Korobov and Kosteniuk dominate IMSA Rapid 2019

Nerves of steel help Korobov and Kosteniuk

Men's Section

Anton Korobov registered two impressive victories over the leaders of day 1 to proclaim his domination. Here are the highlights from those two games against Dominguez Perez and Vladimir Fedoseev. 

The position was even up to this point when Dominguez lashed out with 13...b5, this was rash and led to weakening of the queenside. Black was hoping for 14.♗xb5 ♛a5 perhaps, but after 14.♖c1 ♛e7 15.♕c2 ♞b7 16.♗xb5 ♝xa3 White stood discernibly better and after a few more moves he was completely dominating the queenside.

The diagram above shows the position after Black's 22nd move — White is simply crushing on the queenside.

Korobov in action against Gelfand

The next casualty in line was Fedoseev: 

Magic of Chess Tactics 2

FM Claus Dieter Meyer has put under the microscope a comprehensive fund of topical and timeless games / fragments. On video Hamburg GM Dr. Karsten Müller has outlined corner points of Meyer's work and created 14 tests plus 10 interactive test sets.

After maintaining a good position for twenty-six moves, White erred by playing 27.♖g1. The Ukrainian grandmaster seized the opportunity immediately with 27...♝d4! winning an exchange on the spot. After 28.♕xd4 ♛xf3 it was a fairly easy victory for Black.

After his back-to-back winning spree Anton Korobov emerged as the sole leader. At the end of day 2, he had a score of 6½/8 which was a whopping 1½ points ahead of Le Quang Liem who stood on the second spot with 5.0/8

In the last round of day 2, Le Quang Liem scored an emphatic win over Dominguez Perez which ended with a picturesque checkmate on the board.  

Powerplay 26: Checkmate Challenge — essential knowledge

Checkmate. That's the aim of the game. There are numerous ways to checkmate the enemy king, but there are common patterns that recur over and over again, and having these at our mental fingertips is essential for when we want to finish the game.

White decided here to grab an exchange for a pawn and a piece with 29.b5 ♛xb5 30.♘d4 — the position is theoretically okay here for Black but in practical terms it is the side with the exchange who has better chances. In the game White got a clear advantage by move forty and then the following happened:

Black played 40...h6 with the idea of expanding on the kingside with g5 but this invited a direct mating onslaught. The game ended with 41.♔g1 g5 42.♖b1 ♛d3 43.hxg5 hxg5 44.♖b7 ♛e4 45.♖b6 ♚e8 46.♕h8+ ♚d7 47.♖b7+ ♚c6 48.♕b8 ♚c5 49.♖b5+ ♚c6 50.♖b6+ ♚c5 51.♕d6#

Anton Korobov maintained his unbeaten streak on the last day of the event too. His encounter against Richard Rapport was particularly exciting.

The above is a position laden with many possibilities, Rapport went with the aggressive 12.f5 and after 12...dxe4 13.dxe4 0-0 14.♗f4 ♝d6 15.♖d1 a tactical sequence of exchanges followed which was practically forced. 

15...exf5 16.♖xd6 ♛xd6 17.♘g6 ♛d8 18.♘xf8 ♛xf8 19.exf5 ♝xf5 20.♗xh6 ♜e8 (Note: 20...gxh6 21.♘e5 winning the bishop or knight is obviously inferior for black) 21.♕h4 ♝xc2 22.♕xf6 gxf6 23.♗xf8 ♚xf8 and we arrived at the following position:

Black seems to be better here. Why? Well, Black is a pawn up and even though his pawns are doubled on the f-file he has clear Queenside pawn majority ready to march down the board. 

Chess Endgames 9 - Rook and Minor Piece

Endings with rook and minor piece against rook and minor piece occur very frequently, even more often than rook endings, yet there's not much literature on them. This endgame DVD fills this gap. The four different material constellations rook and knight vs rook and knight, rooks and opposite coloured (and same coloured ) bishops and rook and bishop vs rook and knight are dealt with. In view of the different material constellations Karsten Mueller explains many guidelines like e.g. "With knights even a small initiative weighs heavily".

Black uses his queenside majority, after 32.♖xa5 ♜xb3 he has a passer. The game followed 33.♘d4 ♜b2+ 34.♔e3 and White's pawns on the kingside were hacked off.

The game continued till 61 moves but it was clear that the above position (after Black's 36th) is completely winning.

Winners: 1st: Anton Korobov, 2nd: Quang Liem Le, 3rd: Leinier Dominguez Perez

The smile of victory

Final standings

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Women's section

The end of day 2 saw three leaders emerge from the playing sixteen — Zhao Xue, Valentina Gunina, and Alexandra Kosteniuk. But Kosteniuk won all her games from Round 6 to 11 and emerged as the sole champion. Let's have a look at an interesting highlight from her game against Nana Dzagnidze from the last round of Day 2.

That's the kind of determination required when you score six wins out of six rounds

In the above position 19...e4 was played and now where does White move the knight? In the game 20.♘fe5 was played what followed next was 20...♝g2 21.h4 ♝xh1 22.♔xh1 ♜ae8 23.♖ad1 ♞xe5 24.♘xe5 ♜xe5 25.♗xe5 ♛xe5 and Black had the decisive edge.

Black's pieces, especially the queen, are super-active around the monster of a pawn on e4 and on top of that White is structurally loose — all in all, this is a crushing position for Black. No wonder, what followed next was demolition: 26.f4 ♛h5 27.♖d6 ♛f3+ 28.♕g2 ♛c3 29.♖b1 ♞g4 30.♖dd1 ♞e3 31.♕d2 ♞xd1 0-1

Kosteniuk played a long and exciting round 10 game on day 3. We present an endgame from her duel against Krush.

The position is even here but Black (Kosteniuk) erred with 42...♚e7, the knight on c5 is well-placed and White could have seized the opportunity by pushing a4 followed b4, but 43.♘e6 was played which spares Black, now after 43...♚f6! 44.a4 g5 he has enough counter-play on the kingside to survive. Interestingly, in the next few moves fortunes changed hands quite few more times but every time returning to equilibrium. It was on the 57th move finally that the balance was broken for good, this time it happened in Black's favour. Here, we have the position after 56...♚c4: 

A difficult position, the only move that holds here is 57.♘c5! the point is now Kxd4 can be met with Ne6+ (fork), but the US grandmaster failed to find this and went 57.♔g4 instead. She quickly crumbled after 57...♚xd4 58.♘d6 c5 59. a5 ♝xa5 60.♔xh4 c4 61.♔g5 c3 — the winner is indeed the one who makes next-to-last mistake!

Winners: Alexandra Kosteniuk, Valentina Gunina, Mariya Muzychuk

The satisfaction you get after scoring six straight wins and taking back home 12,000 euros

The closing ceremony in progress

Standings after round 11

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On 17th and 18th the players will indulge in a 11-year-old blitz tournament. Stay tuned for some exciting games!