Inarkiev leads FIDE Grand Prix in Astrakhan

The Sixth Grand Prix is taking place from May 10th to 25th in the new State Drama Theatre of the city of Astrakhan. The stakes are extremely high, not only due to high prestige of winning the event, but also because one can win here a ticket to the candidates matches.

Round four – May 13, 2010

Russian GM Ernesto Inarkiev won a nice game with black against Vassily Ivanchuk, when the Ukrainian lost the thread in a position where a few accurate moves would have brought him victory. All other games of round four were drawn. With his win Inarkiev joined the leading group of six players with 2.5 points in the first four games. Full report here...

Ernesto Inarkiev and Vassily Ivanchuk discuss their game in the press conference

Round five – May 14, 2010

Pavel Eljanov took the lead after defeating Wang Yue with the black pieces in the round five. Eljanov was forced to defend a difficult position for the most part of the game, but the Ukrainian GM managed to complicate the position with an exchange sacrifice, and Wang Yue got nervous. First he missed the winning continuation, and then, after the time control, blundered a rook instead of transposing to a better ending.

Pavel Eljanov before the start of his game against Chinese GM Wang Yue

Another Ukrainian, Vassily Ivanchuk, defeated his compatriot Ruslan Ponomariov

It was Ivanchuk's first win in Astrakhan. Ponomariov, who had white, got a slight advantage after of the opening, but made an unsuccessful pawn sacrifice on the 22nd move and gave away the initiative. White’s problems got worse after he missed Black’s strong bishop maneuver. After the first control Black already had a winning position.

Apart from these two black wins all other games in the round ended in draws. Full report here...

Round six – May 15, 2010

After a rest day the players were apparently fully invigorated and produced four decisive games – and three in which Black took the point.

Pavel Eljanov lost to Evgeny Alekseev, who was well prepared in a trendy line of the Queen's Indian and soon had a large advantage on the clock. His advantage continued to grow and although Eljanov fought valiantly for quite some time Alekseev played well to clinch the win.

GM Boris Gelfand of Israel has already qualified for next year’s Candidates after his World Cup win, but he still wishes to add a GP trophy to his cabinet back home. Breathing down the leader’s neck, he had white against another player on +1, GM Inarkiev from Russia and Elista. Boris elected to play his favourite line against the Meran, and the two GMs trotted out 19 moves of theory. It appears that Black equalized shortly after and then the game trend started to swing in his favour. White gave up two pieces for the rook and Inarkiev milked this advantage to clinch the full point and become the leader of the tournament!

Two Berlin experts clashed today, but not in a Spanish Opening! GM Jakovenko (above right) was White against former FIDE World Champion and wild card for this tournament, GM Ruslan Ponomariov. In a Grunfeld Indian Jakovenko built up an advantage and Ponomariov, in a difficult position, eventually blundered on move 21. He put up a lot of resistance after this, and this is an important lesson for all of us since one should never give up when there may still be some small chances of survival. Nevertheless, Jakovenko’s technique was flawless and he gave black no real chance to save the game.

A match between two solid and technical players, Vladimir Akopian and Wang Yue, was a main line Petroff, where both players have considerable experience. Only a win today could put Wang Yue back with realistic chances of qualifying for the coveted Candidates place. He pressed for a long time and eventually was rewarded with a position having an outside passed pawn. Additionally, White had a somewhat bad bishop also to resolve. Vladimir put up strong resistance but the Chinese player’s persistence won through and he obtained the full point.

Full report here...

Information, images and games by courtesy of FIDE

Standings after six rounds

Statistics Of the 42 games played so far: 71% (30 games) have ended in draws White won five games = 12% Black has won seven = 17%.

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 the free PGN reader ChessBase Light, which gives you immediate access. You can also use the program to read, replay and analyse PGN games. New and enhanced: CB Light 2009!