http://www.hindu.com/2008/03/29/stories/2008032952430300.htm
Two people on a bus stole a large sum of cash (~$15000) from another passenger and got down from the bus immediately. Within 5 minutes the passenger realized that he is missing the money and informed the driver and conductor. They quickly turned around the bus and removed the name plates on the bus. The same duo were waiting on the road and stopped the same bus to get away with the money.
Amber blindfold and rapid chess tournament started today. There were two decisive rapid games and three decisive blindfold games. Anand beat Kramnik in rapid and drew in the blindfold. Aronian is the only other person who won in the rapid section which was against Van Wely. In blindfold Topalov, Karjakin and Ivanchuk won against Leko, Gelfand and Carlsen respectively. The live relay from the official site worked perfectly from the first round itself.
All the games were drawn in the last round. Anand won with 8.5 points. Carlsen was second with 8 points. Aronian and Topalov finished third with 7.5 points. Anand drew easily with Topalov. Carlsen tried hard against Radjabov, since a win would have given him a tie for first place. But Radjabov defended carefully in a rook ending with a pawn down to obtain the draw.
The big news in this tournament is the performance of Carlsen. He will be the biggest rating points gainer in this tournament. At this rate he will soon become the top player. Leko and Shirov who finished last would like to forget about this tournament as soon as possible.
I hope the organizers in the future would plan better for the internet audiences. The java applet by itself was ok. But who wants to see all those logos or even the stream of photos. They just hog the bandwidth making the site terribly slower. An English site would also be nice.
Some interesting notes about this tournament:
- Anand has the least number of losses: only one. Every body else has at least two losses.
- Topalov has the minimum number of draws: 5.
- Anand beat Shirov in both their games. Carlsen beat Topalov in both their games. Topalov and Ivanchuk beat Leko in both their games.
- Radjabov has the maximum number of draws: 10.
- Topalov and Carlsen have the maximum number of wins: 5.
Next big chess tournament is Amber blindfold and rapid starting on March 15th.
Tournament leader Anand drew easily against Ivanchuk with black and remained as leader. Carlsen did an exchange sacrifice against Aronian which tied up Aronian’s pieces. But there was nothing more and they agreed to a draw. Shirov blundered against Radjabov loosing an exchange without compensation and resigned soon. This is not a tournament Leko would like to remember. He lost against Topalov today.
With Anand in the lead, Carlsen is half a point behind, and Aronian and Topalov are one point behind. Tomorrow Anand is playing Topalov. Topalov has to win to have a chance of winning the tournament. If Topalov and Aronian win and Carlsen draws then there will be four players finishing first with 8 points each. But if Anand drew then only Carlsen has a chance to catch him with a win.
The big news today is Carlsen checkmated Topalov. Topalov blundered on move 34 allowing white to checkmate. Topalov had two extra pawns and all he had to do was consolidate his position. But then something happened to him and he made two bad moves in a row. The bad part of this loss is he had lost both his games against Carlsen in this tournament. Shirov and Aronian played the same Marshall attack which Shirov and Leko played in round 10. Here Aronian deviated on move 27 but the result was the same draw. Anand played a slightly longer game in Ruy Lopez today ending in draw just before the first time control. Ivanchuk and Radjabov also had a long fight ending in draw.
Anand is now leading only with half a point with only two more rounds to go. He has 7.5 points, Carlsen has 7 and Aronian has 6.5 points. Only Carlsen and Aronian have a reasonable chance of catching up with Anand. Aronian is playing Carlsen on Thursday after a rest day tomorrow and he will try hard to get back in the race to win the tournament spoiling Carlsen’s attempt.
Two decisive results today. Topalov beat Shirov in a short game. Leko took 62 moves to beat Carlsen. Leko had an extra pawn in an end game with opposite colored bishops and a pair of rooks. This helped Anand to have 1 point lead over the rest. Anand took a safe short draw against Radjabov. Aronian and Ivanchuk’s was also a quick draw but an entertaining one. Now there are 3 more rounds to go with Anand at first place with 7 points and Aronian, Carlsen and Topalov at second place with 6 points. In the 3 rounds remaining Anand has 2 whites. But so far in this tournament he has been doing better with black.
For the first time all games were drawn. There were two short draws. Shirov and Leko played a Marshall attack for about 40 moves and then agreed to draw. Ivanchuk and Topalov had a good fight. Ivanchuk had a good position with an extra pawn. But he failed to find a good winning continuation and had to salvage a draw. Carlsen repeated Sveshnikov Sicilian which Shirov played and lost against Anand two days ago. But Carlsen deviated from what Shirov played at move 12 and they agreed to draw at move 22.
The live java viewer in the Linares official site does not look as good as the flash based viewer in the Morelia site. All the games can also be followed from fics server. But you need to install an interface like winboard. Tomorrow is a rest day and the games will continue on Monday. Anand continues to lead with 6.5 points and Carlsen is close behind with 6 points. There are 4 more rounds.