In college athletics it is common for a coach to leave one program for another, one that promises greater prestige and/or more money. But what if a coach left for a new school and took the entire starting lineup with him?
This is exactly what is happening with Texas Tech’s top-ranked chess team; coach Susan Polgar and many of her players are going to Webster University in St. Louis. The players will be offered scholarships (and likely Polgar will be getting a raise).
The quality (and quantity) of chess video production has increased greatly over the past year, thanks in large part to the efforts of Macauley Peterson. At the current tournament in Gibraltar he has a series (hosted by Stuart Conquest) called Master Class. Below is an hour long video featuring GM Conquest and guest IM Anna Zatonskih, current US Women’s Chess Champion.
She spends the first 25 minutes going over her favorite game, a win from an Icelandic tournament in 2004. She then introduces some great chess puzzles, including possibly the hardest mate in 1 ever.
Master Class – IM Anna Zatonski
After the two Americans played to a draw yesterday, today Kamsky found himself as Black against the #1 player in the World, Magnus Carlsen – and almost won.
Well the eagerly expected rematch between Nakamura and Carlsen came and went today (with a whimper, not a bang). Although it was a quick draw, and Nakamura had White, the result could be considered a psychological win for Hikaru. Why? Well he has not had good results against Carlsen lately, and yesterday Magnus actually lost. The only thing more dangerous than having to face Carlsen is having to face him when he’s mad.
Here’s the game.
One of the most popular tournaments is starting on Saturday (7:30AM EST), featuring some of the strongest players in the world (including #1 and #2, but not the current World Champion).
An impressive statistic – 2 of the players in the top section are American!
GM Carlsen, Magnus NOR 2835
GM Aronian, Levon ARM 2805
GM Radjabov, Teymour AZE 2773
GM Topalov, Veselin BUL 2770
GM Karjakin, Sergey RUS 2769
GM Ivanchuk, Vassily UKR 2766
GM Gashimov, Vugar AZE 2761
GM Nakamura, Hikaru USA 2759
GM Gelfand, Boris ISR 2739
GM Caruana, Fabiano ITA 2736
GM Kamsky, Gata USA 2732
GM Giri, Anish NED 2714
GM Navara, David CZE 2712
GM Van Wely, Loek NED 2692
I wonder if Nakamura will be able to break the Carlsen curse this time…they face off in Round 10 (Jan 25th).
The time control is 100 minutes for 40 moves, then 50 minutes for 20 moves, then 15 minutes for rest of game, with 30 second increment starting from move 1. Do time controls really need to be this complicated? Why not just G/165 + 30inc?
The official site is here, and as always you can watch the games live here.
The FIDE January 2012 rating list is out, and Magnus Carlsen tops the list with an atmospheric 2835, 30 points above #2 in the world, Levon Aronian.
There are 3 Americans in the top 100 list:
12. Hikaru Nakamura 2759
20. Gata Kamsky 2732
76. Alexander Onischuk 2670
On the top 100 female players, the US has two:
15. Anna Zatonskih 2506
28. Irina Krush 2467
For the juniors, the US is represented by Ray Robson (2596, 11th)
The Bobby Fischer documentary I mentioned last year is available in its entirety on Youtube. I just spent 90 minutes watching it, time well spent.
Happy New Year!
It’s the midway point of the Reggio Emilia, and GM Nakamura has the lead! In the 5th round he defeated Ivanchuk in an exciting game where Vassily sacrificed a rook – correctly, according to computers – but he couldn’t find the right continuation and ended up losing.
The Week in Chess has a good roundup of the tournament and the Nakamura-Ivanchuk game.
Italy’s oldest – and strongest – chess tournament has started today, the Reggio Emilia. Nakamura, coming off a successful London Chess Classic, is taking part, along with:
Ivanchuk
Morozevich
Giri
Official site is here (in Italian, of course). As usual you can see the games live here.
HAPPY HOLIDAYS!