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Fischer’s Roots in City Tangle With His Legacy
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 Before the anti-American and anti-Semitic ravings and his complicated relationship to the cloistered world of chess, Bobby Fischer was just another young New Yorker on the make.
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Computer Is Just Warming Up When Humans Call It a Draw
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A basic rule calls a game a draw when 50 moves are played with neither a capture nor a pawn move. But that was before computers.
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Fischer vs. the World: A Chess Giant’s Endgame
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 As Bobby Fischer’s death reminds us, abstract gifts can exact a terrible price.
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Players Recall Fischer as Inspiring and Difficult
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Chess players and chess journalists from around the world reacted to the death of Bobby Fischer with a mixture of sadness, praise and lingering anger about his behavior in his later years.
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Bobby Fischer, Troubled Genius of Chess, Dies at 64
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Mr. Fischer, one of the greatest chess players the world has ever seen, later lived under self-imposed exile.
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Member of U.S. Chess Federation’s Board Is Asked to Resign in Dispute Over an Election
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Paul Truong faces allegations that he posted messages under other people’s names to Internet bulletin boards to get elected to the board.
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Top line-up for Nice
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The 17th Amber Rapid and Blindfold Chess Tournament starts today and runs until March 28th at the Hotel Palais de la Mediterraneeon the Promenade des Anglais in Nice. As ever the sponsor Mr Joop Van Oosterom, himself a strong player and Correspondence Chess champion has spared no expense.
The twelve invited grandmasters will compete for a prize-fund of 216,000 Euros. The Association Max Euwe who put together Mr van Oosterom’s events have assembled one of the highest rated fields of all time with eleven of the world’s top fourteen players. Only Peter Svidler and Alexander Morozevich are missing. Aside from Wijk aan Zee this may be the only event where we can see Vishy Anand, Vladimir Kramnik and Veselin Topalov all play each other.
The line up includes Sergey Karjakin who qualified as the best performer in the NH Experience v Youth tournament at Amsterdam last year. Debutantes usually struggle, particularly in the Blindfold Chess where the moves are displayed on a computer screen and replies are entered via a keyboard which takes a lot of getting used to.
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Adams enters Grand Prix
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The England number one Michael Adams will participate in the FIDE Grand Prix circuit after a quartet of the world’s leading players declined their invitations. Adams had been first reserve. The Grand Prix will be a fine addition to the tournament calendar but has lost some of it’s lustre as the world’s four highest rated players; Vishy Anand, Vladimir Kramnik, Veselin Topalov and Alexander Morozevich decided not to play.
Anand, Kramnik and Topalov are all committed to playing world title matches of one sort or another and their schedule is just too crowded. Morozevich issued a statement in which he pointed out the inconsistencies in Fide’s plans to make the Grand Prix a qualifier towards the world title.
Bessel Kok’s new commercial organisation Global Chess BV must still be congratulated on securing the sponsorship for what should be an excellent series of tournaments running to the end of next year.
The first event will be held at Kasparov’s birthplace of Baku from April 20th - May 6th and Adams will play.
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Topsy-turvy rollercoaster
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The world champion Vishy Anand described the Linares Morelia tournament as ‘a classic’ at the post tournament press conference. Anand described the quality of chess as ‘spectacular’ and highlighted the ‘topsy turvy, rollercoaster’ nature of the event.
‘As a chess fan I enjoyed it’ he said, ‘there many interesting concepts.’ Anand noted that his victory was similar to last year as he won four games and lost one to Levon Aronian and as in 2007, he came off the plane from Mexico on +2, 4.5/7 .
Your correspondent notes that there wasn’t a single Petroff Defence ( 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nf6) played in the entire event which doubtless contributed, to a degree to the high level of fighting chess.
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Cambridge edge ahead
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The 2008 Varsity Chess Match, the longest running chess fixture in the world was held at it’s now traditional home of the RAC Club in Pall Mall. The 126th edition was again supported by Henry Mutkin of the RAC Chess Circle. IM Bob Wade and David Sedgewick were the arbiters.
The guest of honour Daniel Johnson opened the proceedings by playing the first move for Tom Eckersley-Waites the Oxford board 1.
The teams were fairly evenly matched on paper and the match was closely fought with the score 2-2 at the first time control. In the fifth hour Cambridge edged ahead but honours ended even after Steffen Schaper mated Mykhaulo Tyomkyn.
Cambridge maintained their lead in the series by 56 wins to Oxford's 51, with 19 matches drawn.
Oxford 4-4 Cambridge: Tom Eckersley-Waites 0-1 Li Wu; Alvar Kangur draw Peter Roberson; Benedikt Wagner 0-1 Adam Eckersley-Waites; Robert Heaton 1-0 J Stuart Robertson; Steffen Schaper 1-0 Mykhaulo Tyomkyn; Carl Bicknell draw Martin Rohrmeier; Graham Morris 1-0 Tariq Hassen Oozeerally; Agnese Salputra 0-1 Julie Kourtseva.
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Duo come to a sticky end
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Careful play from the world champion Vishy Anand secured the draw he needed against Veselin Topalov to guarantee first place at Linares. Seventeen year old Magnus Carlsen tried for 69 moves to break down the defences of Teimour Radjabov but eventually acquiesced to the draw and ended in clear second place, half a point behind.
Carlsen’s performance was nevertheless outstanding as it follows his shared first place at Corus when he finished ahead of Anand, Topalov and Vladimir Kramnik and he may rise to as high as number four in the world rankings.
Morelia Linares was one of the most entertaining events in recent memory even if the last round was relatively subdued.
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Leonard Barden. March 8, 2008
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Magnus Carlsen, 17, edged closer to the No1 ranking at Morelia-Linares, which ended last night. The Norwegian began slowly but was soon chasing the world champion, Vishy Anand, who led throughout. With one round left, Anand had 8/13, Carlsen 7.5.
Fide's ratings due on April 1 could put Carlsen as high as No 4 in the world. Bobby Fischer was in a similar spot when he was 17 in 1960 but Carlsen's situation is better, since he is 15-20 years younger than the top pair Vladimir Kramnik and Anand.
Carlsen could head the rankings in a year or so but he may have to wait longer for the world title. He has to qualify via the World Cup, a chancy knock-out, or via Fide's new Grand Prix series, which looks vulnerable to the global recession.
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Blessed by a blunder
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An astonishing blunder by Veselin Topalov enabled the 17 year old prodigy Magnus Carlsen to stay in the hunt at Linares. Topalov stood better for some of the game but just when a draw by perpetual check seemed inevitable he allowed an elementary mating combination. Carlsen scored his fifth win to close the gap on the world champion Vishy Anand to half a point with two to play.
Anand drew for the fourth straight game as Peter Leko comfortably defended the Ruy Lopez. He may feel he needs one more win to secure tournament victory.
In rounds thirteen and fourteen Anand plays black against Ivanchuk and white against Topalov while Carlsen is black against Aronian and then white against Radjabov.
M Carlsen – V Topalov
XXV Morelia/Linares (12)
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Second time unlucky
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Peter Leko may be bottom of the tournament table but the former world title finalist can still beat anyone on his day and he handed out a tough chess lesson to the prodigy Magnus Carlsen in the eleventh round at Linares. The world champion Vishy Anand was the main beneficiary and leads by a full point with three to play after a short draw with black against Teimour Radjabov.
The first lesson was: be extremely careful if you are going to play the same opening line twice at an event like this. Carlsen used the same variation he employed to draw quickly with Anand in round nine. Speaking after that game Anand said ‘White has to play the sharp stuff with h4 but I couldn’t remember it’.
Leko obviously prepared it in depth in the intervening three days and headed for an endgame position with rook and opposite coloured bishops which objectively speaking may have been drawn but in practice was very difficult to defend.
We pick up the game after move 33. Leko stands better as his bishop is far superior to Carlsen’s and he has a strong passed pawn and more mobile king. Carlsen gives up a pawn to activate his bishop.
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Respect for the youngster
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Vishy Anand showed the utmost respect to seventeen year old Magnus Carlsen in the tenth round at Linares and agreed an early draw to maintain his half point lead. Carlsen cut the world champion’s lead to half a point with a ninth round win over Alexey Shirov.
The pace finally slackened as for the first time there were four draws but the proportion of decisive games is still 50%. Vasily Ivanchuk has regained his poise and after outplaying Peter Leko with black he was unfortunate not to defeat Veselin Topalov.
Round nine:
Aronian draw Anand, Queen’s Indian;
Topalov draw Radjabov, Ruy Lopez Schlieman 3…f5;
Leko 0-1 Ivanchuk, Caro Kann 4…Bf5 Main Line;
Carlsen 1-0 Shirov, Ruy Lopez;
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Leonard Barden. March 1, 2008
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1990 is shaping up to be the best year in chess history for the birth of strong grandmasters. Magnus Carlsen and Sergey Karjakin, both 17, are close to the top 10, while at least eight of their contemporaries are also precocious GMs.
This elite group, many of whom honed their talents against each other in junior events starting with world U-10 championships, hail mostly from eastern Europe but also include Maxim Vachier-Lagrave of France and the UK's youngest-ever GM, David Howell.
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Atlantic? What Atlantic?
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The Linares tournament got underway with the players showing no signs of tiredness after the journey from Morelia in Mexico. The almost unprecedented proportion of decisive games continued. There was only one draw when Teimour Radjabov offered his hand to Peter Leko who had been defending desperately after a strong piece sacrifice from his opponent and was doubtless relieved to secure the half point.
The world champion Vishy Anand outplayed Alexey Shirov as the Sicilian Sveshnikov was made to look tame for the second time in the tournament. Shirov fought back with a pawn sacrifice but then blundered when there were some drawing chances. Anand completed a double victory over Shirov and increased his lead to a full point.
The prodigy Magnus Carlsen remains in touch with Anand after he bamboozled Vassily Ivanchuk with a dubious line in the Ruy Lopez that was 125 years old. Yet again the Ukrainian ruined an advantageous position.
The other victor in the eighth round was Levon Aronian who was the beneficiary of a 39th move blunder from Veselin Topalov that threw away an advantage and set Aronian on the path to victory.
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Prosper under pressure
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The 2nd Brentwood International took place at Brentwood School last weekend and the Masters Open section again boasted a strong field. GM Jonathan Rowson, three times the British Champion was the pre-tournament favourite and he faced a strong challenge from fellow grandmasters Matthew Turner and Neil McDonald.
Rowson was immediately in trouble and was fortunate that Martin Walker agreed to a draw in their first round game in a superior position but several other title players also failed to win in the second round. Going into the fifth and final game Rowson shared first with GM Neil MacDonald, IM Jovanka Houska, and IM Odion Aikhoje of Nigeria.
Aikhoje prospered in MacDonald’s time pressure and Rowson managed to turn round a dubious position against Houska having been somewhat outplayed in the middlegame as his opponent also fell short of time. Thus Aikhoje and Rowson shared first on 4.5/5.
Other section winners were Ali Kikoyo in the Major and Radha Jain and Adrian Riley in the Minor.
J Rowson – M Walker
2nd Brentwood Int.
Gruenfeld Defence Exchange Variation
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Creativity wins the day
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Ian Nepomniachtchi, one of the most creative young players in the world today scored the finest result of his career with victory at the Aeroflot Open recently completed in Moscow. The Russian GM took home $30,000 and, more importantly, a guarantee of a place in the elite Dortmund Chess Festival which is traditionally one of the strongest events of the year.
The 64 player A1 group was so tough that only eight of the sixty four players scored +3, 6/9 or better. The winner scored 7/9 with Russian internationals Alexey Dreev and Alexander Motylev on 6.5.
One can gauge the strength of the event by the the players near the bottom of the tournament table who included former world title Candidate Artur Yusupov and German number one Arkady Naiditsch from Dortmund who will get a chance to cross swords with the tournament winner later in the year. Alexander Cherniaev of Guildford ADC, Britain’s top team, scored 1/8 plus a point for the bye.
There were many fine games, here is a small selection.
L Le Quang – R Mamedov
Aeroflot Open Moscow (3)
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Anand leads the way
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Vishy Anand will be ahead of the field when the Morelia-Linares tournament resumes in Spain on Thursday afternoon. The world champion drew with Vassily Ivanchuk in the seventh and final round played in Mexico and has 4.5/7 with Alexei Shirov and Veselin Topalov half a point behind.
Linares, a sleepy Andalucian town is the traditional home of the event and the players will return to the familiar surroundings of the Hotel Anibal for the second set of seven games but with colours reversed.
The tournament remained exceptionally competitive with three more decisive games in round seven. Teimour Radjabov’s King’s Indian Defence was breached by Alexei Shirov who became the first player of the white pieces to secure the full point against Radjabov in this opening for some time.
Peter Leko’s poor form persisted and he spoilt a good position with white for the second time and lost badly to Veselin Topalov after blundering in a drawish position. Magnus Carlsen easily refuted Levon Aronian’s unsound, sacrificial idea in the Ruy Lopez.
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Leonard Barden. February 23, 2008
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Morelia-Linares, which concludes its Mexican half today before a venue switch to Spain, is called the chess Wimbledon, though that is an inapt name for an event with only eight elite grandmasters. In this year's renewal India's world champion Vishy Anand leads with 3.5/5 and Norway's Magnus Carlsen, 17, has 2.5/5 despite a defeat to Anand.
Carlsen is the darling of tournament promoters, with a schedule of opportunities which even Bobby Fischer never matched in his youth. But spare a thought for Ukraine's Sergey Karjakin, just turned 18 and like Carlsen a World Cup semi-finalist, whose rating is not far behind his rival's despite many fewer opportunities.
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Shock win for Carlsen
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The world champion Vishy Anand scored a third win with the black pieces in the fifth round at Morelia to take the clear lead going into the second rest day. Anand reached 3.5/5 after outplaying Peter Leko from an endgame position that looked slightly better for the Hungarian.
This looks like excellent prepared analysis from Leko and he avoided several drawing lines before spoiling his position in time trouble
P Leko – V Anand
XXV GM Morelia/Linares
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Moscow toughs it out
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The Aeroflot Open is underway in Moscow with the participation of scores of grandmasters who are chasing $200,000 in prize money including $100,000 reserved for the A1 group. The 64 player event is reserved for players rated 2550 or higher, with a few exceptions.
This is probably the toughest event of its type in the world. The winner collects $30,000 plus a more valuable award, a place in the elite Dortmund Chess Festival.
The top seed at Moscow is Vladimir Akopian rated 2700 and ranked world number 23 but the competition is so tough he has yet to win a game and is on 50%. After five rounds Ian Nepomoniachtchi of Russia and Maxim Rodshtein of Israel, two of the younger generation were in the lead with 4.5 points.
A former Fide world champion has his King’s Indian Defence brushed aside by a relative unknown.
E Romanov – A Khalifman
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Mexico suits Topalov
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Veselin Topalov is enjoying Mexico and reached 2.5/3 with an easy win over Vasily Ivanchuk in the third round at Morelia. Topalov played some of his moves in the early middlegame extremely quickly which suggests that he might have still been in the realms of his home analysis and his remarkable 24th move decided the game, see below.
The world champion Vishy Anand has yet to draw a game and he comfortably overcame the 17 year old Magnus Carlsen after steering the game into a relatively obscure line of the popular Anti Moscow Gambit. Carlsen seemed unprepared and was forced into a lost endgame of rook and h4 pawn v light squared bishop and h3 pawn. Anand demonstrated the winning plan of forcing the defending king back to the c file after which the rook can capture on h3 with the aid of the king who shepherds the passed pawn home.
Round three:
Topalov 1-0 Ivanchuk, Sicilian Najdorf 6.Be3 e5;
Carlsen 0-1 Anand, Semi Slav, Anti Moscow Gambit, 9.Ne5 h5!?;
Aronian draw Radjabov, English Opening;
Leko draw Shirov, Sicilian Najdorf 6.Be3 e5;
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Drawn out of his shell
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The Linares-Morelia tournament is underway in Mexico and will move to Spain at the half way stage when the players will get a one week break to recover from jet lag. Seven of the world’s top ten compete plus 17 year old Magnus Carlsen who shared first with Levon Aronian at Wijk aan Zee.
The full line up is: Vishy Anand, India, 2801; Vassily Ivanchuk, Ukraine, 2787; Veselin Topalov, Bulgaria, 2769; Peter Leko, Hungary, 2755; Teimour Radjabov, Azerbaijan, 2742; Levon Aronian, Armenia, 2741; Alexei Shirov, Spain, 2739; Magnus Carlsen, Norway, 2714.
The 68th Armenian Championship took place in mid January but without some of the country’s leading players who were at Wijk aan Zee and Gibraltar. The winner was Karen Asrian who has been a highly rated GM for ten years now and a regular member of Armenia’s medal winning teams. Asrian won on tie-break from Artashes Minasian, a very strong tactician. The following game caught my eye because the loser, Ashot Anastasian is an excellent positional player who thrives on the exploitation of small advantages but Smbat Lputian, manages to draw him out of his shell.
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Leonard Barden. February 16, 2008
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Gibtelecom, now in its sixth year, is en route to becoming the strongest and best open event in the western world. Hikaru Nakamura, the youngest US champion since Bobby Fischer, defeated Bu Xiangzhi in last month's final to spoil what was otherwise an impressive result for China's grandmasters.
Two results were significant for UK chess. Keti Arakhamia-Grant, Britain's leading female player, tied for the women's award. Then Robert Bellin, who won his British title back in 1979, achieved his first GM result at age 55
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Upset averted
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Luke McShane is no longer playing chess professionally as he works full time in the City of London but the former prodigy still makes the occasional foray into the German Bundesliga and recently drew with the world champion Vishy Anand.
At the last Bundesliga weekend McShane played a wonderful game to defeat former Fide World Champion Rustam Kasimdzhanov with black. McShane was always a master of the King’s Indian Defence and this was a brilliant example of sustained attack. I will analyse it in a future column.
An upset was in prospect in the top match in Germany when the Dutch Grandmaster Daniel Stellwagen defeated Peter Svidler on the top board playing for the outsiders Solingen against the favourites OSC Baden-Baden. However Baden-Baden’s greater experience on the bottom boards swung the match in their favour.
On board three the former world title Candidate Artur Yusupov held Magnus Carlsen to a draw while another veteran, Praedrag Nikolic, also playing for Solingen, drew with Alexei Shirov in what was one of the strongest club matches in Europe this year so far.
Three more of Baden-Baden’s star players; Etienne Bacrot, Liviu-Dieter Nisipeanu and Pentyla Harekrishna were also held to draws and after Peter-Heine Nielsen of Denmark levelled the match it was left to the team’s solitary German player GM Philip Schlosser to score the decisive win.
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Boil for just 20 minutes
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The first ever Lexmark 20 Seconds Chess Tournament took place at Hammersmith in west London on Saturday 19th January. Victory in this original format went to David Howell who defeated fellow GM Keith Arkell in a tense final.
Howell overcame Laurence Trent in his semi-final while Arkell defeated Aaron Summerscale in the other semi-final although the result was in dispute after Summerscale was originally declared the winner.
The arbiters struggled to deal with the original situations caused by the ‘egg timer’ clock settings in which both players start with just 20 seconds each on the clock and one player’s time increases as the other’s decreases when they are thinking. Naturally this leads to entertaining chess, quick-fire moves and huge pressure on everyone involved.
The Open format gave all comers an opportunity to play grandmasters in the knockout stages and overall the event was judged a great success. The Organisers 20 Second Sports are planning a second tournament in mid-March.
A game from a very strong Open tournament in Moscow which is a warm up for the even stronger Aeroflot Open which has a $200,000 prize fund. Black creates counterplay on the queenside very quickly before White can get his kingside attack going with Nd2-f1-e3-g4 and h4-h5-h6 but on move 23 White misses a promising continuation.
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An entertaining gambit
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The Israeli Grandmaster Viktor Mikhalevski played entertaining if not wholly sound chess at Gibraltar. His final tally of 5.5/10 was disappointing but he was rewarded with a share of the Best Game prize for his part in a wacky King’s Gambit against the Australian junior Moultho Ly which is given below.
In the following game he breezed through a sideline that is potentially tricky and his opponent, an expert on unusual openings, had to resign early. (9.Nxd5!? is worth further investigation for example 9…Be6 10.d4 b5 11.Bxf4!? or 9...Kg7 10.d4 Nf6 11.Bxf4 Bd6 12.0–0
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Battle of Fischer wills
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A long legal battle seems inevitable over the estate of the late Bobby Fischer as there are conflicting claims from his wife Miyoko Watai, his brother in law Russel Targ and the mother of his daughter Marilyn Young.
A Philippino lawyer Samuel Estimo is acting for Ms Young and her daughter Jinky and is suggesting that Fischer may not actually have married Ms Watai although this seems highly unlikely as the original marriage certificate is reportedly being sent to Iceland where any claims will be settled.
Fischer's estate is worth an estimated 140m Icelandic kronur, about one million pounds and is deposited in an Icelandic bank. The one claimant who is likely to come away with nothing is the United States Inland Revenue Service. Since the Icelandic authorities turned down the attempts by the US Government to extradite Fischer for breaking UN sanctions against Serbia in 1992, they are not going to look kindly at an attempt to tax the remnants of his prize money.
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