Chess Room Newsletter #409

~ Elizabeth Vicary
From http://lizzyknowsall.blogspot.com

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1) Mechanics' Institute Chess Club News
2) Trying to track down former Mechanics' Member Joel Pugh
3) International Tournament in Berkeley this December by David Pruess
4) Bay Area Chess News
5) Americans Abroad
6) Spice Cup

The Mechanics' will host the 9th Annual Vladimir Pafnutieff Memorial G/45 this Saturday.

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The Irving Chernev Memorial Tuesday Night Marathon started last night with FM Frank Thornally and NMs Michael Pearson and Andy Lee as the top seeds. It's still not too late to enter the 8 round event with a first round half point bye.

MI member Rebekah Liu scored an undefeated 4.5 from 6 to tie for fourth in the Susan Polgar Girls Championship in Lubbock, Texas. The event, won by Courtney Jamison of Texas, attracted 52 of the strongest girls in the country.

FM Daniel Yeager defeated NM Matt Parry to create a 3-way tie for 1st place at 5.0 from 6 between Yeager, Southern California NM Julian Landaw and Scott Low in the 2008 Arnold Denker Tournament of High School Champions held in Dallas, Texas. MI member NM Steven Zierk scored 3.5

Some games have been pre-played in the Alan Benson IM norm tournament at the Mechanics', which officially starts August 16, due to FM Sam Shankland and Gregory Young attending the US Chess School in mid August in New Jersey and Daniel Naroditsky playing in Europe until August 23. The early leader in the event, which features IMs Vladimir Mezentsev, Ricardo DeGuzman, John Grefe and Ganbold Odondoo, is the lowest rated player - Gregory Young - who has 3 from 4.

GM-elect Vinay Bhat concluded his European summer tour by turning into solid performances in Mainz, Germany. Vinay played in both the FiNet Chess960 Open (Fischer Random chess) and the Ordix Rapid. Hikaru Nakamura won the former, tying with fellow GMs Sergei Movsesian and Alexander Motylev at 9 from 11, but getting the nod on tiebreak. Vinay shared 9th place (out of 232 players) with 9 from 11. The Rapid event was won by Ian Nepomniachtchi of Russia with 9.5 from 11 on tiebreak over Pavel Eljanov. Hikaru tied for third at 9 while Vinay was equal 12th with 8.5. Among his victims were 2641 rated Murtas Kazhgaleyev and 2574 rated Robert Ruck. Vinay almost collected an even bigger scalp.

Here is the game and the story. 1.d4 g6 2.c4 Bg7 3.Nc3 d6 4.Nf3 e5 5.e4 Nc6 6.Bg5 f6 7.Be3 Nh6 8.h3 0-0 9.Be2 Nf7 10.0-0 f5 11.dxe5 dxe5 12.Qxd8 Ncxd8 13.Nd5 fxe4 14.Nd2 Ne6 15.Nxe4 Nf4 16.Bf3 Nxd5 17.cxd5 Bf5 18.Rac1 Rfc8 19.Nc5 b6 20.Ne6 c5 21.Nxg7 Kxg7 22.Rfd1 Nd6 23.Bd2 Kf7 24.Bc3 Re8 25.g4 Bc8 26.Re1 e4 27.Bg2 Bb7 28.Rcd1 Rad8 29.g5 Ba6 30.Bf6 Rd7 31.b3 Bd3 32.f3 b5 33.h4 c4 34.Bh3 Nf5 35.fxe4 Bxe4 36.Bxf5 gxf5 37.d6 Re6 38.Be7 c3 39.b4 c2 40.Rc1 Rb7 41.Re3 Rb8 42.Kf2 Rb6 43.Rc3 Rb7 44.h5 Rexe7 45.dxe7 Kxe7 46.R1xc2 Bxc2 47.Rxc2 Rd7 48.Ke3 Ke6 49.Rc6+ Ke5 50.Rc5+ Ke6 51.Rxb5 Rd1 52.Ra5 Rg1 53.Rxa7 Rxg5 54.Rxh7 Rg3+ 55.Kd4 Rg4+ 56.Kc5 f4 57.Rh6+ Ke7 58.Rd6 Rg5+ 59.Kc6 Rxh5 60.Rd3 Ke6 61.b5 Rh2 62.a3 Rc2+ 63.Kb7 Ke5 64.b6 Ke4 65.Rb3 f3 66.Ka7 f2 67.Rb1 Rb2 68.Rf1 Kf3 69.b7 Ra2 ½-½ Hikaru offered a draw after making his last move. In the 7 seconds I had left I didn't see Rb1, so I decided to take the draw.

Here is a sharp win by Hikaru. 1.d4 d5 2.c4 e6 3.Nc3 Bb4 4.e3 c5 5.cxd5 exd5 6.a3 Bxc3+ 7.bxc3 Qc7 8.Ra2 Ne7 9.Bd3 0-0 10.Ne2 Bf5 11.0-0 Bxd3 12.Qxd3 Nbc6 13.Ng3 Rac8 14.f3 f5 15.Re1 Kh8 16.Rae2 b6 17.Nh5 Qd7 18.dxc5 bxc5 19.c4 Qe8 20.Nxg7 Kxg7 21.cxd5 Nb8 22.e4 Qg6 23.exf5 Nxf5 24.Re4 Rce8 25.Qc3+ Kf7 26.Rxe8 Rxe8 27.Rxe8 Kxe8 28.Qe5+ Kd7 29.Qxb8 Qa6 30.h4 Qd3 31.Bg5 Qxd5 32.Qd8+ Ke6 33.Qg8+ Ke5 34.Qh8+ Ke6 35.Qe8+ Kd6 36.Bf4+ 1-0You can read first hand accounts of Vinay on the tournament trail at http://vbhat.wordpress.com.

Ukrainian GM Alexander Moiseenko won the 2008 Edmonton International a few days ago with a score of 7 from 9. Former US Champion Alex Shabalov was second and MI member Josh Friedel and Indian 2600+ rated GM Seyar Ganguly shared third at 5.5 in the 28-player invitational swiss. Other US scores: =5th. GM Jessie Kraai and IM Robert Hungaski 5; =11th WFM Elizabeth Vicary 4.5.

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My name is David Edwards and I'm a journalist with the Daily Mirror newspaper in England. I'm trying to find people who knew a young man called Joel Pugh, who played with the club in the 1960s. Joel was born in 1940 and was from Minnesota but came to San Francisco to study, probably in around 1963. If you, or someone you know, used to know Joel, who sadly passed away in 1969, I'd be extremely grateful if you could get in touch. The best way of reaching me is through my home email: [email protected]

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First-class chess tournament coming!

From December 14-23, 2008, an international chess tournament will be held in Berkeley, California, where California's best will meet the nation's best, and the nation's best will meet top players from around the world. Further details will be released as they are available, but this first announcement will allow players to put this event on their calendars well in advance.

The tournament will be open to anyone with a fide rating over 2200. It will be a 10 round swiss, with games daily at 2 pm. The time control will be 40/2, G/1. International title norms will be possible. Before, during, and after the tournament, there will be events where local chess players may meet some of the elite competitors.

Entry is free to all Grandmasters. The tournament will also cover travel expenses and provide rooms for some (depending on entries and sponsorship). Non-grandmasters will pay an entry fee based on their fide rating and date of registration.

Here is the current prize fund, based on our present sponsorship commitments, and a projected 30 players. As more sponsorship and entries come in, this will be increased!

Overall: 1400, 1100, 900, 700
Under 2500: 700
Under 2400: 600
Under 2300: 600


As we have a target ratio of Grandmasters to non-Grandmasters, we currently have:Airfare/board for the next 4 Grandmasters to register.Room for 13 more non-Grandmaster entries in the tournament.This will also be updated over time.

For questions or entry, contact David Pruess (pruess@gmail.com) or got to http://dotq.org/chess

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Article submitted by organizer and chief TD Charles Sun from Michael Aigner's blog ( http://fpawn.blogspot.com )

The Silicon Valley Challenge #5 was held at Susan’s Dance Studio in northeast San Jose on July 27th. A total of 35 chess enthusiasts participated,four of whom were national masters ! No doubt the Open section had plenty of competition.

Before I go on, I would like to take some time to thank my chess coach, Michael Aigner. Mr. Aigner has been my teacher for the past three years and has helped me tremendously both as a chess player and a tournament director. Since the beginning of 2007, he has come more than 100 miles from Davis, California to play and also help me direct. I can easily say that without his help, none of this would be possible!

Also, I would like to thank Colin Ma for his generous donation. Colin Ma is new to the chess community, only starting to play in tournaments since last year. Your altruistic gesture means a lot!

Congratulations to Steven Zierk for winning the section outright, defeating National Master Richard Koepcke and only yielding a draw versus his teacher, Michael Aigner. The SVC5 has only been one of the numerous successes Steven has encountered while his rating has skyrocketed from 1550 to 2246 over the past two years. Good luck to Steven as he travels to Dallas, Texas for the Denter Tournament of Champions and US Open.

Kudos also to Evan Ye (photo at left) for taking the U1700 prize with an incredible 3-1 score. After losing to Mr. Koepcke in the first round, Evan easily defeated one C player and two B players. The result was a rating jump of nearly 100 points from 1576 to 1669. Second place was a six-way tie between Brian Wai, Daniel Liu, Alex Radu, Daniel Zheng, Eric Xu, and Partha Vora.

The U1600 section was rather small with only nine players. Congratulations to Pranav Nagarajan for winning with a 4-0 score. Kiarash Mavandad, John Canessa, Micah Pruyn Goldstein, and Andrew Couse also won money prizes.

Fremont Open

IM Ricardo DeGuzman and newcomer Damien Vincent ( who earned a provisional rating of 2296) tied for first in the 36-player Fremont Open held August 2-3 at 3 1/2 from 4. DeGuzman was held to a draw in round three by Expert Jason Mueller who also split the point in the last round with Andy Lee. Joining Mueller in a tie for third with three points were Lee ( who also drew with Expert Larry Snyder) and rapidly improving Yian Liou, who at 11 is rated 2029.

Tournament organizer Ken Zowal writes:

See the link below for photos from the 2008 Fremont Open, courtesy of the Incomparable Richard Shorman. Thank you, Richard!

http://www.chessdryad.com/photos/fremont/open_08/index.htm

Steve Gaffagan, David Petty and Steven Krasnov are tied for the lead with 3 1/2 from 4 with two rounds remaining in the 30-player Josh Friedel Friday Night Marathon at the Berkeley Chess Club. Krasnov defeated top-seed Larry Snyder in a game he was justifiably proud of. 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 g6 3.Nc3 d5 4.h4 GM Cebalo likes to use this move. 4...dxc4 Dembo, in her recent book on the Grunfeld praises 4...c5. 5.e4 Nc6 6.e5 Nd5 7.Bxc4 Nb6 8.Bb5 Bd7 9.Nf3 a6 10.Be2 Bg4 11.Be3 Nd5?! This move in conjunction with the trades on e3 and f3 costs Black a lot of time. Simply 11...Bg7 offers satisfactory play. 12.Qb3 Nxe3?! 13.fxe3 Bxf3?! 14.Bxf3 Qc8 15.0-0 Nd8 15...e6 is also no picnic - 16.Nd5 Bg7 17.Nf6+ Bxf6 18.exf6 0-0 19.Rac1 with a big advantage. 16.Rac1 e6 17.Ne4 Be7 18.Nd6+! Bxd6 19.exd6 c6 20.e4 e5 21.dxe5 0-0 22.h5 The immediate plan to attack f7 with 22.Be2 was to be considered. Black would have to play 22...Qe6 and suffer. 22...Re8 23.hxg6 hxg6 24.Be2! Rxe5 25.Bc4 Qd7 26.Rf6 b5? Larry has been hanging tough but misses his last chance to resist with 26...Ne6 though 27.Bxe6 Rxe6 28.Rxe6 fxe6 29.Qg3 leaves White clearly on top. 27.Qg3 This gets the job done but 27.Bxf7+ Nxf7 28.Rcf1 Rf8 29.Rxf7 Rxf7 30.Rxf7 Qxf7 31.d7 was prettier. Also winning was 27.Rxg6+ Kh7 28.Rg7+ Kxg7 29.Qg3+ Kh7 30.Qxe5 bxc4 31.Rc3. 27...Qa7+ 28.Kf1 bxc4 29.Qxe5 Qe3 30.Rc3 Qd2 31.Rh3 Ne6 32.Rh8+ Kxh8 33.Rf2+ 1-0 Yes, 33.Rxg6+ mated in three but the text wins faster. Fun & Educational Club. JOB Openings: Chess instructor for South Bay, San Jose, Campbell, Los Gatos and Sunnyvale

We are looking for the individuals who:

• have previous experience working with children ages 5–12 , passionate about chess, available after 3 PM during the week to teach on school campuses, have own transportation, reliable
• Please email to faec_chess @ yahoo.com

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Standings after 5 round in the FIDE Grand Prix in Sochi where Gata Kamsky represents the United States.

1-3. Radjabov, Cheparinov and Grischuk - 3,
4-12. Gashimov, Svidler, Gelfand,Jakovenko, Kamsky, Wang Yue, Al-Modiahki, Ivanchuk and Aronian - 2½,
13. Karjakin - 2,
14. Navara - 1½.


Larry Christiansen, Luis Javier Bernal Moro and Joel Benjamin shared 1st place in the Curacao Chess Festival 2008 with 7 from 9. Bernal Moro, who was leading throughout and made a GM norm, lost in the last round to Dutch IM Thomas Willemze while the husband and wife team of Daniel Fridman and Anna Zatonskih, lost respectively to Joel and Larry.

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The SPICE Cup takes place September 19th-28th 2008 at the Texas Tech Student Union Building. Eugene Perelshteyn is the defending champion.

Official website: http://www.SPICE.ttu.edu SPICE Cup , 19-28 ix 2008. Category 15 (2605)

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