Veterans win Nutcracker by slimmest of margins

"The Nutcracker" will follow the original formula: the first four days the team members will fight each other in classical time controls of 60 moves in 120 minutes plus 15 minutes for the rest of the game including a 30 second increment as of move 61; and then the last two two days will be devoted to rapid chess with two rounds per player match-up played at 15 minutes plus ten seconds increment per move. The competition will use the Zurich scoring system: two points for each classical chess win, with one for a draw, and in rapid each win will be worth one point and a draw only half.

The Rapid games

The rapid game section was eagerly awaited by the chess fans, and the first round of games of this double-round Schveningen matchup showed anything goes. Daniil Dubov faced Alexey Shirov who has seemed to hold his ticket, but not in the rapid games as the younger player beat the Latvian with a French defense.

Alexey Dreev (right) was the top scorer for the King team in the first half with 3.0/4, while
Daniil Dubov beat his nemesis Shirov in game one, and had a 2.5/4 start

By the midway point with four out of eight rounds played, the Prince team had taken the lead with 8.5-7.5, notably thanks to the heavy scoring Vladimir Fedoseev with 3.0/4 and Daniil Dubov with 2.5/4. On the King team, only Alexey Dreev had managed a plus score with 3.0/4, beating Dubov and Artemiev while the rest of the team struggled.

Vladimir Fedoseev was not only the highest scoring member of the Prince team in the Rapid
section, he also outscored the veterans as well with 6.0/8

Whatever the halftime pep talk they had, it worked wonders and the veterans rallied with such verve, that they not only recovered the one point difference, but managed to edge out the youthful team with with 7.0-9.0 ultimately taking the title by the meagerest of margins 32.5-31.5. Remember the classical games were worth double.

Fittingly, it came down to the game between Peter Leko with white against Vladimir Fedoseev, both of whom were the highest scoring players in the latter half of the rapid games.

Vladimir Fedoseev, with black, decided it with Peter Leko

Sergey Rublevsky, who provided live GM commentary, speaks with the sponsor and organizer,
Oleg Skvortsov (right)

Organizer Oleg Skvortsov gives the King's their prizes

The players and organizers posing together

Classical standings

Rapid standings

Photos by Eteri Kublashvili and Vladimir Barsky

Links Official tournament site All classical games in PGN All rapid games in PGN The games are being 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.