Super-GM Morelia-Linares begins today

The Morelia/Linares Super GM tournament takes place from Feburary 16th until March 11th, 2007. It is staged in two halves, the first from 17th-25th February 2007 in Morelia, Mexico, and the second half from 2nd-10th March 2007 in Linares.

First stop on the trip from Hamburg to Morelia: the capital of Spain, Madrid

Arrival in Mexico City after a 13-hour non-stop flight from Madrid in a Boing 777.

We were offered the option of spending the night in a hotel, with a sumptuous meal in an Argentinian restaurant, or we could rush to the bus station and catch the night bus to Morelia. We opted for the latter and arrived at around 3:30 a.m. at our destination, Hotel Alameda. Body time: 10:30 a.m. Off to bed, except that your inner clock wakes you up three hours later. It will take a couple of days to return to any kind of normalcy.

A familiar sight, the baroque Cathedral of Morelia which dominates the skyline

For more pictures of the city see our report from last year's event, or go to our Spanish site, where my colleague Nadja Woisin has posted a lot of pictures from this year's trip.

At the opening ceremony we see Magnus Carlsen, Peter Svidler, Alexander Morozevich, Levon Aronian, Peter Leko and Vishy Anand in the front row

Peter Leko and Vishy Anand

A pensive Magnus Carlsen wondering how this adventure will end. At sixteen Magnus is of course by far the youngest player in the field.

The drawing of places – Vishy Anand is the first on the stage and gets the seven

Veselin Topalov draws the two and will face Anand in game one

Topalov, Ivanchuk, Leko, Morozevich, Svidler, Carlsen, Anand and Aronian

And this is how they will play.

Schedule and results

Links

• Official web site