Chess Digest ( Vol 1 Issue 9)
WORLD
CARLSEN WINS NORWAY CHESS 2016
Current World Champion Magnus Carlsen won the Altibox Norway Chess Tournament 2016 held in Stavanger from April 18-30,2016.After seven rounds Magnus Carlsen looked almost certain to win the tournament, but then he lost against Levon Aronian in round eight, endangering his tournament win. But things went his way in round nine. Aronian drew against Pentala Harikrishna while Carlsen defeated Pavel Eljanov to win Norway Chess for the first time.
 |
| A beaming Carlsen with his family(file photo). |
BATUMI FIDE WOMEN'S GRAND PRIX
For a long time the players in the Women's Grand Prix in Batumi all snatched points from each other and the lead changed all the time. Until Valentina Gunina took countermeasures: She simply won all her games! In the second last round,she defeated Zhao Xue and jumped to 7.0/10, one-and-half points more than her closest rival, and thus won the tournament with one round to go.In the last round,Zhao Xue again lost to Former Women's World Champion Alexandra Kosteniuk, who went on to take the silver with 6.5/11 points.
A handshake before the decisive game: Valentina Gunina vs. Zhao Xue
TASHKENT OPEN 2016
Grandmaster Farrukh Amonatov from Tajikistan took the winner’s trophy in the 10th Tashkent Open – Memorial of Georgy Agzamov held from 18-26th April at the Shodlik Palace in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, after edging the European Blitz Champion Rauf Mamedov on tie-break.The two players finished on 7,5/9 points each.
WORLD AMATEUR CHESS CHAMPIONSHIPS 2016
The World Amateur Chess Championships 2016 took place from 19-27th April, 2016, in Halkidiki, Greece on the northern coast of the Aegean Sea.The total prize fund was 9000 EUR.The U2300 section had 43 participants. Zhuban Bigabylov (Kazakhstan) and Toomas Valgmae (Estonia) shared the first place with 7,5/9 points each.Bigabylov was declared champion on better tie-break score.The U2000 section had 64 participants. The 21-years old Khulan Enkhsaikhan from Mongolia is the new champion with 7,5/9 points.The U1700 section had 45 participants. The 15-years old Jatin S N from India is the convincing winner with 8,5 points.
LJILJA DRLJEVIC IS SERBIAN WOMEN'S CHAMPION
The Serbian Women’s Chess Championship took place from 20-28th April at Hotel Šumarice in Kragujevac.Ten players with the average elo 2160 competed in the round robin tournament.WIM Ljilja Drljevic, member of chess club Radnički-Bone Ćuprija, cruised to the victory and her first national title despite the loss in the first round.
GM VIKTOR GAVRIKOV PASSES AWAY
The 1985 USSR chess champion GM Viktor Gavrikov has passed away this April 27th in a hospital in Burgas at the age of 59.Since 2015 he was part of the Modern Chess Magazine team, where he wrote brilliant articles including How To Play Against Isolated Queen’s Pawn – Lessons From Russian Chess School, Sicilian pawn structures, and many others.
WEI YI AND GUO QI ARE CHINESE CHAMPIONS 2016
The Chinese Championships 2016 took place from 17th to 28th April and were played in Xinghua. Most of the top Chinese players were absent but with an Elo-average of 2586 the tournament was strong. Elo-favorite Wei Yi still cruised to a smooth victory. He did not lose a single game and won with 7.5/11. New Chinese Women's Champion is Guo Qi. She scored 8.0/11.
INDIA
A RESPECTABLE 50 PER CENT FOR HARIKRISHNA IN NORWAY
India No.2 Harikrishna Pentala is just seven points away from Viswanathan Anand in the live Elo list. With a rating of 2763 it was extremely important for Hari to prove that he could fight it out with the absolute elite players in the world. And he did pretty well. He scored 4.5/9 points with wins over Anish Giri and Li Chao in the Altibox Norway Chess Tournament held from April 18-30 in Stavanger. Indian fans will be looking for more such appearances by Hari so that his experience of playing at this level can match his undeniable talent.
SYNA OPEN 2016
The SYNA International Open turned out to be a double delight for Maharashtra as the leading light from the state IM Anup Deshmukh finished second while GM Swapnil Dhopade was first.The much awaited SYNA Open 2016 kicked off on the 24th of April in the SYNA International school, Katni, Madhya Pradesh. The event lasted for six days till 29th April,2016.
INTERVIEWS
HARIKRISHNA PENTALA
India number two Pentala Harikrishna played in one of the strongest Round Robin tournaments of his career - The Altibox Norway Chess 2016. He performed very well scoring 4.5/9. In this interview he speaks about his tournament, how he prepared himself, what went wrong, how he fought back and how did he find Markus Ragger as his second.And what about his Elo race with Vishy Anand? Well, it is not so important is his straightforward reply!
BORIS GELFAND
In the first part of the interview with Boris Gelfand he spoke about the opening, middlegame, endgame, books he loved, focusing on chess. In the second part Boris tells us about his World Championship Match, how his family supports him, and when a player should think about going professional. He has extremely useful advice for parents of chess kids, and by the end of the article you will learn how to make beetroot salad with prunes and walnuts!
VIDEOS
THEY SAID IT!
“The winner of the game is the player who makes the next-to-last mistake”
(Savielly Tartakover)
“We cannot resist the fascination of sacrifice, since a passion for sacrifices is part of a Chessplayer’s nature” (Rudolf Spielman)
“The chessboard is the world, the pieces are the phenomena of the Universe, the rules of the game are what we call the laws of Nature and the player on the other side is hidden from us” (Thomas Huxley)
Superb! Keep it up.
ReplyDelete