Monday 14 December 2009

Live From Olympia...

Chess Classic

The fighting spirit already established in the tournament was further demonstrated in an excellent round of tough games. Two wins with Black! At this level, that is quite rare.

Round 5 Results

David Howell 0.5-0.5 Vladimir Kramnik

Hikaru Nakamura 0-1 Luke McShane

Ni Hua 0-1 Magnus Carlsen

Michael Adams 0.5-0.5 Nigel Short

Current Standings

11: Carlsen
8: Kramnik
7: McShane
5: Howell, Adams
4: Short
4: Nakamura
3: Ni Hua

The top three players are the only ones to have won games. Howell and Adams have drawn in all five rounds.

Today's Pairings

Kramnik v Short

Carlsen v Adams

McShane v Ni Hua

Howell v Nakamura

No all-English game today! Given the tournament situation and current form, one would expect to see White pushing hard in all four games.

FIDE Open

GM Hammer is now a whole point ahead of the field with 6.5/7. Today he is Black against GM Cherniaev. Five other players share second place on 5.5/7 and they are IM Rendle, GM Williams, GM Wells, IM Houska and GM Hebden.


Women's Invitational

Arianne Caoili won yet again and leads the tournament by a whole point with just two rounds to go. Susan Lalic and Arlette van Weersel currently share the second spot but both have played the leader already so they can only keep winning and hope Caoili slips up.

GM Korchnoi Simul

The simul was a great success last night and Viktor the Terrible scored 21 wins, four draws and one loss.

Jamie Morgan was the winner with a 21 move victory in a Benko Gambit.

The simul went on until 10.30 and the last few games had to be speeded up and eventually adjudicated.

A full report, with games, will appear in a CHESS magazine soon.

Tonight's simul will now start at 6.30 p.m. instead of the previously advertised 7.00 p.m.

More reports later...

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