THE WEEK IN CHESS 829 27th September 2010 by Mark Crowther

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1) Introduction

My thanks to Luiz Roberto Da Costa Jr, Luis Blasco de la Cruz, Adolivio Capece, Bill Townsend, Laszlo Nagy, Sergey Sudakov, Dave Clayton, Mihajlo Savic, Ake Bendz and everyone else who helped with the issue.

The Olympiad has just past its half way stage. In the Men's event Ukraine lead from previous champions Armenia and overperforming Georgia. The Russians have made an all out effort to win and they are not out of it just point behind.

This issue contains the first 6 rounds of the Olympiad with the naming conventions used by TWIC over the years. There are a huge number of games. If the past is anything to go by I may revisit this issue's game section and place corrections to the first round in this issue again. We'll see.

My enjoyment of the Olympiad has somewhat been curtailed by the processes I have created for dealing with the games in this Olympiad. The official site coverage has not been at all bad but the games are capable of some improvement. I created a master list of players from the chess-results.com list which is the site which has the correct results. However they made life hard by not giving the Fide Id for the player and not punctuating the players' names. However once I did that I collected the results from there and compared them with the results from the games. I also added board numbers (Match followed by Board) which allowed me to find some incorrect results. I have also created a completely new pair of Tags WhiteFideId and BlackFideId. The PGN standard is badly in need of some work on it. (FIDE would be the place for such discussions but I would have to think long and hard about contributing if they reelect Ilyumzhinov) Its simpilicity has made the dissemination of games possible and standard. But additional tags would be helpful. If (as it would have been possible to do because of the way I process games) I had processed games in the past with black and white FideIds in it then the material would have gained a huge amount of value (although even here there are problems as unbelievably FIDE reuse the Ids of dead players like there aren't enough numbers). I also want to move to full names, a complex issue, the FIDE rating list, particularly in some areas such as the Indian part of the list, is a mess and as always what do you do about duplicate names? (the many Alexey Ivanovs or other such common name pairs, Hungarian names also seem to have a lot of duplicates). Anyhow the Olympiad is the place to test some ideas because there is so much material. Comments and errors in the PGN on the website with full names and in this issue with the shortened form, are welcome. I hope to move to a better and more streamlined way of processing games. Anyway I think I made big progress and I hope in the second week I can settle down to enjoy the chess.

Hope you enjoy this issue.

Mark

2) 39th Chess Olympiad

The 39th Chess Olympiad takes place in Khanty-Mansiysk, Russia 21st September (Round 1) - 3rd October (11th Round) 2010. Detailed coverage on TWIC's main pages.

Official site: http://www.ugra-chess.com/

3) European Youth Championships

The European Youth Championships take place in Batumi, Georgia 20th-28th September 2010.

Official site: http://www.euro2010.ge

Results: http://www.chess-results.com/tnr38342.aspx

4) US Chess League

The US Chess League takes place August 23rd - 20th November 2010.

Time Controls range from 60+30 to 90+30 depending on the start time and time zone. Games take place on ICC.

Official site: http://www.uschessleague.com/

5) XtraCon 5

The XtraCon 5 open took place in Borup 3rd-12th September 2010. Hans Tikkanen made a GM norm in the final Round. The tournament was won by GM Drozdovskij, Ukraine, with a slightly better tie-break than GM Miezis, Latvia. Both had 7 points. The next places were occupied by IM (soon GM) Tikkanen, Sweden, GM Kulaots, Estonia and GM Tiger Hillarp Persson of Sweden. All with 6.5 points. The games given may be mixed in together with lower groups. It was very hard to separate them.

Official site: http://skovbo.xtracon.dk/ - Results: http://ratings.fide.com/view_source.phtml?code=50417

6) Munich Open

The Munich tournament takes place 25th September - 3rd October 2010.

Official site: http://schachbezirk-muenchen.de/ois10/ois.shtml

7) 7th Highlands Open

7th HIGHLANDS OPEN - Zdar nad Sazavou (FIDE open, active chess, blitz tournament). 25th September - 2nd October 2010.

Official site: http://www.czechtour.net/highlands-open/

8) Dunav-Drava-Sava GM

The Dunav-Drava-Sava GM tournament took place in Borovo, Croatia 20th-24th November 2010. Ranko Szuhanek took clear first place with 7/10 in the double round robin tournament. He achieved the third GM Norm after nine rounds. Chief arbiter was Milutin Lukic, IA. News: Mihajlo Savic.

Details: http://www.chessdiagonals.com

9) 132nd New York State Championship

The 132nd New York State Championship took place Sept. 3 to 6 at the Albany Marriott on Wolf Road in Colonie, which is essentially the main shopping district for the state capital, Albany. Overall about 202 players competed in the six sections, the best turnout since the tournament started being anchored in Albany in 2006, and a sharp improvement over last year's total of 180.

In the Open section, two players tied for first with 5-1: GM Joel Benjamin and IM Marc Esserman. Benjamin was leading by a half point going into the final round, but he could only manage a draw against GM Mark Paragua while Esserman triumphed over FM Igor Nikolayev. Although the two players split the top prize money, according to the rules, neither could be New York State Champion: although a nine-time former champion, GM Benjamin now lives in New Jersey, and IM Esserman, who tied for third in last year's championship, is from Massachusetts. In clear third with 4{-1{ was Aleksandr Ostrovskiy from Brooklyn, so he is the new state champion. He also now holds the record for youngest state champion ever, since he will turn fifteen in January. Previously Hikaru Nakamura (2004) and Aaron Pixton (2002) were sixteen when they won their championships. Worth checking out is Ostrovskiy's first round game, where he was almost upended by local player Peter Henner (1903).

Tied for fourth with 4-1 were: GM Mark Paragua, IM Justin Sarkar and Kassa Korley. Tied for seventh with 3{-1{ were: IM Jay Bonin, FM Igor Nikolayev, FM Alec Getz, Deepak Aaron and Ben Dean-Kawamura. Tied for twelfth with even 3-3 scores were: Yefim Treger, Lonnie Kwartler, Nitai Leve, Matan Prilleltensky and Sam Hamilton.

The New York State championship has a long history. It was first held in 1878 and has been run nearly every year since then, making it easily the longest running annual tournament in the United States. There are many famous players on the list of New York State Champions, such as world champion Jose Capablanca (1910) and 5th World Correspondence Champion Hans Berliner (1953). There are nine U.S. Champions on the list, among them Frank Marshall, Arnold Denker, Gata Kamsky, Joel Benjamin and Hikaru Nakamura.

The event was directed by Steve Immitt and Bill and Brenda Goichberg. Full crosstables for the event are posted at the Continental Chess website, the address is: http://www.chesstour.com/nysc10r.htm

News: Bill Townsend.

10) Forthcoming Events and Links

Chigorin Memorial

The Chigorin Memorial takes place in St. Petersburg, Russia, October 26th to November 5th 2010 and will consist of a rapid and a classic tournament. Details and regulations at: http://www.totalchess.spb.ru/

First Saturday October

First Saturday October tournaments take place 2nd-13th October 2010, GM, IM and FM events. There are still vacancies. Contact E-mail: firstsat@hu.inter.net

Official site: http://www.firstsaturday.hu/1009/index.htm

Registered participants for the FIRST SATURDAY Budapest 2nd-13th October 2010 GM-tournament:

IGM BUI, Vinh /VIE, 2449/, IGM NEELOTPAL, Das /IND, 2454/, IGM CZEBE, Attila /HUN, 2479/, IM WITTMANN, Walter /AUT, 2303/, FM KISLIK, Erik Andrew /USA,2357/. FM HAGEN, Andreas Skytte /DEN, 2311/, FM NATSIDIS, Christoph /GER, 2318/, FM LORAND,Norbert /HUN, 2369,/, IM BANUSZ, Tamas /HUN, 2550/ IM ANTAL, Gergely /HUN, 2526/. Reserves: IM PIASETSKI, Leon /CAN/, IGM KOSIC, Dragan /MNE/ IGM ILINCIC, Zlatko /SRB/, FM KHAMPARIA, Akshat /IND/, IGM VARGA, Zoltan /HUN/.

4CNL Rapid

The weekend 9-10 October is the 4ncl Team and Individual Rapidplay event.

9 Oct - Team Event 10 Oct - Individual Event Both are 9 round events.

4ncl web site - http://www.4ncl.co.uk/

Live games http://www.bcfservices.org.uk/livechess/4ncl/1011/rapid/index.htm

Intercultural Rapid Tournament in Cologne

There is a one day rapid tournament in Cologne at the Satranc Chess Club on 26th September 2010.

Details: http://edl.ecml.at/tabid/1772/EventID/4996/Default.aspx

73rd Tata Steel Chess Tournament 2011

The 73rd Tata Steel Chess Tournament 2011 takes place Friday 14th to Sunday, January 30th, 2011, in the traditional "De Moriaan" venue in Wijk aan Zee. The event which has taken place since 1938 will carry a new name, that of Tata Steel, they bought Corus a number of years ago.

Confirmed players are: World Number One Magnus Carlsen (last year's winner), reigning world champion Viswanathan Anand and his predecessor Vladimir Kramnik. The composition of the A-Group is expected to be finalised shortly after the conclusion of the Olympiad in early October with the remaining groups to follow after that. The start for the registration for the amateur groups is on November 1, 2010. The official website will change to http://www.tatasteelchess.com/ (not yet active probably from October the old Official Site is currently the one to look at)

London Chess Classic 2010

Viswanathan Anand will become the first reigning world chess champion to play in a major tournament in London since Anatoly Karpov in 1984 when he joins the eight-player field for the second London Chess Classic, which runs from 8-15 December 2010 at the Olympia Conference Centre.

Alongside him will be World Number one Magnus Carlsen, former World Champion Vladimir Kramnik, US number one Hikaru Nakamura and the top four English players Michael Adams, Nigel Short, Luke McShane and David Howell.

For more information and to buy tickets to The London Chess Classic, please go to www.londonchessclassic.com Tickets will go on sale in July.

The London Chess Classic doesn't just feature the World Chess Champion Viswanathan Anand and the World Number one Magnus Carlsen and a strong field of English and foreign stars. There are a large number of side events for amateur and professional alike. There are two simuls with chess legend Viktor Korchnoi, the very popular daily blitz tournaments, weekend and rapidplays. Finally, and definitely not least, there is the FIDE rated open which last year was won by Jon Ludvig Hammer with a first prize of £2500. This year you can play the full schedule 8th-15th December or the busy person's 11th-15th December.

The Entry form is now available.

DOWNLOAD PDF Entry form

See body of this article for links to tickets and downloads and a grid of the schedule of the events.

53rd Reggio Emilia 2010

The 53rd "Torneo di Capodanno", takes place December 28th 2010 - January 6th 2011. Venue hotel Astoria Mercure in Reggio Emilia. Games start at 2.30 pm. Free day: Jan 01, 2011 - Press conference December 28th, morning.

4ncl Team and Individual Rapidplay Championship

The 4ncl Team and Individual Rapidplay Championship on takes place 9th-10th October 2010 at Harben House, Milton Keynes. Saturday - team championship Saturday - individual championship

Official site: http://www.4ncl.co.uk/2010_rapidplay.htm

Chinese Chess League Division A

The Youngor Chinese Chess League Division A takes place April 16th - December 30th 2010 in China. 10 teams compete in the Double Round-Robin event. I've rounded up the games so far from their archive and will give them again as there are more than I've given so far.

Time control: 1 hour 30 minutes for the whole game with an incremental time of 30 seconds per move.

Prize: 500,000 yuan or Euro 50,000.

The first 3 rounds took place in Ningbo city.

Official website : http://ccl.sports.cn/ - http://games.sports.cn/chessorg.ccl2010/index.html

The live games broadcast : http://live.chinaqiyuan.com/chess.html

Archive of games should be here eventually: http://ccl.sports.cn/2010/news/2010-04-01/1995059.html

Results: http://chess-results.com/tnr32818.aspx

Rounds 4-6 take place June 6th - June 9th 2010 in Shenzhen

Rounds 7-9 July 23rd - July 26th 2010 in Shanghai

Rounds 10-12 9th-11th Sept 2010 in Guangzhou

Rounds 13-15 in Oct. 10th-13th 2010

Round 16-18 in Dec. 28th-30th 2010 in Beijing.

Leading players: Wang Yue g CHN 2749; Wang Hao g CHN 2713; Alexander Motylev g RUS 2705; Bu Xiangzhi g CHN 2682; Zhou Jianchao g CHN 2650; Li Chao b g CHN 2613; Zhang Pengxiang g CHN 2605; Zhou Weiqi g CHN 2585; Peng Xiaominn g CHN 2581; Zhao Jun g CHN 2575; Yu Yangyi g CHN 2574; Hou Yifan g CHN 2570; Ding Liren g CHN 2564; Wen Yang g CHN 2520; Li Shilong g CHN 2514; Xu Jun g CHN 2513; Liang Chong g CHN 2502; Ju Wenjun wg CHN 2500; Xiu Deshun CHN 2493; Zhao Xue g CHN 2490; Ruan Lufei wg CHN 2479; Xu Yuhua g CHN 2478; Zhu Chen g QAT 2476; Tan Zhongyi wg CHN 2464; Wu Shaobin g SIN 2453; Lin Chen CHN 2448; Liu Qingnan m CHN 2445; Shen Yang wg CHN 2444; Huang Qian wg CHN 2439; Zhang Xiaowen wg CHN 2437; Le Thanh Tu wg VIE 2318

Gujuan Tzu Blog is http://blog.sina.com.cn/chessnews

Bansko Grand Chess Open

The Bansko Grand Chess Open 12th-19th December 2010, Bansko - Bulgaria.

Details: http://www.bansko.chessdom.com

Tradewise Gibraltar Chess Festival 2011

The 2011 Tradewise Gibraltar Chess Festival takes place at the Caleta Hotel, Gibraltar, from Monday 24 January to Thursday 3 February 2011. The new primary sponsors, Tradewise Insurance Company Ltd, have enabled the prize fund to be increased to £126,000, with £17,500 going to the winner of the Gibraltar Masters, £10,000 to the top woman scorer and two extra rating prizes (of £2,000 and £1,000) being awarded to each of two further rating bands (2000-2099 and under 2000) in the Masters. The tournament will be powered by previous primary sponsors Gibtelecom.

Official site: http://www.gibraltarchesscongress.com

Bilbao Masters Final 2010

The Bilbao Masters Final takes place October 9th-15th 2010. Viswanathan Anand and Magnus Carlsen plus two players from the Shanghai Masters compete in the four player double round robin.

Official site: http://www.bilbaofinalmasters.com/

Pearl Spring Masters Nanjing 2010

The Pearl Spring Masters (I'm assuming the sponsor remains the same) takes place in Nanjing 18th-30th October 2010. ChessDom reports that the field has been finalised and that it should be just about the strongest of the year with Magnus Carlsen, Viswanathan Anand, Veselin Topalov, Vugar Gashimov, Wang Yue and Etienne Bacrot. 6 players 10 Round Double Round Robin.

Official site: http://www.chess-pearlspring.com/

Gibraltar Masters

Official site: http://www.gibraltarchesscongress.com/

Tal Memorial 2010

The likely dates for the Tal Memorial are 4th-13th November 2010. As yet there seem to be no details at all as to the composition of the field. I would welcome any news as to any early indications of the players and confirmation of the dates.

Shanghai and Bilbao Masters

The Shanghai and Bilbao Masters takes place in two stages. The First stage is in Shanghai September 3rd-8th 2010. The Final in Bilbao, October 9th-15th 2010.

The four players who will participate in the first stage in Shanghai are: Wang Hao, as best Chinese player (20th ranked); Alexei Shirov, as best Spanish player (9th ranked); Levon Aronian, as winner of the Final Chess Masters 2009 (5th ranked);and Vladimir Kramnik, as fourth ranked in the world ranking (4th ranked).

The top two qualified in Shanghai will play in Bilbao along with Magnus Carlsen, winner of the tournaments of Wijk aan Zee, Nankin and Bazna, and current number one of the world (1st ranked) and Viswanathan Anand, current World Champion (3rd ranked). Among the best players of the world, only Veselin Topalov (winner of Linares and number 2 of the world) will miss the Final, due to personal reasons.

Official site: http://www.bilbaofinalmasters.com/

X Benidorm Chess Festival 2010

The X Benidorm Chess Festival takes place 3rd-12th December 2010.

Official site: http://www.ajedrezenelbali.com

Vasylyshyn Memorial

The Vasylyshyn Memorial Chess Festival takes place in Lviv, Ukraine November 23rd - December 1st 2010. Men's and women's events.

For more details: http://www.grandcoach.com/en/students/11/blog/31/

Men's event tournament director GM Yuri Vovk (English, Ukrainian, Russian languages ) via: e-mail:wolfisthegreatestpredator@gmail.com mobile phone:+380 673912027 skype:Imperator15chess ICC: Imperator15 Playchess: JohnConnor

Women's tournament director IM Vladimir Grabinsky (English, Ukrainian, Russian languages) via: e-mail:perfectchess@ukr.net mobile phone:+380 977471673 skype: perfectchess ICC: grandcoach

Players in the GM event so far: GM round robin : Oleksienko, Mikhailo g UKR 2548 Vovk, Andrey g UKR 2522 Petr, Martin m CZE 2511 Semcesen, Daniel m SWE 2420 Smith, Axel m SWE 2416 Bernadskiy, Vitaliy m UKR 2414 Grabliauskas, Virginijus m LTU 2404

XL Rilton Cup 2010-11

The XL Rilton Cup takes place in Stockholm, Sweden 27th December 2010 - 5th January 2211.

Details: http://www.rilton.se

PDF Invitation: http://www.rilton.se/1011/inbjudan_eng/XL_RILTON_CUP_eng.pdf

4th Rijeka open chess tournament "Mediterranean 2017"

The 4th Rijeka open chess tournament "Mediterranean 2017" takes place 13th-20th November 2010 in the city of Rijeka, located at the North-west part of the Croatian coast of the Adriatic sea.

The president of the Republic of Croatia, Ivo Josipovic, has accepted to be a sponsor of this chess event while the County primorsko-goranska and the City of Rijeka are the co-sponsors.

Details: http://www.mediteran2017.com/en/home/About_the_tournament/Application

IX Festival Internacional de Ajedrez Benidorm 2010

The IX Festival Internacional de Ajedrez Benidorm 2010 takes place 3rd-12th December 2010.

Further details: http://www.ajedrezenelbali.com

Entries: info@ajedrezenelbali.com

Information: festivaldebenidorm@gmail.com

Mobile: 0034-615547567

14th Unive Tournament

The 14th Unive Tournament takes place in Hoogeveen, Netherlands Fri 22nd - Sat 30th Oct 2010.

The 4 player double round robin sees Alexei Shirov, Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, Anish Giri and Sergei Tiviakov compete.

There is an open alongside for which entry is invited on the official site. Both events don't have a rest day in order to accommodate travel to Bulgaria for the European Club Cup.

(4 players 6 Rds DRR Indiv TC: 90m:30m+30spm(1))

Official Site

European Individual Senior Championship 2011

The European Individual Senior Championship 2011 has been awarded by the ECU to Courmayeur, Aosta Valley, Italy 10th-20th April 2010.

Official site: http://www.scacchivda.com

Chinese Events 2010

Gujuan Tzu sends new of events in China in 2010. At the moment if you don't grab the games live they have a tendency to disappear (although http://ccl.sports.cn/2010/news/2010-04-01/1995059.html does now seem to have the early rounds of the Chinese League). It would be nice to find one spot where the Chinese Federation archives all their games.

1. The 2nd Chess King and Queen Matches in 29 August-3 Sept. 2010 in Jiangzhou, China. Live games: http://live.chinaqiyuan.com/chess.html

2. Chinese League A Round 10-12 in 9-12 Sept. 2010 in Guangzhou, China. Live Games: http://live.chinaqiyuan.com/chess.html

3. Chinese League A Round 13-15 in 10-13 October 2010 in Hangzhou, China. Live Games: http://live.chinaqiyuan.com/chess.html

4. The 3rd Nanjing Super Chess Tournament in 18-28 October 2010 in Nanjing, China. 6 players, Official site: http://www.chess-pearlspring.com/www/chess_pk/2009/cn/index.htm

5. The second half of Bilbao Final Masters in 10-16 October 2010 in Shanghai, China. Official site: http://www.bilbaofinalmasters.com/

6. Chinese League A Round 16-18 in 28-30 December 2010 in Beijing, China. Live Games: http://live.chinaqiyuan.com/chess.html

Gujuan Tzu Website: http://blog.sina.com.cn/chessnews

World Chess Tour Events

Tournaments, simuls and classes in Moscow.

Contact: Contact: Igor Glek, International Grandmaster, FIDE Trainer, Deputy Chairman of the RSUPES&T Chess Chair E-mail: worldchesstour@gmail.com Russia: (7)903-5593052, (Germany/World): (49)152-04014194

Web-site: http://www.chess-events.org

Swiss Team Championships 2010

The Nationalliga A of Switzerland takes place 14th February - 7th November 2010. Round 2 games not yet available.

Dates: Round 1 (2010.02.14), Round 2 (2010.03.21), Round 3 (2010.04.25), Round 4 (2010.06.13), Round 5 (2010.06.27), Round 6 (2010.08.28), Round 7 (2010.08.29), Round 8 (2010.11.06) and Round 9 (2010.11.07).

Details

Czech Tour 2010-11

The 10th International Chess Festivals Series Czech Tour 2010-11 has the following preliminary list. (Subject to small changes.)

7th HIGHLANDS OPEN - Zdar nad Sazavou (FIDE open, active chess, blitz tournament). 25th September - 2nd October 2010.

11th LIBEREC OPEN (FIDE open, active chess, blitz tournament). 23rd-30th October 2010.

1st BRNO OPEN (FIDE open, active chess, blitz tournament). 14th-20th November 2010

4th SOUTH BOHEMIA OPEN - Cesky Krumlov (FIDE open, active chess, blitz tournament). 21st-27th November 2010.

2nd PILSNER OPEN (FIDE open, active chess, blitz tournament).4th-11th December 2010.

10th PRAGUE OPEN (2 FIDE opens, one of them with IM norm, active chess, blitz tournament). 7th-14th January 2011.

10th MARIENBAD OPEN (FIDE open, closed GM and IM tournaments, active chess, blitz tournament). 15th-22nd January 2011.

2nd NOVY BOR OPEN (FIDE open, active chess, blitz tournament). 12th-19th February 2011.

More detailed information: AVE-KONTAKT s.r.o., Sukova 1556, 530 02 Pardubice, Czech Republic tel./fax + 420 466 535 200, mobile phone + 420 608 203 007 e-mail: j.mazuch@avekont.cz

http://www.czechtour.net

Historical Elo Ratings

http://www.shakki.net/history/elotop.htm has a list of historical top ten FIDE lists. The text is in Finnish but is understandable anyhow.