London Chess Classic 2011

The 2011 London Chess Classic is taking place in the Olympia Conference Centre from Saturday, December 3rd until Monday, December 12th, starting at 14:00h London time each day (final round 12:00h). Time controls are classical forty moves in two hours, then twenty moves in one hour and thirty minutes for the rest of the game. A win is counted as three points, a draw as one, and a loss zero. Tiebreaks: 1) number of wins, 2) number of wins with Black, 3) result of the individual game between the tied players. In the unlikely event that there is still a tie then: 4) 2 x 15'+2" games, and if necessary then 5) an Armageddon game: 6'+2" vs 5'+2" with draw odds for Black. If there is a tie involving more than two players then the Rapid games will be conducted as a double round all play all. The total prize fund is €160,000 before tax.

Vlad The Anglocide

Round eight report by John Saunders

There was just one decisive result in the penultimate round: Vladimir Kramnik broke English hearts by beating home player Luke McShane in a long, fluctuating struggle. That put the former world champion two points clear of the field. He has White in the final round and is not someone who is readily beatable with that colour. And in order for Vlad not to finish first (at least on tie-break), something would have to happen that has never happened before at a classical time control: Levon Aronian would have to beat him with Black in tomorrow’s final round.

Let’s run through a few possible last-round permutations. If Vlad wins, of course he takes the title and the 50,000 Euros first prize. If he draws, and Magnus Carlsen fails to win (he’s Black against Nigel Short), the same applies. If Vlad draws and Magnus wins, then Vlad is first on tie-break (an extra black win) but they receive 37,500 Euros each. If Vlady loses, Magnus could jump over him to take first, or if he fails too, Luke McShane can even finish first ahead of Vlad on tie-break (if he beats Vishy) as can Hikaru Nakamura (after a play-off, if he beats Mickey Adams). The upshot of this is that all four boards tomorrow feature a player who has a chance (albeit remote) of first place.

It’s a shame I used my Jack in the Beanstalk pantomime joke in the round five report because, as it turns out, Vlad Kramnik (and not Hikaru Nakamura) was the Giant after all. Today Vlad completed his sweep of the four English players. Luke put up a grand fight, not just to draw but to win, but in the end an extreme case of time trouble was his undoing. Luke fought right through the next time control but it always looked forlorn.

David Howell (above) completed his quota of eight games with a draw with Levon Aronian after a long struggle. Tomorrow he reappears as a commentator. Aronian tried what is an unusual opening for him – the Pirc. (Which far too many British chessplayers pronounce ‘perk’ – one of my pet hates! It is more like ‘peerts’.) This was a very good effort by David Howell against the world number three and allowed him to finish on, if not a ‘high’, at least a ‘medium high’.

The first game to finish was Anand-Carlsen, which was drawn after 33 moves. It started life as a Queen’s Gambit Declined, Tartakower Variation. It followed theory for about 17 moves and then a number of pieces were exchanged, coming down to a fairly arid position, with rook and knight each and symmetrical pawns. “Not your most exciting game ever,” said Lawrence Trent to the players. “It had its moments,” replied Vishy, good-humouredly.

Top US grandmaster Hikaru Nakamura in round eight against...

... former World Championship challenger Nigel Short of Britain

The last game to finish was Nakamura-Short, which started with an English Opening and a Dutch flavour (...f7-f5 being played), not unlike the game Carlsen-Nakamura from last year (which ended in a draw). Before long, the pawns locked across the board like a World War One trench system. They said of that war that it would be “over by Christmas” but Mickey Adams took a look at this game and commented “this could last forever!” With draw offers illegal under the Classic rules, it was a worrying point. A couple of pawns were exchanged at move 31 but it made little difference. A pair of rooks were exchanged at move 73 but that didn’t change anything either. Thankfully the players repeated positions at move 90 and an armistice was signed.

FIDE Open

The last round proved fruitful for India but barren for the home nation. Top seed GM Abhijeet Gupta beat Keith Arkell to secure the first prize with 8/9. IM Sahaj Grover, also of India, finished second on his own with 7½ after beating Peter Wells. Completing the English misery, IM Arghyadip Das beat Jovanka Houska and thus deprived her of a GM norm. Third place was shared by Gawain Jones, Tiger Hillarp Persson, Arghyadip Das, Aaron Summerscale and Lorin D’Costa with 7. Tom Weber of Luxembourg achieved an IM norm.

Jovanka Houska’s quest for a full GM norm came to a tragic end. Her time will come.

Women’s Invitational

The two leaders, IM Dagne Ciuksyte of England and WIM Guliskhan Nakhbayeva of Kazakhstan, both won to score 7½/9 and share first place. For the Kazakh player it brought a WGM norm.

Standings after eight rounds (London scoring)

Standings after eight rounds (traditional scoring)

Schedule and results

All games start at 2 p.m. or 14:00h British time = 15:00h CET, 17:00h Moscow, 7:30 p.m. Chennai, 22:00h Beijing, 01:00 a.m. Melbourne, 03:00 a.m. Auckland (sorry Murray!), 6 a.m. San José, 9 a.m. New York. You can check your location here. Naturally the games will be covered live on the official web site (below) and on Playchess. Stand by for further details on Saturday. The games of the final round start two hours earlier.

Links Official tournament site All games in PGN All ChessBase reports on the Chess Classic 2011 (+ 2010 and 2009) 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 and get immediate access. Or you can get our latest Fritz 13 program, which includes six months free premium membership to Playchess.

Copyright ChessBase

London Chess Classic 2011

The 2011 London Chess Classic is taking place in the Olympia Conference Centre from Saturday, December 3rd until Monday, December 12th, starting at 14:00h London time each day (final round 12:00h). Time controls are classical forty moves in two hours, then twenty moves in one hour and thirty minutes for the rest of the game. A win is counted as three points, a draw as one, and a loss zero. Tiebreaks: 1) number of wins, 2) number of wins with Black, 3) result of the individual game between the tied players. In the unlikely event that there is still a tie then: 4) 2 x 15'+2" games, and if necessary then 5) an Armageddon game: 6'+2" vs 5'+2" with draw odds for Black. If there is a tie involving more than two players then the Rapid games will be conducted as a double round all play all. The total prize fund is €160,000 before tax.

Vlad The Anglocide

Round eight report by John Saunders

There was just one decisive result in the penultimate round: Vladimir Kramnik broke English hearts by beating home player Luke McShane in a long, fluctuating struggle. That put the former world champion two points clear of the field. He has White in the final round and is not someone who is readily beatable with that colour. And in order for Vlad not to finish first (at least on tie-break), something would have to happen that has never happened before at a classical time control: Levon Aronian would have to beat him with Black in tomorrow’s final round.

Let’s run through a few possible last-round permutations. If Vlad wins, of course he takes the title and the 50,000 Euros first prize. If he draws, and Magnus Carlsen fails to win (he’s Black against Nigel Short), the same applies. If Vlad draws and Magnus wins, then Vlad is first on tie-break (an extra black win) but they receive 37,500 Euros each. If Vlady loses, Magnus could jump over him to take first, or if he fails too, Luke McShane can even finish first ahead of Vlad on tie-break (if he beats Vishy) as can Hikaru Nakamura (after a play-off, if he beats Mickey Adams). The upshot of this is that all four boards tomorrow feature a player who has a chance (albeit remote) of first place.

It’s a shame I used my Jack in the Beanstalk pantomime joke in the round five report because, as it turns out, Vlad Kramnik (and not Hikaru Nakamura) was the Giant after all. Today Vlad completed his sweep of the four English players. Luke put up a grand fight, not just to draw but to win, but in the end an extreme case of time trouble was his undoing. Luke fought right through the next time control but it always looked forlorn.

David Howell (above) completed his quota of eight games with a draw with Levon Aronian after a long struggle. Tomorrow he reappears as a commentator. Aronian tried what is an unusual opening for him – the Pirc. (Which far too many British chessplayers pronounce ‘perk’ – one of my pet hates! It is more like ‘peerts’.) This was a very good effort by David Howell against the world number three and allowed him to finish on, if not a ‘high’, at least a ‘medium high’.

The first game to finish was Anand-Carlsen, which was drawn after 33 moves. It started life as a Queen’s Gambit Declined, Tartakower Variation. It followed theory for about 17 moves and then a number of pieces were exchanged, coming down to a fairly arid position, with rook and knight each and symmetrical pawns. “Not your most exciting game ever,” said Lawrence Trent to the players. “It had its moments,” replied Vishy, good-humouredly.

Top US grandmaster Hikaru Nakamura in round eight against...

... former World Championship challenger Nigel Short of Britain

The last game to finish was Nakamura-Short, which started with an English Opening and a Dutch flavour (...f7-f5 being played), not unlike the game Carlsen-Nakamura from last year (which ended in a draw). Before long, the pawns locked across the board like a World War One trench system. They said of that war that it would be “over by Christmas” but Mickey Adams took a look at this game and commented “this could last forever!” With draw offers illegal under the Classic rules, it was a worrying point. A couple of pawns were exchanged at move 31 but it made little difference. A pair of rooks were exchanged at move 73 but that didn’t change anything either. Thankfully the players repeated positions at move 90 and an armistice was signed.

FIDE Open

The last round proved fruitful for India but barren for the home nation. Top seed GM Abhijeet Gupta beat Keith Arkell to secure the first prize with 8/9. IM Sahaj Grover, also of India, finished second on his own with 7½ after beating Peter Wells. Completing the English misery, IM Arghyadip Das beat Jovanka Houska and thus deprived her of a GM norm. Third place was shared by Gawain Jones, Tiger Hillarp Persson, Arghyadip Das, Aaron Summerscale and Lorin D’Costa with 7. Tom Weber of Luxembourg achieved an IM norm.

Jovanka Houska’s quest for a full GM norm came to a tragic end. Her time will come.

Women’s Invitational

The two leaders, IM Dagne Ciuksyte of England and WIM Guliskhan Nakhbayeva of Kazakhstan, both won to score 7½/9 and share first place. For the Kazakh player it brought a WGM norm.

Standings after eight rounds (London scoring)

Standings after eight rounds (traditional scoring)

Schedule and results

All games start at 2 p.m. or 14:00h British time = 15:00h CET, 17:00h Moscow, 7:30 p.m. Chennai, 22:00h Beijing, 01:00 a.m. Melbourne, 03:00 a.m. Auckland (sorry Murray!), 6 a.m. San José, 9 a.m. New York. You can check your location here. Naturally the games will be covered live on the official web site (below) and on Playchess. Stand by for further details on Saturday. The games of the final round start two hours earlier.

Links Official tournament site All games in PGN All ChessBase reports on the Chess Classic 2011 (+ 2010 and 2009) 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 and get immediate access. Or you can get our latest Fritz 13 program, which includes six months free premium membership to Playchess.

Copyright ChessBase