The 2012 Biel Chess Festival is taking place from July 23rd to August 2nd, in a number of groups: the Master Tournament (eleven rounds Swiss); the Main Tournament (nine rounds Swiss); a Rapid and a Blitz tournament; Chess960; Youth, Simultaneous, Chess Tennis, ChessBase training seminars. Of greatest interest is of course the Accentus Grandmaster Tournament with six very strong grandmasters playing a double round robin: Magnus Carlsen, Hikaru Nakamura, Alex. Morozevich, Wang Hao, Etienne Bacrot and Anish Giri.

Hikaru Nakamura, Etienne Bacrot, Magnus Carlsen, Wang Hao, Anish Giri and Alex Morozevich

The rate of play: 40 moves in 100 minutes, then 20 moves in 50 minutes followed by 15 minutes for the rest of the game, with 30 sec increment per move. The scoring system is three points for a win, one for a draw and zero for a loss. No draw offers are permitted before move 30.

Round five

After an opening loss in his first game to replace Morozevich, Viktor Bologan chose a fighting opening as black to take on the leader, Wang Hao: the Benko Gambit. While dynamic and energetic, the opening has an iffy reputation at the top and is rarely played.

Wang Hao has been a runaway train so far with 4.0/5

It turned out to be a less than ideal choice against the Chinese player, who appeared well-prepared against it as a rule, and had no issues making the most of his extra pawn. He soon developed this into a winning advantage and stormed ahead in the lead with 4.0/5 and 12/15 by the Biel scoring system.

The losing player has so far avoided appearing in the post-mortem, but Bologan has
been generous and analyzed both his games so far.

With his second straight win, Hikaru Nakamura has put his foot on the accelerator

Hikaru Nakamura found himself on the white side of his pet King’s Indian, as Etienne Bacrot chose to fight him with his own weapons. On a whim, the American chose the Petrosian at the last minute, sensing that Bacrot was well-prepared against other lines. Somehow things never worked for the Frenchman as his initiative failed to really fly, and Nakamura’s understanding of the opening shone through with decisive effect. With this second straight win, he is now tied with Anish Giri for second with 3.0/5 or 8/15.

Hikaru Nakamura reviews his game and gives a class on the King's Indian  

Anish Giri and Magnus Carlsen look at a contentious point

Both had a good time analyzing together

Magnus Carlsen and Anish Giri made a fight of it, and struggled extensively to try and sneak in an advantage. In the end, they were forced to shake hands, despite both wanting more.

It was a pleasure watching both the young prodigies go over their game together  

In the Master tournament, an eleven-round swiss with over 30 grandmasters, Russian GM Maxim Turov, winner of Wijk Aan Zee C earlier this year, is leading with 4.5/5 followed by nine with 4.0/5. In round six he will face GM Pentala Harikrishna the winner of Wijk Aan Zee B.

Maxim Turov has had a strong start with 4.5/5 in the Master tournament

Traditional standings after five rounds

Three-point standings after five rounds

Pictures by Pascal Simon

Live GM commentary on Playchess

There is live audio and video commentary on the chess server Playchess. The English commentary starts at 3:30 p.m., and German commentary directly from the playing site begins at 4:00 p.m. In addition Yasser Seirawan is doing round-up shows at 8:00 p.m. on the days he is commenting.

Commentary schedule

As a special treat the multimedia commentary live from Biel is also available on our live browser coverage. This also includes the players analysing after their games.

• You can watch the live coverage of Biel 2012 in your browser here

Overview: schedule and results

Links Official tournament site All 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 11 or any of our Fritz compatible chess programs.

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