Carlsen's meteoric rise to the top

A period of phenomenal success

RAKESH RAO

The penultimate part of the Carlsen series plots his ascent to World No.1 as a teenager

It’s said that appetite improves during the meal, and Magnus Carlsen was proving the adage right. With every taste of success, he grew hungrier. The New Year’s Day of 2008 saw him ranked 13th in the World with a rating of 2733. But he would have a special reason to rejoice at the end of the month.

Carlsen was back at Wijk aan Zee, the Netherlands, for the Corus tournament. Eager to make amends for the fiasco on his debut — he went without a victory in 13 games — the previous January, Carlsen came well prepared after being made part of the strongest field assembled by the organisers.

What followed was Carlsen’s finest performance, reinforcing his place among the chess elite. He tied for the top place with Levon Aronian by scoring eight points. His list of five victims included Vladimir Kramnik and Judit Polgar. One of his two losses came against a third-placed Viswanathan Anand.

Carlsen performed at the level of 2,830 — almost 100 points above his rating. “Before the tournament, I thought if I could score 50 per cent, it would not be a bad result. I wasn’t expecting to win, of course, and sharing of first place was a pleasant surprise to me,” said a modest Carlsen.

By this time it was clear that Carlsen was perfecting his positional understanding, and the technique to play simple positions, especially in the endgame. Gone was the eagerness to get into sharp, exciting positions and brilliant finishes. Instead, it was more businesslike execution of what he discovered as “playable” positions.

From the success at Corus, Carlsen arrived to take on an even stronger field at the Morelia-Linares super tournament. In this hand-picked eight-player field, Carlsen finished second behind Anand. He posted five victories, including two against former World champion Veselin Topalov and once over Vassily Ivanchuk. Again, one of his three losses came against Anand. Creditably, Carlsen had performed 75 points above his rating — a performance that would launch him into the top-10 in the next publication of the rankings.

After Corus and Morelia-Linares, noted Russian chess journalist Yuri Vasiliev wrote: “Magnus, this little mongoose, rising sharply and swiftly over the board when he needs to grasp the nape of another cobra, is the new super-hero!”

It was apt enough a metaphor for the 17-year-old’s dynamic and uncompromising play. These successes earned Carlsen 32 rating points from 27 games. That meant that when the rankings were announced in April, he had jumped to fifth spot with a rating of 2765 — at the age of 17 years and four months.

Later that month, Carlsen started as the ‘rating favourite’ in the 14-player Grand Prix at Baku, where he eventually became part of a three-way tie for honours. For the rest of the year, Carlsen progressed at a slower pace and climbed only one more rung in the world rankings. However, the chess world knew it was only a matter of time before Carlsen scaled ‘Peak 2800’.

For the better part of 2009, the 18-year-old trained with Garry Kasparov. What followed was a path-breaking performance in the Nanjing Pearls Spring event in China. In a double round-robin format, Carlsen destroyed the six-player field by scoring 8/10. He defeated everyone in the draw at least once, and performed at a whopping 3002.

The performance saw Carlsen catapult to the second spot in World ranking with a rating of 2801 — at 18 years and 11 months, the youngest among the five players at that point of time to ever breach the 2800-mark.

His pursuit for the World No.1 spot continued when he finished tied-second behind Kramnik in the super strong Tal memorial tournament in Moscow. Carlsen left the city after winning the World blitz title finishing three points ahead of Anand.

Carlsen then dominated the year-ending London Classic. He defeated Kramnik in the opener and maintained his lead to claim the title.

By taking his rating to 2810, as on January 1, 2010, Carlsen seized the World No.1 spot from Topalov, becoming the youngest to reach the summit at 19 years and one month. 

Source: http://www.thehindu.com

Checkmate!

CHESS
By QUAH SENG SUN

This column draws to a close with a look at the oldest chess association in the country.

IT WAS about this time 40 years ago that I heard from school friends that a formal chess club was to be set up in Penang. There had never been one before despite a strong presence of student chess activities in the state.

Dr Yeoh Bok Choon, president of the Johor Chess Club.

Intrigued, I joined my chess mates at the Penang Public Library – which was located on the top floor of the imposing Penang Supreme Court heritage building in Farquhar Street, George Town – on March 12, 1972, just as the inaugural meeting was being called to order.

If I remember correctly, there were about 50 people, both young and old, congregating around several chess boards in a section of the library on that Sunday in 1972. The number surprised me as I didn’t know then that the game already had such a wide appeal among adults at a time when the Internet was still unheard of.

Like me, they had come specially for this chess meeting. Like me, they had heard about it from friends. There were no such conveniences then like e-mails or electronic bulletin boards or the world-wide Web. Just plain old-fashioned word-of-mouth or telephone calls or the rare one-column inch announcements in the newspapers.

As I was still below 18 at the time, I had to sign up as a junior member of the fledgling Penang Chess Association (PCA). Such was my enthusiasm that I could not care about requiring approval for joining a society outside school.

It’s hard for me to believe that 40 years have gone by. Possibly, of all the people who attended the inaugural meeting, I am the only one remaining who is still active enough in this game. The only one left, so to speak, to remind the PCA that they must celebrate their 40th anniversary this year with a big bang.

In my opinion, the Penang heritage city international chess championship at the end of this year should be the perfect forum for them to do so and I hope they will make full use of the opportunity to celebrate this once-in-a-lifetime occurrence.

In the same vein, I also wish to remind the Malaysian Chess Federation and the Chess Association of Selangor that they, too, must celebrate their own 40th anniversary in 2014. We all owe it to the chess enthusiasts in the country, estimated at 100,000 or more.

Chess is no longer the domain of the supposedly intellectuals; it has seeped down to a new generation of grassroots in the urban and non-urban areas of society.

Enlightened educationists now recognise chess as a useful training tool for the mind. That’s why more and more countries have included chess in their school curriculum.

The Chess In School programme, an ongoing movement championed by the World Chess Federation, is bearing fruit.

I have always maintained that in this modern era, the PCA was the oldest chess association in the country. After it was established in 1972, both the Malaysian Chess Federation and the Chess Association of Selangor were formed in 1974.

Some may argue that the Johor Chess Club already existed long before 1972. I would not dispute that but unfortunately, the Johor Chess Club is defunct and its functions have been taken over by the newer Johor Chess Association.

The Johor Chess Club would always be synonymous with its president, Dr Yeoh Bok Choon. For a long time, he cast a long shadow over chess development in Johor as well as Singapore.

Dr Yeoh was an athlete. He was the first schoolboy ever to win gold medals at a Malayan or Malaysian Amateur Athletic Association meet. That was in 1930. After completing his secondary education at the Penang Free School, he proceeded to the King Edward VII College of Medicine in Singapore.

He honed his chess skills in tournaments there and even became the Singapore Chess Club champion in 1947. Today, that’s the equivalent of becoming the Singapore national champion.

He worked in Singapore after graduation but by 1951, he had relocated to Johor Baru where he became the state surgeon. In October that year, he formed the Johor Chess Club and became its first president.

This much I know about the man. A few months ago, I wanted to know more about him because I was then involved in a book project for The Old Frees’ Association in Penang. However, all my efforts were stymied as nobody from the present generation of chess players in Johor seemed able to provide any information on him.

As far as they were aware, after Dr Yeoh passed away in 1983, his family moved to the Klang Valley, and they lost contact with his family.

By a curious coincidence, about two weeks ago, I received an e-mail from someone in Singapore who, as part of his research into the history of Singapore chess, had wanted to know whether I have any useful information to share with him.

Inevitably our e-mail exchanges gravitated to the topic of Dr Yeoh. This chap from Singapore told me that the name did crop up in conversations recently with their 100-year-old Mah Beng Guan, who was the secretary of the Singapore Chess Club in the 1950s. Mah remembered Dr Yeoh but could not offer more information than what I already know.

This is the end of my quest to dig into details about the former Johor state surgeon. But there is still a very slim chance that his family may be reading this column and if so, I would very much welcome their effort to contact me at ssquah@yahoo.com

The end of the Johor Chess Club typifies that nothing is permanent in this world. Chess clubs come and go; people come and go. And chess columns also come and go.

That’s right, folks. This weekly chess column ends with this final article from me. The last four years – no, I should say the last 32 years – have been a great time for me. Though not a staff, I have grown with the best newspaper in the country. In the process, I have made many firm friends there. What the future holds, I do not know. But I do know that some day, we may meet again.

Goodbye. -The Star

Armenia triumphs in chess world

Chess
BY QUAH SENG SUN

Crowded calendar keeps enthusiasts on their toes.

THERE are just too many world-class chess events which have taken place or are taking place all over the world at the same time. From Ningbo in China to Dortmund in Germany and Biel in Switzerland, my attention is being divided by this surfeit of chess activities.

Would I consider this a problem? Yes, but this is a happy problem. I don’t mind the distraction. It only proves that chess can have a crowded calendar.

So where shall I start? Perhaps, from where I left off last week, with the world team chess championship that ended in Ningbo on Tuesday with Armenia deposing Russia to become the new champion.

Poised to win: Vladimir Kramnik is creating waves at the Dortmund Sparkassen invitational chess tournament.

I thought at first that Russia was going to win this event but the Russians stumbled badly and lost to China and Azerbaijan, and in the final round, suffered the ignominy of losing to India.

Russia’s setback was the opportunity for Armenia to spring into the lead. The Armenian team had played so steadily that they hadn’t lost to any other team yet. At their worst, they drew with Russia, the United States and Azerbaijan.

On Tuesday, Armenia was due to play Ukraine in the final round. A drawn match was all that they needed to clinch the title but the Ukrainians themselves were in the chase. If they could score a crushing result like a 3½-½ win against Armenia, they may even come out tops. Maybe the Ukrainians saw the unlikelihood of this ever happening because soon after the start of the round, their match was quickly drawn.

I believe China was disappointed with this outcome because they were mathematically in contention for the title and they would only need to win by 2½-1½ against Hungary, which they did, to be the champion if Ukraine had won by any score line. The only consolation for the Chinese team was that they actually finished with the same game points as the Armenians, except that on the more important match points, they trailed the new champion.

India, Israel and Egypt found themselves out of their depth. Israel was possibly the biggest disappointment seeing how just a year ago, they had finished third in the Chess Olympiad.

India came into this event as the Asian champion but they soon realized that even finishing in the middle of the table would be a tall order. I thought they could play the role of a spoiler and take surprising points off the main title contenders but the only problem was, they could not until the very last round against Russia when the results did not count any more.

As for Egypt, there is little to be said about this African representative except that they failed totally.

And so we move on to Germany where the former world champion, Vladimir Kramnik, is creating waves at the Dortmund Sparkassen invitational chess tournament. Well, at least he has been in impressive form right until the mid-way point of this event last Monday. By the way, the tournament ends on Sunday so there is still time to see whether Kramnik will carry his advantage right through till the end.

The Dortmund Sparkassen is an elite chess tournament that goes a long way back. However, it was not until 1973 that it was converted into a regular annual event. This year’s edition is a six-player, double round-robin tournament that features Vladimir Kramnik, Hikaru Nakamura, Ruslan Ponomariov, Le Quang Liem, Anish Giri and local German player Georg Meier.

As mentioned, Kramnik has been showing great form. He couldn’t have been happier. In the first half of the tournament, his victims included Ponomariov, Giri, Meier and Nakamura, and he has dropped only a draw to Le. Even if he eases up on the pedal and draws the rest of his games in the second half, I believe he should coast through easily to win the top prize.

The last tournament on my list today is the annual Biel Chess Festival.

This chess festival has been around for decades. It started as a masters open tournament in 1968; the grandmaster tournament was introduced in 1976, and evolved into one of Europe’s showcase events. Like in Dortmund, this is a double round-robin tournament featuring six very strong players. Their names speak for themselves: Magnus Carlsen, Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, Alexei Shirov, Fabiano Caruana, Alexander Morozevich and Yannick Pelletier.

I would be very surprised if Carlsen does not win the event which will end today. On Tuesday as I was writing this story, Carlsen was leading the field with only Morozevich following hard on his tail. The rest had been left behind.

Caruana, who had won last year’s Biel grandmaster tournament, found himself trailing everyone this time around. A complete reversal of form.

source: the Star

Attention on junior players at chess championships

Chess
By Quah Seng Sun

Young players provide excitement at championships.

ONE of the most encouraging signs in local chess is the continuing willingness of the Malaysian Chess Federation (MCF) to allow their state chess affiliates to play active roles in organising some of the national-level chess competitions.

Take the annual national age group chess championships as an example.

Last year, the Penang Chess Association was given the go-ahead to plan for this competition in George Town on behalf of the federation. This year, the challenge was offered to the Perak International Chess Association (PICA).

PICA did so in Tronoh, Perak, in a joint effort which involved Universiti Teknologi Malaysia. By all accounts, this year’s edition of the national age group championships was a great success for the organisers. A total of 380 players took part in the three-day competition which, I was told, proceeded without any hitches.

As was to be expected, the most closely watched contest was the boys’ under-18 event. There were a few junior heavyweight players in the field, the most notable among them being the top-seeded Evan Timothy Capel who was a former national closed champion and last year’s winner of the boys’ under-16 event.

This year, though, the 17-year-old would be playing in the under-18 section, no longer eligible for the younger age group event. In fact, many of his rivals who played with him in Penang last year had also been elevated to the under-18 section.

Past successes, however, do not guarantee future gains, and Evan found this out pretty quickly. By the third round, he had already dropped a point to the second-seeded Sumant Subramaniam. By the tournament’s end, he had dropped two more points to Patrick Lim Kong Hui and the new winner of the boys’ under-18 event, Muhd Nabil Azman Hisham.

This was also a sobering experience for Sumant. After his heady win against Evan, he was brought down to earth by two consecutive losses to Muhd Nabil and Low Jun Jian. A further loss to Chong Shao Hong also ended his hopes in this tournament.

For Muhd Nabil, though, everything fell into place for him perfectly. He had lost to Evan in the boys’ under-16 event last year but this year, he exacted revenge on the top seed. By also defeating the second seed, there could only be one description for Muhd Nabil: worthy winner. His draws were with Jun Jian and Mark Siew Kit Tze, but he won all the other six games.

Now with the national age group championships over, the focus this week is on the national closed and national women’s closed championships that are taking place at the Wilayah Complex in Kuala Lumpur.

Today is already the third day of play and there are only five more rounds to go before the two competitions end on Sunday. So if you are not competing but have time on your hands, why not go and speculate who will emerge as the 2011 national champions?

The organisers tell me that as of the beginning of this week, there hasn’t been any change to the number of entries: still 89 players for the national closed and 34 players for the national women’s closed. At press time it is impossible to say whether there were any dropouts from the players’ lists or additions to it.

Anyway, I have to set the record straight in a slip of the finger that appeared in last week’s story. In my excitement to see our international master Jimmy Liew enter the fray as one of the competitors, I have inadvertently described him as a grandmaster.

I’ve received a lot of ribbing privately from friends and chess players in the past week. Really, I’m a bit embarrassed. I hope that my personal embarrassment has not spilled over to Liew. I really don’t want this episode to distract him in this national event where he is clearly the top seeded player.

So I shall wish “best of luck” to Liew, as well as wishing the same to last year’s winners Tan Khai Boon (national closed defending champion) and Fong Mi Yen (national women’s closed defending champion) and all the hopefuls this year.

Both events are being played at the Datuk Arthur Tan Chess Centre, Wilayah Complex, Kuala Lumpur until Sunday. The games start at 9am and 3pm daily. For more information, contact Najib Wahab (016– 338 2542 or najib.wahab@chass-malaysia.com.

source: The Star online

Looking to the future in chess

CHESS By QUAH SENG SUN

Chess enthusiasts can expect a busy year ahead.

IT IS three weeks into the new year already. Pardon me if I’m still delving into the past but I need to mention two things before I move on.

The first was the demise of a fellow Malaysian chess journalist, one whom I’ve known since the 1980s.

Local chess enthusiasts will know the name of Lim Chong who worked with the Economics Desk of our national news agency, Bernama. Lim passed away in November last year while en route from an assignment in London.

In the 1980s, The Star and The Malay Mail were the only newspapers in the country with a regular chess page, and Lim was in charge of the chess output over there. Though we had different styles, I rather enjoyed what he wrote.

After a long helm, he was transferred to a sister publication and was in charge of the computer section. Much later, he left for Bernama. Though he no longer wrote about chess, he was still very much in touch with the game and concerned about the accuracy of local chess news.

For instance, in April last year, I had a rather long conversation with him about a news item on one of the Malaysian chess players. It was quite clear that the reporter had misunderstood our player and written something that created a minor flap in our chess circles. I was right there when the player was interviewed, so I could explain to Lim what went wrong.

However, that was an exception rather than the norm because Lim was a person of very few words, even in conversations. What he wanted to say, he preferred to say via e-mail. At least, that was my impression.

In the last year of his life, we exchanged quite a number of e-mails. He was working to compile information on the history of the Selangor open chess tournaments and he wanted me to fill in some blanks. I don’t know the extent of his work but I hope that he had completed it and handed it to the Chess Association of Selangor.

The other thing I must mention is the withdrawal of Datuk Tan Chin Nam from chess sponsorship. Immediately after the conclusion of last year’s Malaysia Chess Festival, Tan announced that he would be taking a sabbatical from sponsoring chess activities in the country.

He said that in order for chess in Malaysia to progress beyond the present, the chess movement should no longer be dependent on him to provide monetary assistance.

Chess organisers, he said, should be prepared to look at other sources of sponsorship. He considered himself a hindrance to chess. Though he did not say it, that could possibly mean that he did not want chess organisers to take him too much for granted.

I believe the implication of his decision has finally sunk in. I heard that when the Malaysians went down to Singapore in December for the annual chess match between the two countries, Tan declined to help meet the travel expenses. The Malay-sian Chess Federation was forced to look elsewhere for funds.

I have also been told that the running of the Datuk Arthur Tan Chess Centre at Wilayah Complex in Kuala Lumpur may also have been impacted. For the past two years, Tan had been meeting the cost of running this place. But since the beginning of this month, it has been different. Several chess supporters have banded together to keep the centre up and running.

There is definitely change in the air. In the months ahead, surely there will be more changes. The greatest impact will be felt nearer August and September. How will the next Malaysia Chess Festival be affected?

Although I’m not privy to the Festival’s finances, I know that the cost of staging it can be quite monumental. Hundreds of thousands of ringgit, perhaps? If Tan is not prepared to bankroll it, we should not expect this year’s Malaysia Chess Festival to be organised the same way as before. Only time will show how this will turn out.

Okay, now that I’ve gotten these two things out of my system, I’d just like to mention that this year’s Malaysian chess calendar has been released. Frankly, I’m very much surprised as this is only January. That’s pretty efficient on the Malaysian Chess Federation’s part.

So what sort of events can we expect this year? Well, in two months’ time, there will be the national age group championship and the national closed championships. They follow one another: the age group event is from March 12 to 15, while the national closed and the national women’s championships are from March 16 to 20.

In May, there will be the Malaysian men’s and women’s masters tournaments. Also in May and extending into June, we shall see the national schools chess tournament, organised by the Majlis Sukan Sekolah-Sekolah Malaysia (MSSM).

Also on the calendar will be a Malaysia inter-state chess championship in June, the Merdeka team chess championship and the Malaysia open championship in August, the national rapid age group and the national rapid championships in September, various chess camps for students in November, and the national junior chess championship in December.

On top of all that, the Chess Association of Selangor is certain of holding its Selangor open tournament, the Penang Chess Association will want to hold its Penang open tournament, and the Kuala Lumpur Chess Association will be planning its next KL open, while the Sarawak Chess Association will be looking into organising its Sarawak open.

Then, we should also expect to see all manner of organisers around the country coming out to plan their one-day tournaments as well. All too many to mention here at this stage, but they shall be announced as we go along.

It looks like it’s going to be another busy chess year indeed.

source: The Star Online

Focused or aimless?

Chess
BY QUAH SENG SUN

Nurturing and training young talent is the way to go.

IF SOME of us are still feeling smug two weeks after the Malaysian side had beaten their Singapore counterparts in the annual chess match between the two countries, my advice is this: stop. It’s over; let’s not waste more time on it. We should move on, because chess-wise there is a lot to do.

My own general sense of euphoria ended right after I had written last week’s article. I don’t gloat over the results because in reality, this isn’t much of an achievement. I know the Malaysian team badly wanted to win but what do the results really mean? Don’t read too much into them.

We went into the match with a senior team that lacked our best players. We missed out on several key players until the Malaysian Chess Federation was forced to field our better junior players for the senior side. Not that I am complaining about this, though. I’ve always been an advocate of the move to bleed in new talent. Our national chess body as well as our state chess associations must always allow talented juniors to come forward and show their mettle.

Short-lived stint: Bangladeshi grandmaster Ziaur Rahman was under-utilised during his short stay here.

It’s the only way forward. If junior players are cloistered and shielded behind their age group events, we are simply limiting them. How on Earth can they develop and blossom if not given the chance? So what the Malaysian Chess Federation did was right. In the absence of the usual senior regulars, the boys were asked to play like men.

Budding players like Edward Lee, Evan Capel (yes, there are even former national champions who are no older than 20), Lim Zhuo Ren, Sumant Subramaniam and Yeap Eng Chiam ... they all stepped up admirably to fill the seniors’ shoes.

What was at the back of my mind was whether or not the Singapore side had fielded their best players against us.

While players like Daniel Chan, Jarred Neubronner and Tan Weiliang are among the top 15 active home-grown players in Singapore today, their senior line-up was nowhere near the best they could assemble either.

Despite this, there was about a 100 rating-point gap that separated the two senior sides. With the strength of their senior side far out-weighing ours, it wasn’t any surprise that we lost out on these boards. We were not good enough, period.

But at least, we redeemed ourselves with far better results in the age-group encounters. It’s almost impossible to determine for sure which side was the stronger on paper as many of the players were young and without official ratings. Nevertheless, based on the results, we were better in the age groups.

However, one thing became clear, looking deeper at the results. Regardless of whether we talk about Singapore or Malaysia, the future of the game will always have to come through from the younger ranks. We shall have to continue nurturing and training them from small. There is no other way for succession planning.

The important question that needs to be asked is how well are we moving forward today? What is the big picture? Are we focused or are we simply moving aimlessly? How are our young chess players here being trained? If you ask me, I’d say the road ahead is bumpy. The journey is not going smoothly. Not at all.

In November, we lost our one and only big-name foreign chess trainer. Bangladeshi grandmaster, Ziaur Rahman, has ended his stay here in Kuala Lumpur and returned to his home country. He was on contract for a year but he asked to be released early.

From what I heard, it was an amicable separation for both him and his private chess employers. And since his departure, all that we have left are the same old local chess coaches. We continue to be so dependent on them to impart chess knowledge to the young.

In the last decade or so, chess coaching clinics have sprung up in the bigger chess centres around the Klang Valley and elsewhere in the country but sad to say, coaching techniques and quality are far from consistent.

So how can we determine whether one coach is better than another? Just because a local coach may have been successful as a player does not necessarily mean that they are competent enough to teach.

On the other hand, a local coach who is just an average-level player can turn out to be a good teacher who inspires his students. I suppose, at the end of the day, the only measure of a coach in Malaysia is his track record, that is, how successful his students are when they play competitively.

From my point of view, it looks unlikely that anyone will be bringing in more foreign chess coaches anytime soon. Malaysia is spread too wide as a country, compared to a compact place like Singapore, and there is not enough spending power to support the presence of foreign coaches. It’s the vicious law of supply and demand.

To my mind, Ziaur Rahman was under-utilised during his short stay here. But for better coordination with all the state chess associations, more could have been achieved with him. But then also, chess exists in this country as a result of parents and volunteers pitching in their time and money for the game. The state chess associations are not exactly rich, so that leaves the parents to fork out the dough.

When I was in Singapore a fortnight ago, I noticed that there are quite a number of foreign trainers – players with acceptable credentials – around to provide chess tuition to the children there. Fees are not cheap, but the parents are prepared to pay good money to make their children play better than the next kid.

One parent there claimed to have spent S$20,000 over the years on foreign chess trainers for her children. Are our parents here capable of spending RM20,000 on their children’s chess and, if so, how many such parents are there?

(Unfortunately, spending so much also puts the children under immense parental pressure to perform well in competitions; not all children can deal with it. However, this is not a topic I want to raise here.)

Nevertheless, to answer my own question, I doubt there are many parents in Malaysia who are able to spend that amount of money on foreign chess tutors. And without these parents spending on foreign coaches, all we have left are the local ones. How far they can bring their students forward will depend on their local expertise. No more and no less.

At the end of the day, some will say that we get what we pay for. We reap what we sow. I suppose it’s true, after all.

source: The star Online

Anand draws with Adams, remains in joint lead

LONDON: World Champion Viswanathan Anand was held to a draw by Michael Adams of England in the sixth and penultimate round but the Indian ace continued to hold joint lead at the London Chess Classic.

Anand remained in the lead after Russian Vladimir Kramnik failed to bring home full points from a winning position against Magnus Carlsen of Norway in the 1,45,000 Euros prize money tournament being played on a round-robin basis.

On a day of drawn games for the first time in the tournament, the status quo remained and Anand continued to share the lead with Carlsen and Luke McShane of England on 10 points in the Soccer like scoring system in use that gives three points for a win and one for a draw.

Kramnik and Hikaru Nakamura share the fourth spot now on nine points each while Adams is sole sixth on seven points, well ahead of compatriots David Howell, who has three points, and Nigel Short, who has just two points with his two draws so far.

With just one round remaining, Anand faces arch-rival Kramnik, Carlsen is up against Short while McShane will take on Howell. The fact that Anand is playing white in the crucial last game gives the Indian ample chances to stay clear of the rest of the field in case he is able to register a victory.

Playing black against Adams, Anand did not face any difficulties. It was a Sicilian Najdorf by the Indian ace who showed right intentions for a full-bloodied battle but Adams shied away from complicated lines and stuck to his basics out of a positional system.

Anand equalised comfortably out of the opening and it looked as if he was pressing for an advantage in the endgame that ensued.

However, an alert Adams kept black's forces at bay and once he had established an outpost for his knight in the middle of the board the outcome of a the game was a foregone conclusion. The peace was signed on move 54.

Kramnik may not get a sound sleep in reflection of what he missed. The Russian could have been the sole leader and that many believed was just a notion once he got the winning position out a Nimzowitch defense that Carlsen employed with his black pieces.

With an army-like pawn structure in the centre, Kramnik almost forcibly won a piece and had a huge material advantage when he missed out on a brilliant exploit that was seen only by Carlsen.

Up a Bishop against just one pawn, Kramnik had to split the point in 86 moves.

In other games of the day, Luke McShane went for the English opening and sorted out his middle game problems through perpetual checks to earn a draw against Nakamura while Nigel Short's hunt for an elusive victory continued after he could not demonstrate an advantage with his King's gambit against Howell.

In the open section being held simultaneously, International Master Sahaj Grover misplayed a winning position and lost against Grandmaster Neil McDonald of England.

Sahaj, needed 1.5 points from the last two games for his second GM norm and this is already the second time in under three weeks that the talented youngster missed on the opportunity to make the norm after a fine start.

Earlier in the Cultural village tournament in Wijk Aan Zee, Sahaj needed a draw in the final round to make the grade.

Former world junior champion Abhijeet Gupta gave a fine demonstration of his endgame skills to beat Gary Quillan of England to share the fourth spot on six points while Sahaj remained on 5.5 following the loss.

The event is being jointly led by English duo of Simon Williams and Gwain Jones both of who have seven points in their kitty.

Results Classic round 6: Michael Adams (Eng, 7) drew with V Anand (Ind, 10); Vladimir Kramnik (Rus, 9) drew with Magnus Carlsen (Nor, 10); Luke McShane (Eng, 10) drew with Hikaru Nakamura (Usa, 9); Nigel Short (Eng, 2) drew with David Howell (Eng, 3).

source: The Times of India

Low-key affair at chess tournament

Chess

By Quah Seng Sun

All is quiet on the Asian front.

THE first time is always very eventful – the first time you take part in a local tournament, the first time you return home with a prize, the first time you represent the country in a sports event. For organisations, it may be the first time your game is featured in a multi-sport event like the SEA Games, or the Asian Games.

I remember when chess was first included in the SEA Games in Vietnam in 2003, the Malaysian Chess Federation (MCF) made a lot of fuss over the fact.

Rightly so, because it also marked the first time the MCF ever went anywhere under the banner of the Olympic Council of Malaysia (OCM).

Chess was also in the 2005 SEA Games in the Philippines and the Malaysian chess players were also right there mixing with the athletes of the other sports. But thereafter, for the 2007 Games in Thailand and the 2009 Games in Laos, chess was dropped.

Nevertheless, there is also the Asian Games which is a much bigger and more significant multi-sport event than the SEA Games. When chess was introduced to the 2006 Asian Games in Doha, Qatar, there was much hope that the MCF would participate, but it did not.

But being absent once does not mean being absent a second time. This year at the 16th Asian Games in Guangzhou, China, the Malaysian chess players are finally there.

It was a rather small contingent of three chess players that were picked for duty in Guangzhou: Mok Tze Meng, Alia Anin Bakri and Nur Nabila Azman. They would play in only the men’s and women’s individual rapid chess tournaments and come home immediately. There would be no Malaysian team in the men’s and women’s classical chess tournaments.

When I asked the MCF secretary about this, he said that everything boiled down to mainly two issues: funding and player availability.

As far as the OCM was concerned, chess was in their B category of games, which means that if the MCF wanted to play in the Asian Games in Guangzhou, the federation or the players would have to raise their own funds.

As for player availability, many of them were indisposed due to work. Some had already taken time off for other tournaments so it was near impossible for them to play again this year. So a decision was taken not to play in the team events.

All that was left was for Mok, Alia and Nur Nabila to play in the individual rapid chess events. Perhaps because of this, the MCF decided against informing the Malaysian chess public about our participation in this Asian Games. Personally, I feel that instead of keeping it very low key, the MCF should still have announced it just for the record.

Mok played in the men’s rapid chess individual tournament and finished 38th, while both Alia and Nur Nabila participated in the women’s rapid chess individual tournament and finished in the 22nd and 28th spots, respectively. Both events consisted of nine rounds of rapid chess games and these were completed in four days.

As a measure of the strength of the men’s rapid chess tournament, 12 of the participating countries sent their top grandmasters. Indeed, Mok found out the hard way that negotiating his way through this minefield of grandmasters was no easy task. His quest for a first grandmaster title norm will have to wait.

The rapid chess gold medal went to Uzebekistan’s Ruslan Kasimdzhanov who scored 7½ points. Kasimdzhanov was the FIDE world chess champion in 2004 and he had been working with Viswanathan Anand in preparation for the latter’s world chess championship matches in 2008 and 2010.

Vietnam’s Le Quang Liem also scored 7½ points but he had to settle for the silver. The bronze medal went to China’s Bu Xiangzhi.

The women’s rapid chess tournament also featured several top-class players that included three with full-fledged grandmaster titles.

The Chinese grandmasters made a clean sweep of the top medals with Hou Yifan, as the outright winner of the event, taking the gold and Zhao Xue the silver. India’s Dronavalli Harika took the bronze.

Meanwhile, there are 17 teams taking part in the men’s team tournament and 12 teams in the women’s team tournament. In both events, China are the top seeds for the gold medal. The ninth and final round of both events is scheduled for today.

source: The Star Online

Our Chess Olympiad players did us proud

CHESS
By QUAH SENG SUN

Kudos to our players for turning in their best.

IN the last week or so since the end of the Chess Olympiad, I have witnessed heated debates in the local chess scene about the selection process and the performance of our men’s team in Khanty Mansiysk.

The post-mortem was lively but personally, I believe that while everyone has a right to say whatever he wants about chess in this country, the debates do not matter anymore. It’s moot; the Chess Olympiad’s over.

It’s important to me, however, that we look on the positive side. At the Olympiad, what struck me was that our players tried their best. Each and every one of them, in their own way, gave their best to the Malaysian team. Collectively, it was a team effort from start to finish.

Girl power: The Malaysian women’s team comprising (from left) Nurul Huda Wahiduddin, Nur Nabila Azman Hashim, Alia Anin Bakri, Fong Mi Yen and Roslina Marmono.

So allow me to acknowledge the contributions of our players, both the men’s and women’s teams.

For Mas Hafizulhelmi, playing on the first board on the men’s team was never going to be easy. The final round was very unfortunate for him (refer to last week’s column to know what happened) but to his credit, he scored 5½ points from 10 games. That’s a 55% score.

Neither was it supposed to be easy for Alia Anin Bakri who played on the first board of the women’s team. However, she turned in the most memorable result for the Malaysian contingent. Seven points from 11 games for a 63.6% score. It’s uncertain whether her results would merit her the title of woman international master (WIM) but at the very least, it should be good enough for a WIM norm.

I’m crossing my fingers that FIDE, the World Chess Federation, will award her the title.

In the men’s team, Mok Tze Meng’s uncompromising style on the second board netted him six points from 11 games (a 54.4% result). Peter Long was a very steady player on the fourth board and he turned in 5½ points from 11 games (a 50% score). Both Mok and Long were the only players in the men’s team to play every round of the Olympiad.

Current national champion Tan Khai Boon was probably overwhelmed by his first international duty but he still contributed three points from nine games (a 33.3% result). I believe the tension got to him towards the end of the event and he was replaced by Gregory Lau. Despite playing only three games (winning two of them with a 66.7% result), Lau will be best remembered for delivering that vital final point for the Malaysian men’s team.

On the second board in the women’s team was Nur Nabila Azman Hisham. Like Alia, Nabila played in all 11 rounds and she scored five points for a 45.4% result. Although Nurul Huda Wahiduddin brought in only one point from six games on the third board, she achieved an important draw against a Dutch woman international master in the ninth round.

Roslina Marmono had a 50% result as our fourth board player, collecting 3½ points from seven games while our debutant reserve board player, Fong Mi Yen, who is also the current national women’s champion, had the tournament of her life with 5½ points from nine games (a 61.1% result).

I’m still waiting for word from the Malaysian Chess Federation whether this would warrant Fong a woman candidate master title from FIDE.

Finally, the games this week feature some of the best moves from our women players:

White: Alia Anin Bakri (Malaysia)

Black: IM Baquero Martha Fierro (Ecuador)

1. d4 g6 2. Nf3 Bg7 3. e4 d6 4. c4 Nf6 5. Nc3 O-O 6. Be2 Nbd7 7. O-O e5 8. Be3 Ng4 9. Bg5 f6 10. Bd2 c6 11. Ne1 Nh6 12. d5 f5 13. dxc6 bxc6 14. Bxh6 Bxh6 15. Qxd6 Rf6 16. Qd1 Qe7 17. Qc2 Nc5 18. Rd1 a5 19. Bf3 Ne6 20. Ne2 Ng5 21. Ng3 f4 22. Ne2 Nxf3+ 23. Nxf3 g5 24. Qd3 Bg4 25. h3 Bh5 26. Qd7 Re8 27. Qxe7 Rxe7 28. Rd8+ Bf8 29. Ra8 g4 30. hxg4 Bxg4 31. Rd1 Rg7 32. Kf1 Rh6 33. Neg1 Bxf3 34. Nxf3 Rh1+ 35. Ke2 Rxd1 36. Kxd1 Rxg2 37. Ke2 Kg7 38. Rxa5 Kf6 39. Rxe5 Bd6 40. Rf5+ Ke7 41. Rh5 Rg7 42. Nd4 Kd7 43. Kf3 Re7 44. Ne2 Ke8 45. Nxf4 Rf7 46. Rf5 Ra7 47. a3 Ra4 48. c5 Bxf4 49. Kxf4 Rc4 50. f3 Rc2 51. b4 Rc3 52. Rh5 1-0

White: Damaris Abarca Gonzalez (Chile)

Black: Alia Anin Bakri (Malaysia)

1. e4 e6 2. d3 d5 3. Nd2 Nf6 4. g3 Bc5 5. Bg2 dxe4 6. dxe4 e5 7. Ngf3 Nc6 8. O-O O-O 9. Qe2 Qe7 10. c3 a6 11. b4 Bd6 12. a4 Be6 13. Nc4 Rfd8 14. Bg5 h6 15. Bxf6 Qxf6 16. Ne3 Ne7 17. Rab1 c6 18. c4 b6 19. Qc2 Bc7 20. Rfd1 Ng6 21. b5 cxb5 22. axb5 axb5 23. Nd5 Bxd5 24. cxd5 Bd6 25. Rxb5 Bc5 26. Qe2 Ra7 27. h4 Rda8 28. Rdb1 Qd6 29. h5 Ne7 30. R5b2 Qf6 31. Qd3 Ra3 32. Rb3 Ra2 33. R1b2 Ra1+ 34. Bf1 R8a3 35. Rxa3 Rxa3 36. Rb3 Ra2 37. Be2 Nc8 38. Rc3 Nd6 39. Rc2 Ra4 40. Qb3 Ra1+ 41. Kg2 Nxe4 42. Qb2 Ra8 43. Qxe5 Qxe5 44. Nxe5 Rd8 45. f4 Nf6 46. Bc4 Bd6 47. Rb2 Bxe5 48. fxe5 Nxd5 49. Kf3 Nc7 50. Rxb6 Re8 51. Rc6 Re7 52. Kf4 Kf8 53. Rd6 Ne8 54. Rd8 Rb7 55. Bd5 Rc7 56. Bb3 Rb7 57. Bd5 Rc7 58. Kf5 Ke7 59. Rb8 Rc1 60. Bb3 Rc3 61. g4 Nc7 62. Rb7 Rf3+ 63. Ke4 Rc3 64. Kd4 Rc1 65. Bc4 Rd1+ 66. Bd3 Kd8 67. Ke4 Ne6 68. Rb5? Re1+ 69. Kf5 Nd4+ 70. Kf4 Nxb5 71. Bxb5 Ke7 72. Bc4 Rc1 73. Bd5 Rf1+ 74. Ke4 Re1+ 75. Kf4 f6 76. e6 Re5 77. Bc4 Kd6 78. Ba2 Rb5 79. Kf3 f5 80. Kf4 fxg4 81. Kxg4 Rg5+ 82. Kh4 Ke7 83. Bc4 Kf6 84. Ba2 Rb5 85. Kg4 Rb2 86. Bd5 Rb4+ 87. Kg3 Rb5 88. Bf3 Kxe6 89. Bg4+ Kf6 90. Be2 Rb4 0-1

White: Roslina Marmono (Malaysia)

Black: Sohair Basta (Eqypt)

1. d4 Nf6 2. c4 e6 3. Nc3 Bb4 4. Qc2 c5 5. e3 cxd4 6. exd4 Nc6 7. Nf3 O-O 8. Bd3 h6 9. O-O d5 10. c5 Bxc3 11. bxc3 Qc7 12. Re1 a6 13. h3 Bd7 14. Ne5 Ne7 15. Bf4 Qa5 16. Nxd7 Nxd7 17. Rab1 Ra7 18. Bd6 Re8 19. f4 Qd8 20. f5 exf5 21. Bxf5 Nxf5 22. Qxf5 Nf6 23. Rxe8+ Qxe8 24. Qe5 Qxe5 25. dxe5 Ne4 26. Rb3 Nxd6 27. exd6 Kf8 28. c4 dxc4 29. Re3 Ra8 30. Rc3 Ke8 31. Rxc4 Kd7 32. Kf2 Re8 33. Rc2 Re5 34. Kf3 g5 35. g4 Kc6 36. Kf2 Re4 37. Rd2 Kd7 38. Re2 Rc4 39. Re7+ Kd8 40. Rxb7 Rxc5 ½-½

White: Fayrouz Elgohary (Eqypt)

Black: Fong Mi Yen (Malaysia)

1. d4 g6 2. Nf3 Bg7 3. e4 d6 4. Nbd2 Nc6 5. c3 Nf6 6. Bd3 e5 7. O-O O-O 8. h3 Nh5 9. Nb3 h6 10. Be3 Qf6 11. Nc1 Kh7 12. Ne2 Bxh3 13. Ng3 Bg4 14. Nxh5 gxh5 15. Be2 Rg8 16. dxe5 dxe5 17. Nh2 Rad8 18. Qc2 Qg6 19. Nxg4 hxg4 20. Rad1 Bf6 21. Rxd8 Bxd8 22. g3 h5 23. Kg2 Rh8 24. Rh1 Kg7 25. Bd2 Ne7 26. Bd3 Qf6 27. Qd1 Ng6 28. Be3 a6 29. Bc2 Be7 30. Qe2 b5 31. a3 c5 32. Bd1 Nf4+ 33. gxf4 exf4 34. Bxf4 Qxf4 35. Qd3 Rd8 36. Qg3 Qxe4+ 0-1.

source: The Star Online