The million dollar Brains in Bahrain match between Vladimir Kramnik and Deep Fritz takes place 2nd-22nd October 2002 (Opening Ceremony 2nd October. Playing days 4, 6, 8, 10, 13, 15, 17 & 19 October, 2002).

Report Nine: Game 5 Report
by Ebrahim Al Mannai

Fritz Wins!! Sunday, 13 October

It was half past five when the Arabian sun was setting on Muharraq island, and Kramnik and Fritz had been going at it for two and a half hours upstairs. Everyone was expecting another long dreary game that would take us up to eight or nine o’clock.

Fritz team before the game:' What you've got to ask yourself is...do you feel lucky?

That’s when I was gracefully swept away by the wonderful Zena Howard (Einstein Chief of Communication, and my immediate supervisor- incidentally). She wanted another chess lesson from her faithful press officer. It was with utmost pleasure I dropped the ten thousand necessary tasks I was performing in order to be seated across the chessboard from the enchanting Ms. Howard.

Kramnik before his unlucky game 5

Of course, mine was not the only heart captured by this fair lady (and, oh, so very fair boss). I felt a pair of envious eyes follow us into the common hall, where we were to innocently play with our wooden pieces. As we reviewed the rook’s move, I sensed his presence lurking in the shadows, waiting for the right moment to intrude and shatter our rapport. We were examining the tricky knight’s move when he revealed himself.

Kramnik answering questions from children. Photo Mig Greengard

Christopher Lutz, with his bright and friendly smile, sat down to join us. He appeared quite fascinated in our chess-101 session. I was a little on-edge to be conducting a chess lesson with Germany’s number one grandmaster sitting right next to me. He seemed very interested in our session. Lutz, who happens to be Kramnik’s second for this match, listened intently to my words. His eyes would hardly look away from the board on which my basic illustrative positions were played. He’d briefly contribute occasionally but, for the most part, he observed us with a silent, and modest, smile.

‘What is he doing?’ I asked myself, ‘How could he possibly be enjoying this?!’

Frans Morsch and Vladimir Kramnik after Game 5

I figured he might have been in a reflective mood, where he’d observe the game from the eyes of a novice. He definitely wasn’t brushing up on the conditions of castling. It was most distracting.

He seemed even more engrossed when my precious Zena and I decided to play an Italian game for practice, going over the general opening principles. It actually got to be quite fun with the three of us- a novice, a tournament player, and a grandmaster - discussing the logic and reasoning behind the different moves. I was just beginning to reluctantly prepare a fierce attack against my dear opponent’s weakened castled position when Aziz, Kramnik’s kickboxing bodyguard approached us with the surprising news:

"He just lost."

Lutz rushes away with Aziz. Zena and I abruptly end our game to go tell the world media about today’s extremely news-worthy result.

After it’s first two games with white, it seems that Fritz might have decided to send the 1.e4 file of its openings database to the recycle bin. For the first time so far in the match, Fritz opened with the queen’s pawn.

The computer’s choice of opening was a successful one. This is not because Fritz eventually won the game (this was due to a two-move blunder by Kramnik!), but because Fritz exhibited its best play so far in the match, never quite letting go of the (mostly minute) pressure it exerted on Black’s position.

Another first-time happening is that the queens managed to survive the beginning of the game, and actually stayed on the board until the end. This was the most favourable change Team Fritz could have hoped for.

Kramnik signing autographs. Photo Mig Greengard

Despite the result, Kramnik’s conduct of the opening was that of a world champion. His handling of the black side of this QGD resulted in no serious weakness and a practically equal position. At one point, Kramnik decided not to enter a variation which forces the queen trade (move 12- see game below), probably because he’d assessed White’s resulting position as being too advantageous. The champ opted for safe exchanges and simplification, obviously aiming for a draw.

Fritz Team after Game 5. Photo Mig Greengard

It was only in the endgame when Kramnik was forced to lose a pawn. He then had to reckon with the possibility of defending an objectively-drawn but very difficult queen and pawn endgame; with 4 vs. 3 pawns on the kingside. He later claimed that defending such an endgame would require an adjournment- or perhaps a double adjournment- and much mental energy to play (and for a draw, at that). It was perhaps the thought of this daunting scenario which caused him to blunder away his knight, with 15 minutes left on his clock.

The losing move

At the following press conference, Vlad claimed to have had seen that 34. ..Qc4 loses the knight to 35. Ne7+ and that he had moved on to examine other candidate moves only to return to 34…Qc4, forgetting the reason he’d dismissed it. Personally, as a mortal chessplayer, I find this somewhat encouraging. The fact that even a player the like of Kramnik would fall into the “I-saw-it-and-then-forgot" type of oversight. Of course, after this fatal error, Kramnik resigned.

Deep Fritz - Kramnik, Vladimir [D57]
Brains in Bahrain (5), 13.10.2002

1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nf3 d5 4.Nc3 Be7 5.Bg5 Having faced accusations of playing too many Kasparov openings, Deep Fritz adopts a Karpov favourite today. 5...h6 6.Bh4 0-0 7.e3 Ne4 The Lasker variation 8.Bxe7 Qxe7 9.cxd5 Nxc3 10.bxc3 exd5 11.Qb3 Rd8 probably better than 11...c6, which restricts both of Black's minor pieces. 12.c4 dxc4 Instead of this, the GM team of commentators were examining what looks like a forced queen exchange: [ 12...Nc6 13.cxd5 Qb4+] 13.Bxc4 Nc6 14.Be2

This avoids the possibility of losing a tempo and the capture of White's good bishop after 14...Na5. 14...b6 15.0-0 Bb7 16.Rfc1 Rac8

Preparing for an eventual ...c5 pawn break to butt heads with White's rock-solid d-pawn. 17.Qa4 Na5 18.Rc3 c5 19.Rac1 cxd4 20.Nxd4 Rxc3 21.Rxc3 Rc8 22.Rxc8+ Bxc8

Entering this endgame, Black's ace-in-the-hole is his queenside pawn majority. This could materialize into a dreaded distant passed pawn, but only if Black trades off the pieces first! Currently, White's knight is powerfully centralised while the poor Black winny on a5 might as well be off the board. 23.h3 g6 [ 23...Bd7 24.Qc2 Qd6 enabling 25...Nc6 and preventing 25. Qc7 25.Qe4 Nc6 26.Bd3 Nxd4?? 27.Qa8+! (Pein).] 24.Bf3 Bd7 25.Qc2 Qc5 26.Qe4 Qc1+ 27.Kh2 Qc7+

I suspect the purpose behind the queen checks was to help reach the time control. 28.g3 Nc4 the knight finally joins the battle. 29.Be2! Excellent maneuvering by Fritz! It rightly anticipates the advance of Black's queenside pawns, beginning with 29...b5 to support the knight, but then 30. a4! a6 31. Qa8+ nails it. 29...Ne5

At this point, most humans- including the grandmasters here- would probably kick the knight with 30. f4. According to Frans Morsch, this move was what the machine was considering as its best option for a while, until it happened upon 30.Bb5! Bxb5 31.Nxb5 Qc5 Black cannot hold on to his a-pawn. 32.Nxa7 Qa5 33.Kg2 Qxa2 34.Nc8

In this position, Kramnik played the worst move of his world championship career. 34...Qc4?? 35.Ne7+ 1-0