India will be organizing AAI International Chess Tournament, a category 17 event, from 21st June to 2nd July 2011 in New Delhi. The tournament format will be six-player double round robin.

Six top upcoming Grandmasters led by Fabiano Caruana of Italy and the Women’s World Champion Hou Yifan of China, including Philippines No. 1 Wesley So, Czech Republic No. 2 Viktor Laznicka, Indian No. 2

For fans of computer-computer matches, the third season of Martin Thoresen’s TCEC (Thoresen Chess Engines Competition) is underway. Information on how this season’s competition is arranged is here, while the live broadcast (and a list of the participating computers, their ratings and their scores) is here.

They’re almost here – less than a week away! Eight players will face off in a series of knockout matches in Kazan, Russia for the right to face world champion Viswanathan Anand for the title in early 2012. As there are eight players, there will be three rounds of matches: four-game quarter-finals, four-game semi-finals, and a six game final. Here’s the “bracketology” (to borrow a neologism from US sports) – the winner of the first match plays the winner of the second, and so on:

• (1) Veselin Topalov (BUL, 2775)
• (8) Gata Kamsky (USA, 2732)

• (4) Boris Gelfand (ISR, 2733)
• (5) Shakhriyar Mamedyarov (AZE, 2772)

• (3) Levon Aronian (ARM, 2808)
• (6) Alexander Grischuk (RUS, 2747)

• (2) Vladimir Kramnik (RUS, 2785)
• (7) Teimour Radjabov (AZE, 2744)

As you can see, seedings have little to do with current ratings, so don’t base your predictions on pairing numbers! Let’s offer a little information about these pairings:

Topalov – Kamsky: You may recall that they played a short Candidates final a couple of years ago. Topalov qualified as the loser of the match with Kramnik, while Kamsky won the preceding World Cup. Topalov won the match 4.5-2.5, but it was in fact very close: Topalov won the last game, but was losing at one point, in which case the scores would have been equalized. Oddly, Kamsky seemed to have the better preparation in that match, while Topalov did a better job controlling his nerves, both factors going against type.

Overall, Topalov has a big plus: 7 wins against 1 loss, with 7 draws in their classical battles, not counting a blindfold win for Topalov and a rapid win for Kamsky from Monaco in 2009. Ratings and history suggest that Topalov is the favorite, but Topalov has not played especially well since 2009 while Kamsky had a very good 2010 and just won the US Championship (even hiding his prep). Still, I think Topalov must be the favorite here.

Gelfand – Mamedyarov: Seven of their first nine games were drawn, but since then they’ve gone at each other like cats and dogs with an incredible 13 of their last 14 games having a decisive result. In classical games, Gelfand has five wins to just one loss, with six draws; in rapid it’s 1-0 for Gelfand to 1-0 for Mamedyarov in blindfold. Finally, in blitz, it’s +4 -3 =2 in Mamedyarov’s favor. As these Candidates matches may come down to rapid and then blitz tiebreaks, these stats may be relevant!

Picking a winner here is tough. Mamedyarov is younger and higher-rated, but Gelfand just keeps marching on, prepares extremely well, is a great fighter in events of this nature and has very good nerves. Gelfand has been in these battles many times before, and has consistently risen to the occasion, while this is new territory for Mamedyarov. I’ll go with experience here and pick Gelfand.

Aronian – Grischuk: On paper this looks pretty easy to predict, with a sizable rating gap for Aronian, who keeps going up and up and up while Grischuk alternates excellent results with fair ones and time at the poker table. Still, Grischuk is tremendously talented too and seems to have been working pretty hard on his chess the last year or so.

In classical chess, Aronian leads their series pretty convincingly, +6 -2 =9. This includes a victory in their last classical game, played earlier this year in Wijk aan Zee. In blindfold, they’re 1-1-1, and likewise in rapid. (Grischuk won the last game they played, a rapid in the final Amber tournament in March.) Finally, in blitz, Aronian leads by one: +2 -1 =4.

Anything’s possible, but I can’t see any good reason to pick against Aronian here.

Kramnik – Radjabov: Kramnik has everything on his side but youth and their last blitz game: rating, experience, superior preparation (to go by the past, anyway) and a plus score in their head-to-head battles. It’s not quite as bad as it might at first seem, because while Kramnik is +2 =7 against Rajdabov in classical chess, he hasn’t beaten him in a classical game in 8 years. In blindfold Kramnik leads 2-0, in rapid they drew their first four games before Kramnik beat him in the President’s Cup last year, and in blitz they each won their white game in the last December’s World Blitz Championship.

As with the Aronian match, anything is possible, but I can’t see any good reason to go against Kramnik here.

I’ll look more carefully at the semis once the quarter-finals end, but just to fill out the bracket now for the sake of making false predictions, I’ll go for Topalov to beat Gelfand, Aronian to beat Kramnik, and in the finals Aronian will beat Topalov.

Your turn!

Hosting European women’s chess championships may backfire a bit on home turf
2011-04-30 14:39:43
by Yi Gaochao

TBILISI, April 30 (Xinhua) — Feelings toward the board game of chess among Georgian women are as split as generation gaps between grandmothers and granddaughters.

The generation-asunder feelings are once more brought forth by the incoming of the 2011 European Individual Women Chess Championship and the 2011 European Individual Women Rapid Chess Championship to the threshold of the South Caucasus country. Georgia is hosting the two events one after the other in early and mid-May.

For the old-timers, chess for women is reminiscent of a Georgian glory, though under the flag of the then Soviet Union. Between 1961 and 1991, two Georgian women reigned the international chess scene for women with 10 successive world championship titles spanning the entire three decades.

For the newcomers, chess for the weaker sex set off the jinx and jitters for them to break through so as to equal even part of the 1961-1991 Georgian glory.

First Nona Gaprindashvili and then Maia Chiburdanidze made their fame not only for reigning the world for three decades but also for being the world’s first and second women to gain the title of grandmaster for their expertise and excellence in the game.

Their fame soon spilled out of the chess board. Gaprindashvili has a perfume named after her, with a Tbilisi factory churning out Gaprindashvili perfume in bottles shaped like the chess piece of Queen. Chiburdanidze has several commemorative postage stamps minted for her including a 1986 one by Mongolia to depict one of her famous moves in the world championship games.

Be it the dissolution of the former Soviet Union or the political and economic ups and downs, Georgia has experienced 20 years of oblivion through a drought of medals of any hue in women chess actions.

Gia Giorgadze, president of the Georgian Chess Federation, said while explaining the backstep: “Speaking on this setback we have to take into account one important circumstance such as a painful process of changing of generations.”

The absence of Chiburdanidze from the Georgian squad led to a below-par performance at last year’s Chess Olympiad as against the Chiburdanidze-paced Georgian team for the previous Chess Olympiad.

Yet such young talents as Salome Melia and Bella Khotenashvili produced some brow-lifting performances at the last Chess Olympiad held in Russia.

Spearheaded by top-seeded Nana Dzagnidze, the Georgian trio are expected by compatriot chess lovers and admirers to revive to some extent and even to restore to the full the Georgian glory in women chess games by making the most of their home advantage.

But chess pundits in Georgia cannot be just too optimistic, in that Georgia enters this year’s European championship with none who has ever taken any medal from the annual event which was inaugurated in 2000 in the Georgian Black Sea resort of Batumi. The Georgians took two bronze medals from the 2000 and 2001 championships but these medallists do not play this year.

The upcoming young Georgian women chess players will face strong rivals as two-time continental champions Pia Cramling from Sweden (2003 and 2010), Tatiana Kosintseva of Russia (2007 and 2009) and Kateryna Lahno of Ukraine (2005 and 2008).

If they truly want to triumph on home turf, the Georgian women chess players, especially the leading trio, will have to beat their own nerves and nerds first before they can hope to beat their opponents en route to taking their first European medals after a hiatus of a full decade.

Source: http://news.xinhuanet.com

Chess daily news from Susan Polgar

I have the highest respect for Ken Rogoff. I think he would be an excellent choice as the Treasury Secretary. Of course I am a little biased

Game ‘hard-wired’ into economic guru

Ken Rogoff is a 58-year-old economist who chose that field over chess.

His doctorate from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1980 launched him on a distinguished career, including positions as chief economist at the International Monetary Fund and a professor at Harvard University.

The author of a column syndicated in 50 countries and 13 languages, he is frequently consulted by political leaders and interviewed by the media.

Although he no longer plays chess competitively, he hasn’t abandoned his early passion for the game. Formerly a precocious and high-ranked American player, he earned the grandmaster title in 1978.

“I think about chess all the time,” he recently told the magazine New in Chess.

“I’m not thinking about it with any depth, but I think part of my brain is hard-wired to play chess. I’ll think about it in boring meetings, … walking along. It’s something I do to relax.”

Rogoff has found his chess experience useful during his career, particularly for maintaining calm in challenging situations – and in negotiations, where chess taught him “to think about what the other person is thinking in a very disciplined way.”

Source: http://www.dispatch.com

Chess daily news from Susan Polgar

Top Junior

Chess daily news from Susan Polgar

2011 US Women’s Champion broke the top 10 and 2500 for the first time! Congratulations!

Top Girls

Chess daily news from Susan Polgar

The chess students at Intermediate School 318 are featured in an article from the Brooklyn Daily Eagle.