Chess Classic: Chess960 results, Anand and Aronian simuls

Chess Classic Mainz 2006 The event takes place from August 15 to 20 in the Rheingoldhalle of the Congress Centre, Hilton Hotel in Mainz, Germany. It includes matches and Opens in traditional and Random Chess, with stars like Anand, Aronian, Svidler, Radjabov, Kosteniuk and Pähtz participating.

View from last year's Classic, with the Open and two matches in progress

Chess960: stunning comeback for Harikrishna, Kosteniuk and Hort win

Chess960 junior world championship: Harikrishna-Naiditsch 4.5-3.5
After three losses and a draw on the first day India's second strongest player Pentala Harikrishna struck back against Arkadij Naiditsch, Germany's top GM, with four straight wins to take the Chess960 Junior world championship in Mainz. It was a very dramatic match: in the last and decisive game 20-year-old Naiditsch had a very promising position, but lost on time. Harikrishna, who is concentrating on the upcoming FiNet Open, said he never thought that he would win four games in a row.

Arkadij Naiditsch (portrait by Fred Lucas)

Chess960 women's world championship: Kosteniuk-Pähtz 5.5-2.5
Alexandra Kosteniuk became the first Chess960 women world champion, after beating Germany's top female player Elisabeth Pähtz. On the first day the score was 2-2, but then the Russian grandmaster, who is number three on the world women's rankings, won the first two games and drew the penultimate game to take the match. In the final game the women did not play a quick draw, but entertained the audience with a nice game, which was won by Kosteniuk.

Russia's Alexandra Kosteniuk vs Germany's Elisabeth Pähtz

Chess960 senior world championship: Hort-Portisch 4-4, tiebreak 1.5-0.5
In the seniors' section chess legend Vlastimil Hort, 62 had a slight advantage over his 69-year-old colleague Lajos Portisch of Hungary, after their first day of play. Hort led 2.5-1.5, but on day two, after two draws, Portisch won the seventh game. After a peaceful 20-move draw in the last game, two blitz games had to decide the match. After a draw in the first blitz game, Hort managed to exploit a minimal advantage to a full point, winning the beautiful trophy in the end.

Veterans Vlastimil Hort and Lajos Portisch

Simultaneous exhibitions

Anand won his simultaneous exhibition with a 35:5 score – 31 wins, eight draws, one loss. The marathon lasted four hours and twenty minutes.

Anand vs the Lord Mayor of Mainz, Jens Beutel, who lost in 41 moves

Migé and Burton, bass and keyboard with the rock band HIM (Finnland), played in the simultaneous exhibition against Anand. Migé lost in 29 moves, but Burton drew his game.

Burton building up a solid position against Anand

On Wednesday Olympiad Gold medalist Levon Aronian of Armenia gave a simultaneous display in Chess960. One of his opponents was the German soap star Vaile, who lost quickly. After the exhibition Aronian was persuaded to play a blindfold Chess960 game against her, which he also won.

Aronian in his blindfold Chess960 game against Vaile, Germany's answer to Jennifer Aniston

Schedule, live coverage and downloads

Links Official web site: in German and in English First ChessBase report Course of events (PDF, German) Tournament plan 1 (PDF, English) Tournament plan 2 (PDF, English) Event details Registration Interview with Jens Beutel, Lord Mayor of Mainz Interview with Arkadij Naiditsch Mainz Chess Classic poster Chess Classic 2002, 2003 Chess Classic 2004 + the Carmen Kass story Chess Classic 2005