2016 IMSA Elite mindgames (1/2)

2016 IMSA Elite Mind Games

Photos by Gu Xiaobing at the official site

Over the years, chess has been making desperate attempts to find a place in the Olympics. Often, the sport’s attempt is met with a polite expression of bewilderment, but no concrete results. At best, chess was an exhibition sport during the Sydney 2000 Olympics.

This resulted in the creation of a unique association between the sporting bodies, each of whom identifies the game they represent as a ‘mind sport’ – International Mind Sports Association (IMSA).  The aim of the association is to engage in a dialogue with the International Olympic Committee and initiate these mind sports into the Olympics.

The IMSA in association with FIDE organized the IMSA Elite Mind Games 2016 from 25 February to 3rd March 2016 at Huai’an, China. The event consisted of a rapid tournament, a blitz tournament and a basque tournament for men and women with a handful of top stars competing for the medals.

Rapid Games

The Rapid games were 20 minutes+10 seconds per move affairs with seven rounds in both the Men and Women section. Many pundits have argued that Rapids are the future of the game, where chess is more entertaining and spectator friendly, at least in their opinion. The Games did much to entertain chess fans with fast, heart-pounding action.

The winner: WGM Tan Zhongyi (2450)

However, the Women’s section only kept the excitement to the games as the competition was nearly run over by the surprise winner Tan Zhongyi who began with five consecutive victories that almost sealed the Gold in her favour before it was over. She did lose the sixth round to Kateryna Lagno but promptly won the last round against Anna Ushenina to finish clear first with 6.0/7.

Tan Zhongyi-Huang Qian

A nice mate in three by the champion

Huang-Lagno

Ideally, White wants to castle ASAP, but Black finds a creative idea to keep
the White monarch in the center.

Final standings of Women's Rapid

Cuban GM Leinier Perez Dominguez (2775)

China’s GM Wang Hao (2752)

Things became very tight in the Men’s section. Four rounds were played on the first day and Dominguez, Ponomariov and Wang Hao were in the lead with 3.0/4. The games were fiercely fought and, as expected in faster time controls, riddled with mistakes and, of course, tactics!

Wojtaszek-Ivanchuk

Even though it is Ivanchuk, Black’s position looks suspicious and rightly so.
How did White puncture Black?

Movsesian-Tomashevsky

Black has only one way to survive, and even win!

Former FIDE World Champion GM Ruslan Ponomariov (2672)

Of all the early leaders, only Ponomariov managed to survive, and even then, all he could manage was a tie for first place with Shakhriyar Mamedyarov on 5.0/7. An Armageddon tie-break became necessary to determine who took gold.

The Armageddon turned out to be a heart-stopping affair for the spectators

Shak won the toss and chose to play the white pieces with five minutes on the clock to win, while Pono had to play with only four minutes and the black pieces but with a draw sufficient for victory!

A victory on demand made Shak the gold medalist in the Rapids

The medalists on the podium

Final standings of Men's Rapid

Links Official tournament site All Rapid men games in PGN All Rapid men TB games in PGN All Rapid women games in PGN All Blitz men games in PGN All Blitz women games in PGN All Basque men games in PGN All Basque women 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 13 or any of our Fritz compatible chess programs.