games, with comments, here.

Finally, here's a third exercise for your solving pleasure:



This exact position is my invention (at least to the best of my knowledge), but I've seen the key idea at least twice before: once in a rapid Jay Bonin game, and once in Alexander Baburin's excellent Winning Pawn Structures. (Cf. his analysis of Kholmov-Kremenietsky, USSR Trade Unions Ch. 1981, pp. 105-108. A note about the book title: it's inapt (though it wasn't Baburin's fault), as 90% covers the isolated queen pawn and the remaining 10% the affiliated hanging pawns and isolated pawn couple structures. It's not a general treatise like Andy Soltis' Pawn Structure Chess or Hans Kmoch's old Pawn Power in Chess.)

This background out of the way, the task is to evaluate 1...g5. The solution will be given on Wednesday.

Courtesy of reader Joseph Amaral, our second king and pawn ending study is a reasonably well-known effort by F. Teed (1885):



White to move and win.

For this problem, I'd like to make a special request of my readers: please write me, via this link, to let me know two things: (1) your attempted solution and (2) your rating. (But please do not give the solution in the comments!)

The solution will be given on Tuesday.

Solving king and pawn endings is among the best exercises available to a chess player.

For starters, the reduced material makes calculating everything in one's mind relatively easy, even when the variations are extremely long. Second, pawn endings are fundamental, so skill in solving studies is very likely to translate into improving one's playing skill in a pretty direct fashion. And finally, they're just plain interesting! (At least I think so, and I hope some of the exercises I present will leave you feeling the same way if you don't already.)

Here's the first one:



From an actual game, Black to move (and draw). (Solution tomorrow; quasi-hat tip: Chess Today-1936)

A problem many young chess players suffer is an inclination to what's often called "hope chess". Hope chess works like this: one sees an idea for himself - often a cheapo - and then considers only second-rate defenses for the opponent. In short, he calculates for his opponent only what he hopes he will play.

Most of us overcome this difficulty quickly enough; understandably, as the path of hope chess leads to destruction. Human beings are good learners, but we're not always good at meta-learning. What do I mean? Just this: we may a learn a lesson in one particular context, but not do such a good job of applying it to broader contexts.

For example: when players start working on studies, they'll often find some good idea for White (studies are almost invariably White to move and win or draw), make natural replies for Black, and consider the problem solved. Unfortunately for them, that's not how studies work! Any study worth its salt will have at least one of two features: a seductive false lead, refuted by a brilliant Black resource, or a brilliant Black resource in the main line topped by an equally brilliant White rejoinder.

Thus if the inexperienced solver thinks she's done the job by means of the first good idea she finds for White, she's almost surely mistaken: she's guilty of another version of hope chess.

Here's an example from a study I solved earlier today.



(M. Liburkin 1949) White to move and draw.

The problem is clear: Black has two pawns ready to queen and White isn't stopping either of them yet. That makes the first two moves obvious (or at least apparently so):

1.Ng3+ Kh4 2.Kb2.

Both pawns are stopped, and now if Black plays 2...Kxg3, White uses his bishop to take the knight's place: 3.Bc6 with a draw (3...c1Q+ 4.Kxc1 Bf5).

Problem solved? Hardly - it's too easy! White didn't have to find a single difficult move, and there wasn't anything aesthetically pleasing about the solution, either. So for all you budding solvers out there, remember to look for at least two things in a successful solution: (1) real resistance, and (2) a meaningful aesthetic component (flow, paradox, sacrifice, humor - something will grab your attention and hopefully make you smile).

With that in mind, I wish you success in solving this puzzle (and others); you can find the answer here.

After a fake day off (except for Topalov and Aronian) and a real day off, the players resumed the fighting chess characteristic of the first two rounds, with three decisive games out of four.

The continuing stars are the two Peters - Leko and Svidler - who have defeated everyone they've played except each other. In this round, Leko convincingly outplayed Ivanchuk on the White side of a Ruy Lopez, Anti-Marshall; while Svidler outplayed the proponent of another draw, please? opening: Bacrot and his Petroff. (Correct: the Marshall Gambit is a beg-for-a-draw opening.)

There was one fake game, between Vallejo and Aronian (drawn in 20, but Aronian gets some slack, having played 123 moves in the previous round), but the remaining game saw Radjabov defeat the FIDE Champion (with Black!), Veselin Topalov, who now shares last place with Vallejo with 1/4.

Round 4 Results:

Leko-Ivanchuk 1-0
Svidler-Bacrot 1-0
Vallejo-Aronian 1/2-1/2
Topalov-Radjabov 0-1

Standings after Round 4:

Leko, Svidler 3.5
Aronian, Ivanchuk 2
Bacrot, Radjabov 1.5
Topalov, Vallejo 1

Pairings for Round 5:

Bacrot-Leko
Aronian-Svidler
Radjabov-Vallejo
Ivanchuk-Topalov

Games, with comments, here.

Back in October, I made brief mention of a short film on the ChessBase server, dramatizing portions of a famous game (the "Immortal Game" - Anderssen-Kieseritzky) in a surprisingly effective way using still-action shots and specially composed music.

The original short is no longer available, but the filmmakers received a very positive response to their work and decided to convert it into a commercial product, now covering the entire game. Interested viewers can find product information and a short clip here or here. (The first is for NTSC format (USA); the second for PAL (UK).)

- at least for me. A couple of weeks ago, I presented A Tough Nut to Crack (solution here), and while it wasn't trivial, I was able to figure it out. Not so, at least so far, for a fiendish little problem sent to me by Ron Fenton, who writes:

Dennis, I'm happy to see you sharing 'simple' but challenging puzzles with your readers! Nothing stokes interest in chess quite like an 'easy' looking puzzle that takes a lot longer to figure out than it should.

I'm not a great player, but I do enjoy a good puzzle and a few of my creations have even been published. One of my favorites that also falls in the 'simple but challenging' category goes as follows...

Remove all pawns from the start position - then, with White going first, the goal is to reach 'bare Kings' in 8 - the only stipulation being that the Queens be captured last.

[...]

I seek no credit, just trying to pass along an interesting item for consideration. R.F.

Credit (or perhaps blame!) may not be sought, but it is deservedly given. In any case, while I haven't been able to spend as much time working on it as I might have liked to, I have spent a reasonable amount of time trying to solve it, and without success. Readers, if you can figure it out, please don't write in the solution. I'll put up another post in a week, either with the solution, if I've figured it out for myself, or to solicit the solution from Ron Fenton or anyone else who has plumbed its depths.

Happy solving, and if you get stuck, try to remember to get your real work done!

Draw, draw, draw, draaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaw. (It was a very long draw.)

Three of the games were non-events, generally for understandable reasons. Vallejo and Radjabov (against Bacrot and Ivanchuk) wanted to avoid "castling long" (0-0-0), while Svidler and Leko were happy to maintain their mutual tie atop the leaderboard.

Aronian-Topalov, on the other hand, was a very long, er, drawn-out affair, with both sides having excellent winning chances at different points. The games, with some comments on Aronian-Topalov, can be replayed here.

Round 3 Results:

Svidler-Leko 1/2-1/2
Bacrot-Vallejo 1/2-1/2
Aronian-Topalov 1/2-1/2
Radjabov-Ivanchuk 1/2-1/2

Standings after Round 3:

Leko, Svidler 2.5
Ivanchuk 2
Aronian, Bacrot 1.5
Topalov 1
Radjabov, Vallejo .5

Round 4 Pairings:

Leko-Ivanchuk
Svidler-Bacrot
Vallejo-Aronian
Topalov-Radjabov

Another great round, again with three decisive games out of four.

The hero of round 1, Peter Svidler, won his second consecutive game. His victim was Francisco Vallejo Pons, who again lost with White, again achieving a terrible position practically in the opening itself. The game offers a nice demonstration of the old warning about premature flank attacks, as Svidler broke open the center and proved that it was Vallejo's king that was in danger, not his own.

Svidler was caught at 2-0 by his namesake, Peter Leko, who likewise defeated an opponent now on 0-2. The Sveshnikov Sicilian may look positionally crazy to the uninitiated, and when all goes well for White, that impression can be powerfully confirmed. And that's what happened: Teimour Radjabov, with Black, amassed weaknesses on d5, d6, f5 and a5; and Leko took advantage beautifully, concluding with a mating attack.

Vassily Ivanchuk is half a point back, thanks to his win over Levon Aronian. Ivanchuk maintained a clear edge for many moves, but only won after Aronian (with 43...e5? rather than 43...Nb1) missed a bone-crusher at the end of the game.

Finally, Veselin Topalov enjoyed a slight advantage throughout his game with Etienne Bacrot, but was unable to convert it into something substantial: draw.

Round 2 Results:

Vallejo-Svidler 0-1
Leko-Radjabov 1-0
Ivanchuk-Aronian 1-0
Topalov-Bacrot 1/2-1/2

Standings after Round 2:

Leko, Svidler 2
Ivanchuk 1.5
Aronian, Bacrot 1
Topalov .5
Radjabov, Vallejo 0

Round 3 Pairings:

Svidler-Leko (only one perfect score, at most, after this one)
Bacrot-Vallejo
Aronian-Topalov
Radjabov-Ivanchuk

Games can be replayed here, while a couple of on-site videos can be accessed via the ChessBase site, here.

We start with this innocent-looking position



and try to figure out how White (to move) is going to save it. I presented it on Saturday, and if you think you've succeeded in solving it and desire confirmation, or if you've tried and want to see the answer, enlightenment is just a click away.

Sometimes super-GM events can be snorefests, but that hasn't been the case in the era of Veselin Topalov. Sure enough, round 1 set the tournament on its way in an suitably violent, hard-fought way, with three decisive games out of four and no game shorter than 40 moves.

In the marquee matchup, Svidler produced a mild upset, defeating Topalov's Berlin Defense in a long game. Early on, Svidler offered a pawn for an attack, and while Topalov was able to defend, he found himself in a bind. It seems to me Topalov missed a chance for an advantage and then panicked: he freed his own pieces, but at the cost of increasing White's already superior activity.

In the other games, Vallejo had a terrible opening against Leko and was soundly beaten; Aronian-Radjabov was a typical King's Indian win for White: Black was restrained on the kingside as White gradually exploited the remaining weaknesses; finally, Bacrot-Ivanchuk would have been a fourth decisive game, had it not been for some errors by Ivanchuk in the technical stages near the end.

A great first round, and you can replay the games here.

Round 1 Results:

Vallejo-Leko 0-1
Svidler-Topalov 1-0
Bacrot-Ivanchuk 1/2-1/2
Aronian-Radjabov 1-0

Round 2 Pairings:

Leko-Radjabov
Ivanchuk-Aronian
Topalov-Bacrot
Vallejo-Svidler

Though it's only twenty-two moves, our game for this Monday has more than enough content for a rich hour's show. Albin Planinc (also spelled "Planinec" in some sources - ChessBase's databases, for example) is now retired, but in the mid-60s and 70s was among the world's most creative players.

You want proof? Take a look at what he does to Rafael Vaganian, then a young, up-and-coming GM. White's opening play was ambitious, taking time to secure the bishop pair and then, at Planinc's invitation, to win a central pawn. Vaganian's king remained in the center as his kingside pieces slept, but it didn't seem that his opponent had enough development to do anything about it.

That's how it seemed, but as you can imagine, things worked out differently. To see just how differently, you'll want to tune in this Monday night at 9 pm ET as we explore a game I can almost guarantee you'll long remember!

If you're new to the show, click here for details about watching live and/or archived programs, while a list of games covered in previous shows can be found here.

While the first round of Morelia/Linares was Saturday's big event, there were some big names playing that morning in the world's premiere chess league, the Bundesliga. Many chess fans don't know about the Bundesliga, and even those who do rarely get to see the games.

To offer a small remedy against this general misfortune, I've made the game Anand-McShane available here, with some brief notes. Surprisingly, McShane, as Black in the Berlin, outplayed Anand, and only a slip at the very end let the Indian escape with a draw. It's worth a look, especially for those who play either side of the Berlin ending.

One interesting, slightly underpublicized variation of the Dragon begins 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 g6 5.Nc3 Bg7 6.Be3 Nf6 7.Bc4 O-O 8.Bb3 d6 9.f3 Bd7 10.Qd2. Black can transpose into main line Dragon variations with 10...Rc8 11.O-O-O Ne5, but the game will maintain its distinctive Accelerated Dragon if Black chooses 10...Nxd4 instead. After 11.Bxd4 b5 12.h4 a5 13.h5, we reach a critical position:



I have already discussed this position in three posts (in chronological order, see here, here and here; the first two are from my previous blog), and my preference to date has been for White.

Nevertheless, theory moves on, and I've attached a recent game in which the lower-rated Black player braved this line and won anyway. White didn't play what I had previously considered the best move (which may or may not be significant), but it's an interesting game nonetheless. I've also included a game in a slightly different but closely related variation. In this second game, White commits to castling queenside sooner than usual, which should favor Black, at least in theory. White won the game, but in neither case should we rush to assume a reliable link between the opening's evaluation and the result.

Without further ado, here are the games.

Here it is; White to move (and draw, obviously, as no other goal makes sense):



J. Fritz, 1965

The solution will be given in a day or two; as usual, I ask those who have solved it to be courteous and not spill the beans in the comments section.

Three in particular: the German Championship, the Cuernavaca Young Masters, and the Aeroflot Open. All three events finished with ties for first place, though in two cases the top place was awarded on tie-breaks (without playoffs).

First, the German Championship, run as a swiss system event from February 2-12, found a three-way tie at the top between GM Thomas Luther, IM (!) Vitaly Kunin and GM and former Candidate Artur Jussupow with 6.5/9. Luther won, on tiebreaks.

Second, the Cuernavaca Young Masters (February 1-11) saw an unresolved tie atop the leaderboard, with Ruslan Ponomariov and Francisco Vallejo Pons scoring 6.5/9, half a point ahead of Hikaru Nakamura (no 2.Qh5? games, thankfully).

Finally, the Aeroflot Open in Moscow finished earlier today in dramatic fashion - especially dramatic after the spate of short, bloodless draws on the top boards in the previous round. Going into the final round, Pavel Eljanov and Kiril Georgiev led a large pack of pursuers in the race for the big bucks and automatic qualification for the Dortmund Super-GM event later in the year. Amazingly, both lost: Eljanov to Shakriyar Mamedyarov and Georgiev to Krishnan Sasikiran.

Unfortunately, neither of those heroes won the event, nor did Viorel Bologan (the 2003 winner who went on to win Dortmund), who also caught them on - you guessed it - 6.5/9. The tiebreak winner was the fourth member of the quartet: Baadur Jobava of Georgia.

On now to upcoming events: first, the Mexican half of the "Linares" tournament starts this Saturday (the 18th), and it features a super-strong cast of characters, as always. Veselin Topalov leads the way, but for whatever reason Viswanathan Anand is sitting it out.

Vladimir Kramnik is also sitting it out, almost certainly still fighting off his illness, but it's looking like he'll be in action this September...against Topalov! According to Chess Today, issue 1927, FIDE President Kirsan Iljumzhinov restated that they will play a 12-game match in Elista for $1.2 million.

To paraphrase Yogi Berra, it's not official 'til it's official, but at least the noise is positive and the players' camps aren't issuing denials. It's a pity the match will be so short, but it's much better than nothing.

Yesterday, I offered the following problems:

Puzzle 1:

From the starting position, White plays 1.f3 and will continue with 2.Kf2, 3.Kg3 and 4.Kh4; Black makes legal moves in reply and delivers mate on the fourth move. (White's moves must be legal, too.)

Puzzle 2:

Reach this position after Black's 4th move (not third):



Puzzle 3:

White starts with 1.e4, and Black finishes the game with 5...NxR#.

I hope you'll give them your best shot before going on to the solutions - they'll only be new once! When you're ready, click and proceed.

I recently browsed Howard Gardner's Changing Minds, and my attention was caught by his parenthetical remark on page 19 that there are only six basic jokes.

My first thought was the obvious one: what are they? (If someone knows and the answer can be provided cleanly, let me know in the comments; otherwise, use the Contact link, please.)

My second thought turned to chess: can we offer a similar breakdown of the basic types of chess game? A quick brainstorm (or rather, as I'm a card-carrying dualist, mindstorm) produced the following:

1. Model positional game

2. (Winning) attack on the king

3. The (decisive) tactical melee

4. The prearranged game/result (usually drawn)

5. The "grandmaster" draw

6. The swindle (whether good for a win or a draw)

7. The see-saw affair (win or draw)

8. The blunderfest (win or draw)

9. The well-played smooth draw

10. The well-played tactical draw

11. The well-played counterattack draw

12. The time loss (occasionally a draw)

13. The wuss draw (the "stump" - generally occurs when the lower-rated player has a big advantage but is afraid of blowing it)

And here's one way of subsuming the above under categories:

I. Fights

A. Especially well-played

1. Attacking

a. Decisive

b. Drawn

2. Tactical

a. Decisive

b. Drawn

3. Positional

a. Decisive

b. Drawn

B. Not especially well-played

1. Blunder by at least one player

a. Swindle

b. Blunderfest

2. Smaller errors by both sides (See-saw game)

3. The time loss

II. Non-Fights

A. Prearranged games

1. Drawn

2. Decisive

B. Wuss

1. "Grandmaster" draw

2. The "stump"

No doubt this can be improved (though I do doubt that anyone should bother with the attempt!), but this could prove a useful tool for the lazy tournament reporter: generate a template for each game type with the modifiers generated randomly and with blanks for player names, opening names, and move numbers.

These were all given in the comments to the Mate in Five with Re5 post, but for the benefit of my non-comment reading audience, I'll present them here (with a diagram for the second one).

Puzzle 1:

From the starting position, White plays 1.f3 and will continue with 2.Kf2, 3.Kg3 and 4.Kh4; Black makes legal moves in reply and delivers mate on the fourth move. (White's moves must be legal, too.)

Puzzle 2:

Reach this position after Black's 4th move (not third):



Puzzle 3:

White starts with 1.e4, and Black finishes the game with 5...NxR#.

The solutions will be provided tomorrow.

A very interesting interview with Viktor Korchnoi has been published on the e3e5 website. Among the eyebrow raisers are comments like these:

Q: What about Karjakin and his future?

A: I will pass this in silence. I do not think that highly about Karjakin’s talent.

...

Q: Did you meet people, who gave up chess because of their keenness on other things and became famous in that kind of activity, though they could become outstanding players?

A: Kamsky is the only person I can mention, I do not consider him to be a very talented chessplayer though.

There's plenty of other provocative and noteworthy material about Topalov, Carlsen, Tal, Nakamura and others, but the last quote I will reproduce makes for an interesting comparison with my previous post:

Q: ...Do you think that children should be taught chess in the modern world? If you think that they should be taught, at what age it’s better to start?

A: From personal experience I feel thatfirst children should get a general education. I was a talented child, I used to read a lot… As soon as I started studying chess seriously I gave up reading and I haven’t read books for adults, Dostoyevsky, for example: I had neither time nor strength for this. For this reason education should be provided first, and then one can be taught chess. It’s quite another matter, that chess lessons instill assiduity, develop mental abilities for comprehending other knowledge, it means that chess is useful. There are not many proofs, though. [Emphasis added.]

Educators, parents and thoughtful individuals: comments?

In the introduction to his Symbolic Logic, Charles Dodgson (aka Lewis Carroll) tells us that if we give his book a fair trial,

I promise you, most confidently, that you will find Symbolic Logic to be one of the most, if not the most, fascinating of mental recreations!

Skeptical? He goes on to say that

Mental recreation is a thing that we all of us need for our mental health; and you may get much healthy enjoyment, no doubt, from Games, such as Backgammon, Chess, and the new Game "Halma". But, after all, when you have made yourself a first-rate player at any one of these Games, you have nothing real to show for it, as a result! You enjoyed the Game, and the victory, no doubt, at the time: but you have no result that you can treasure up and get real good out of. And all the while, you have been leaving unexplored a perfect mine of wealth. Once master the machinery of Symbolic Logic, and you have a mental occupation always at hand, of absorbing interest, and one that will be of real use to you in any subject you may take up. It will give you clearness of thought - the ability to see your way through a puzzle - the habit of arranging your ideas in an orderly and get-at-able form - and more valuable than all, the power to detect fallacies, and to tear to pieces the flimsy illogical arguments, which you will so continually encounter in books, in newspapers, in speeches, and even in sermons, and which so easily delude those who have never taken the trouble to master this fascinating Art. Try it. That is all I ask of you! (Lewis Carroll, Symbolic Logic, cited in The Complete Works of Lewis Carroll (New York: Barnes & Noble, 1994), pp. 1118-1119.)

Maybe it's time to found SLITS: Symbolic Logic in the Schools!

Reflecting on recent news (H.T. to one of my readers) - news not meriting further discussion at this point, in my opinion - it seemed to me that this would be an auspicious time to more or less repeat advice from an earlier post.

In the U.S., and perhaps in other countries as well, it's coming to the time of the year when state (regional) and national scholastic championships take place, and my guess is that inappropriate sexual contact between adults (e.g. chess coaches) and children is most likely to occur at or around the time of these events. Here, then, is a word or two of advice:

First of all, if you're a chess teacher, REFUSE to be the sole chaperone of ANY kids you didn't bring into the world. I have turned down several opportunities to earn some extra income by driving kid x to a tournament; I simply won't do it. (I'm referring to driving a male child. All this gets raised exponentially if we're talking about a female student.) If the child is a minor, then even he's big enough to physically damage me, I'm still not going anywhere with him in the absence of another adult, preferably one of his parents. Everyone stays out of trouble that way, and if you're a good teacher, you'll make plenty of money anyway.

Second, for parents: follow this same rule. If you can't bring your kid to a tournament, then he doesn't go. Or if he or she does go, this only happens when there are multiple adult chaperones, who do not stay in kids' rooms. In fact, I'd say that unless there's a medical emergency, no adult should ever be by him- or herself in a kids' room. Further, unless these chaperones have been investigated by the school district, forget about it. A freelance guy like me should NEVER be the chaperone, even if I'm with my wife, another chessplayer or instructor, whatever, if it involves situations where I could be out of the public eye with a child. (Part of a group, sure, as long as the group has some sort of worthy accreditation and, again, no one is ever alone with the kids.)

All this seems like common sense to me, just as (male) pastors should never counsel women behind closed doors, teachers should never be in an office with students of the opposite sex behind closed doors, etc. Instructors (or parents, if they take off work to take their kids) might lose a little money, and kids might miss out on opportunities to play every now and then, but that's life. Chess teachers won't have to worry about false rumors, and parents will have a lot less to worry about with their kids.

Alexander Alekhine was the fourth world chess champion and one of the greatest and most appreciated players of all time. Chess fans are more familiar with his best games than those of any other player prior to Tal, I would guess, and yet...even in his well-covered career, there are some gaps that need to be filled. Alekhine's books of his best games cover the period from 1924-1937, and Kasparov in the first volume of My Great Predecessors likewise pays scant attention to the post-1937 phase of Alekhine's career. Yet although his later games may not have exemplified his best chess on as consistent a basis, there are still many beautiful efforts deserving to be known.

Naturally, this week's show will cover such a game. We'll take a look at his victory over the Finnish player Eero Böök (1910-1990, IM in 1950, honorary GM in 1984) from the 1938 Margate tournament (which he won). The game commenced as a safe, ordinary-looking Queen's Gambit Accepted, when Böök attempted a rather ambitious novelty. Unfortunately for the Finn, Alekhine refuted his conception over the board, even though it required committing to the sacrifice of a full rook for seemingly vague threats. Most of the time, Alekhine's attacking instincts were on the mark, and this was no exception.

It's a fine game, and an instructive one too, as you'll see when you join me this Monday night at 9 pm ET on the playchess.com server. Directions for watching the show (as well as previous weeks' shows) can be found here, while a list of games covered in past shows can be found here.

P.S. If among my readers there are any Finns or titled players who knew Böök personally and can explain how to correctly pronounce his name, I would be grateful if you would share that information with me!

John Nunn is not only a very strong OTB (over the board) grandmaster, he's also a real connoisseur of studies and problems: both as a composer and especially as a solver - he is the current world champion at that discipline!

Having recently turned 50, a study competition was held in his honor, and you can find the winning entries, with solutions, here in both .pdf and .pgn formats. In my opinion, solving studies is one of the best ways to improve, and I'm sure these will prove worthy of one's efforts. (Warning: while I think practically anyone will benefit from trying to solve these, these are likely to prove challenging even to those on the higher end of the rating spectrum.)

In a comment to the original A Tough Nut to Crack post, IMJP (IM Jovan Petronic), offers a fun little problem:

If you don't mind, here's is an example I gave to my chess kids just yesterday: Starting position, White to play and checkmate Black in five moves with a Rook on e5. Black helps White to do the job.

It took me a few minutes tonight to solve it, but solve it I did. If you want to see the solution, click below.

In late 1983 or early 1984, GM and Chess Life columnist Andy Soltis invited readers to submit made-up games. He suggested - but didn't demand - that the games follow either of two themes: Paul Morphy vs. Mikhail Tal or the final game of the Fischer-Karpov World Championship Match. (Hmm, that one rings a bell.)

A young expert on the verge of USCF masterdom tok up the challenge, and produced a hypothetical game between Morphy and Wilhelm Steinitz. It's not a masterpiece (remember, it's the pre-computer era!), but it did win an honorable mention in the context (the winning entries were presented in the April 1984 Chess Life, pages 8-9 and 45).

I hadn't thought about it in a while, but while scrounging through some boxes in search of something else I came across a photocopy of the article. Whether that's your gain or your loss is for you to judge, but you can see my entry here.

It's not going to receive the ink San Luis did, but it's still a World Championship and thus worthy of notice. The Women's World Championship will take place from March 10-27, 2006, in Ekaterinburg, Russia, and you can find more details here.

Yesterday, I introduced a position tough for humans and really tough for computers to solve, and in case it's not tattooed in your minds yet, have another look:



M. Matous, Szachy 1975


Did you solve it? Apparently at least one IM and one NM were stymied, and none of my software came even remotely close. Fortunately for my sanity, I solved it, and I hope some of you did as well. Of course, you're welcome to keep trying, but if you want relief, the answer is just a click away...

This weekend I offered a mild challenge to my readers. Take the following position



let Black play 40...Qf1 instead of resigning, and figure out how White is to win. I trust that many, quite possibly most of you were able to handle this one without too much trouble, but for those of you who had a tougher time with it, kudos for persevering. Pushing yourself on problems you find difficult (but not out of the range of possibility) is one of the best ways to improve.

Without further ado, I present the solution: click here.

Here's a puzzle that will make you work and give your computers heartburn: White to move and win.



M. Matous, Szachy 1975


A few weeks or months ago, I came across a slightly different version of this puzzle, with the Black pawn on a6 (rather than a7, as mistakenly given earlier tonight, or a5, as Andrey has since informed me and as given above), and after a few minutes' thought found the right idea.

Unfortunately, checking it with the computer way back when, it found a defensive try I hadn't considered at first, and as it hadn't yet detected a win for White, I assumed I was wrong and left the puzzle to languish until today.

After watching the computer's futility this time around and after getting the right position at last, I went back to work by myself. I quickly convinced myself that my initial approach had to be right, and then it was just a handful of minutes until I overcame the final difficulty. It's a nice problem, but I have to say I'm not nearly as impressed by it as I was initially inclined to be, as (a) I solved it relatively easily and (b) there's an aesthetic flaw: the Black pawn can be placed on a5 or a6 without any substantial difference.

A word of encouragement in closing: while it's true that it's a real pain for current chess engines, a diligent human who has solved studies in the past should be able to work it out. You can do it!

Again, out of consideration for other readers, please don't state the solution in comments (or even hint at it). If, however, your chess software can solve this study from the starting position, I would like to know about that!

The solution will be given later today (Wednesday).

Further update:

If Black's a-pawn is on a6, a5 or a4, or if Black's a-pawn is missing altogether, White wins. (The latter scenario also has the drawback of being solvable by Mr. Chips - so don't test it until you're 100.000000% sure you've got it right!) If Black's a-pawn is on a7 or a3, then White's usual winning idea fails nicely. Finally, Black is just winning if the pawn is on a2.

It's an ugly-looking move, but other moves that violated the aesthetic sensibilities of a given generation have become wholly accepted, even taken as obviously sound and reasonable. (Examples: the Sveshnikov Sicilian and the Chebanenko Slav.) Vadim Zvjaginsev trotted it out three times in the Russian Championship at the end of 2005, with mixed results (see here, for example), and it seemed that interest in 1.e4 c5 2.Na3, then a novelty, had already peaked and run its course.

But maybe not! At the Moscow Superblitz tournament in January, the line was tried no less than nine times - including twice by Morozevich and thrice by Svidler. That said, the line bombed: +3 -5 =1. It's probably premature to consider it dead and buried, though, so I invite curious souls to have a look at the games, which I've attached here. (The games are from Chess Today-1917, and have plenty of errors in the notation, as often happens with attempts to transcribe blitz games.)

Pittsburgh 21, Seattle 10

Drive carefully, everyone.

On the ChessBase server, there's a link to a Boston Globe article commemorating the 100th anniversary of American great Harry Nelson Pillsbury. He rocketed into the elite in his early 20s, but he soon contracted syphilis, leading to a loss of chess strength and ultimately his premature death at the age of 33.

If the "lay" press is going to offer its tribute, how can I, as someone trying to promote the history of the game, do any less? (Answer: I can't!) This week, therefore, we'll take a look at his last great triumph, his victory over world champion Emanuel Lasker in the Cambridge Springs tournament of 1904. Utilizing an important, long-planned improvement over his choice in an 1896 loss to the same player, they rapidly reached a position where Pillsbury's lead in development compensated for a pawn and the bishop pair. The position was roughly balanced, but Pillsbury was in his element, outplayed his great opponent, and won brilliantly.

It's a great game, an interesting opening, and covers a player all real chess fans (especially but not only in the U.S.) should know about! I hope therefore you'll join me this Monday night at 9 pm ET on ChessBase's playchess.com server. It's free to watch, and you can find directions for watching the show here. That link also explains how to access my previous shows, and if you're curious about what you'll find in the archives, try this link. See you Monday!

The championship of the Fibertex Cup came down to the last round game between Peter Heine Nielsen and Magnus Carlsen, and in this position, Carlsen (Black) resigned:



White is up a piece, has a dangerous passed pawn and is threatening f7, but what if Black plays 40...Qf1, threatening ...Qg2#?

The solution won't give your chess software so much as half a second's difficulty, and strong players won't find much of a challenge either. Nevertheless, the puzzle makes for a nice exercise for the club player (but don't move the pieces around - that will make it too easy), and the solution is elegant despite its simplicity.

Remember, please don't comment the solution; I will provide it in a day or two.

In the previous post, I noted that although Linares (or what was Linares - see below) is the next super-GM event coming up in the wake of Wijk, the Young Masters event in Cuernavaca should keep chess fans happy in the meantime.

But that's not the only event of note.

First, the Gibraltar Congress, a strong open swiss event, finished a couple of days ago, won by Kiril Georgiev with 8.5/10, a full point ahead of Nigel Short and Emil Sutovsky. Other players of note include Vladimir Akopian and Alexei Shirov (both with 7/10; Shirov's 13-move loss was from this event), while Viorel Bologan and Viktor Korchnoi finished with 6.5 points.

Next, a two-day blindfold event finished earlier today, the Fibertex Cup in Aalborg, Denmark. The tournament was a four player double-round robin featuring GMs Peter Heine Nielsen, Magnus Carlsen, Lars Schandorff and IM Nicolai Pedersen. Going into the last round, Nielsen and Carlsen were tied with 4/5 and scheduled to play; unfortunately for the youngster, Nielsen, with White, won the game and the tournament; Schandorff and Pedersen tied for last with 1.5/6.

Turning to ongoing events, the Moscow Open (January 29-February 6) is a strong swiss system tournament, but is merely an appetizer for the monster Aeroflot Open (starting February 8, according to supergrobi). That is not merely the strongest open event on the chess calendar, it's also an important qualifier, as the winner receives automatic entry into the Dortmund super-GM tournament.

Finally, a word about the Linares/"Linares" tournament. According to TWIC, the first half of the tournament will take place in Morelia, Mexico. The players then have about a week off, fly to Spain, and complete the event in its normal location of Linares, Spain. It's a good thing for chess that more and more high-quality events are taking place in Mexico, and I suppose it's good for fans that their enjoyment of Linares will be stretched out an additional week. But it seems to me a terrible arrangement for the players themselves: a second occasion for jet lag, a wasted week on their schedule, a bigger bill from their seconds, a complete loss of momentum, and an increased likelihood of getting sick. Maybe there wasn't any choice for the organizers - maybe the Linares patrons couldn't afford to pay for the whole tournament themselves - but otherwise I think it's a real disservice to the players.

Normally the chess world must wait patiently for several weeks once the Wijk aan Zee tournament ends, in eager anticipation of the next super-tournament in Linares, but this year we have a special treat: the Cuernavaca Young Masters in Mexico. Featuring (in rating order) Ruslan Ponomariov (2723), Andrei Volokitin (2665), Sergey Karjakin (2660), Francisco Vallejo Pons (2650), Lazaro Bruzon (2650), Hikaru Nakamura (2644), Lenier Dominguez (2638), Ivan Cheparinov (2625), Ruben Felgaer (2607) and local hope Manuel Leon Hoyos (2428), the event is loaded with talented, aggressive players.

Ironically, the first round saw five draws while round two had only two decisive results (Nakamura over Volokitin and Vallejo Pons over Leon Hoyos). Nevertheless, there haven't been any short games, so the event should prove a chess fan's delight.

First, here's a report of an excellent practical joke on the FIDE Champ on the ChessBase site, complete with video.

[Hat tip: Brian Karen]

Next, there's this report in Chess Today (issue 1913):

Kramnik agrees to play in Elista

According to Sport-Express, Vladimir Kramnik in his conversation with Kirsan Ilyumzhinov agreed "in principle" to play the match against Veselin Topalov in September 2006 in Elista, Russia.

Rumors of a September match between Topalov and Kramnik have been moving along for some time now, but as far as I know, official confirmation (understandably) is wanting. So is this another practical joke, or a portent of things to come? Hopefully the latter, but only time - and perhaps Kramnik's physical condition - will tell.