In-Depth look at Challengers in Tata Steel

The Tata Steel Chess Tournament has two main tournaments. They are played according to the 'round robin' system, whereby each competitor plays in turn against every other during the tournament. The Tata Steel Masters has 14 participants and the Tata Steel Challengers has 14 participants. Both groups start on January 10th 2015 and the last round is on January 25th. All rounds in Wijk aan Zee begin at 13.30 hours, except for the last round on January 25th, which begins at 12.00 hours. The time control is 100 minutes for 40 moves, followed by 50 minutes for 20 moves, then 15 minutes for the remaining moves with 30 seconds cumulative increment for each move starting from the first move.

Admission to the playing hall in Wijk aan Zee, Rotterdam and The Hague is free of charge

Challenger's Recap

In our past reports we have been less focused on the Challengers group to some extent. But you cannot blame us when players like Carlsen, Caruana, Aronian, So, Ivanchuk and not to forget Jobava, play in the Masters category. It is natural that the entire focus is on this elite tournament. However, alongside the A category an equally interesting and intense fight for the top spot is taking place in the B group.

With an average Elo of 2561, Tata Steel Challengers is an extremely strong event

Challengers standings after nine rounds

David Navara and Wei Yi who are on 7.5/9 and 7.0/9
(respectively) are leading the tournament by a huge margin

Other players do have a chance to catch up with four rounds still to be played but there is a high probability that one out of the above two would become the champion. So it makes sense to see who their remaining opponents are. Navara has an edge in that aspect because he has to play only one 2600+ player: Potkin; meanwhile Wei Yi has to fight it out against two 2600+ players (L'Ami and Salem).

Wei Yi has been absolutely brutal with the white pieces and has scored an amazing 4.0/4 with them

Navara prefers the black magic as he has won all his five black games.

Navara-Timman, Rd 6

In the sharp line of the Bogo Indian, Navara unleashed a novelty with 11.Nb3. How good is this move remains to be seen. But it had the effect of throwing Timman completely off balance and Navara won the game in a mere 19 moves!

Chess is a young man’s game? The legendary Jan Timman is struggling in the tournament with 3.0/9

The battle between the two leaders in round five ended in a draw

Navara-Wei Yi, Rd.5

Navara pushed throughout the game with the white pieces. In the above position it is clear that White is better but whether he could win or not is quite a complicated question. Usually, when one is an exchange up and has a passed pawn it should be sufficient to win. Here, White has both these advantages but they are offset by black passed b-pawn being securely defended by the bishop and the protected passer on f4. Wei Yi managed to cling on and the game ended in a draw.

Quad-S: Super Solid Sam Shankland is unbeaten and currently in the third place with 5.5/9.

Why do I call him super solid? Because a small research in the Mega-Database shows that this guy has lost only one out of the last 68 games! But Samuel needs to start winning a few now if he has any chances of catching up with the leaders.

Robin Van Kampen- Samuel Shankland, Rd.5

Black has just played Nf4. What should White play? Hint: Find a spectacular move!

Potkin-Gunina. Rd.3

The tactic of Qf7!! shown in Van Kampen vs Shankland was very unusual and not so easy to find but here is a position with a similar tactical motif that is much much easier to find!

Potkin finished off the game with the pretty 27.Rd8+!

The 2011 European Individual champion is on +1 with 5.0/9 and in the seventh place

Robin is definitely playing some uncompromising chess with four wins and two losses

It’s always nice when you have your back covered! Erwin L’Ami (left) with Robin Van Kampen

More is expected of this smart Dutch player but 5.0/9 is not bad

Salem (Above) who is being trained by Ivan Sokolov (Above, right) in this tournament has not impressed by scoring just -1. Recently he has had a string of excellent performances like Qatar Open where he finished seventh, which has propelled him over 2600.

In his game against Erwin L’Ami he had definite chances of winning:

Salem-L’Ami, Rd.5

Can the queen destroy Black's defenses?

Salem’s loss can be aptly shown in these two pictures:

You build a winning position with great care and concentration….

…..And just in a moment it all comes crashing down!

America's youngest grandmaster Samuel Sevian (above) started off with two losses but has come back well in the tournament with four wins over Potkin, Gunina, Haast and Klein. The youngster has been showing excellent stamina with many of his games going the distance and in two of them he played for as many as 91 moves!

GM Michiels Bart is a Belgian grandmaster and maybe one of the most educated chess players in the world. He has a rating of 2563 and is a Civil Engineer. He has a PhD from Ghent University for his thesis on parallel fast multipole methods for the simulation of extremely large electromagnetic scattering problems.

Being thoroughly prepared before a game of chess. You can expect this from a PhD holder!

Bart misplayed a rook vs bishop endgame and was mated against GM Erwin L’Ami.

Do you know who he is?

Meet the Dutch GM David Klein who is just 21 years of age. Apart from possessing obvious chess playing skills, Klein is also a great problem solver. In 2012 Tata Steel problem solving competition, this young lad won the contest finishing ahead of legendary problem solvers like John Nunn, Oleg Pervakov and Piotr Murdzia. Quite an achievement!

She is the number two Dutch women player behind Peng Zhaoqin…

…and she is a top Russian female player, ranked number seven in Women’s rating list.

The two girls met each other in the eighth round of the event and produced a
very interesting and exciting game in one of the romantic old lines

Ari Dale is a 16-year-old Australian IM who has qualified to the tournament by virtue of winning the top amateur tournament in the 2014 TATA steel chess festival. He has scored four draws including a very brave double piece sacrifice against the current tournament leader Wei Yi which ended in a draw.

Replay Challengers games

Select games from the dropdown menu above the board

Photos by Alina l'Ami for the official website

Schedule and results - Challengers group

Venues

The tournament has a slight change this year. Most of the rounds will be played in the traditional De Moriaan Community Centre in Wijk aan Zee, but two of the rounds will be played elsewhere. Last year the tournament traveled to the National Museum in Amsterdam and the High Tech Campus in Eindhoven.

This year the fifth round will be held in De Rotterdam. De Rotterdam is a building on the Wilhelminapier in Rotterdam, designed by Rem Koolhaas in 1998.

Rotterdam is ready to host Tata Steel!

The tenth round will be played in the International Press Cnetre Niewuspoort in the Hague. Councillor Karsten Klein of The Hague had this to say: "The Hague is honored to be able to host the Tata Steel Chess Tournament 2015 at the heart of the Dutch parliamentary democracy. Our city has a long history of international chess tournaments, a tradition which is continued in this manner. "

Commentary on Playchess

This being the first major event of the year, it is clear that we will be bringing you live commentary on our server www.playchess.com!

Links Official tournament site Master Games in PGN Challenger Games in PGN The games will be broadcast live on the official web site and on the chess server Playchess.com. If you are not a member you can download a free Playchess client there and get immediate access. You can also use ChessBase 12 or any of our Fritz compatible chess programs.