17th Amber Tournament. Levon Aronian
having already secured victory with a round to go in the
combined and rapid sections also shared first in the blindfold section
along with Kramnik, Morozevich and Topalov.
John Watson has a program called Chess Talk on
ICC Chess.fm. Tuesday 29th sees him interview Jonathan Berry.
Tuesday 22nd April saw him interview Bill Hook who has played in many
Olympiads and has just release a Book on
his many experiences
TWIC Theory is an electronic monthly magazine with high quality
articles delivered in PGN and PDF format on the 25th of every month.
You can still get the back issues.
Number 35 September 2007. Benko Gambit - Main Line/ The Latest Trends
in the post-Topalov period By GM Alex Finkel
M-Tel Masters takes place 7th-18th May 2008 in the Central Military
Club in the Bulgarian capital Sofia. The event is a 10 round double
round robin with a 5 hour time control.
In the event of a tie for first a tie break will be employed. As in the
previous three editions of the M-Tel Masters the Sofia rules concerning
draws will apply. Players cannot offer draws and a game can only be
declared drawn by the Chief Arbiter.
The 1st FIDE Grand Prix took place in Baku, Azerbaijan
20th April - 6th May 2008. Vugar Gashimov, Wang Yue and Magnus Carlsen shared first place on 8/11.
The IX European Individual Chess Championship took place in Plovdiv,
Bulgaria 20th April - 4th May 2008. Sergei Tiviakov took the
men's title with 8.5/11 half a point clear of the field, Sergei Movsessian took the silver after beating Sergey Volkov
in the playoffs. Kateryna Lahno won the women's event also with 8.5/11 half a point clear. Viktorija Cmylite beat
Anna Ushenina in the playoffs to take the silver.
The 16th Sigeman & Co Chess Tournament took place 22nd - 30th April
2008 in Malmo,Sweden. Tiger Hillarp Persson took clear first place with 7.5/9 a point clear of Daniel Stellwagen.
The New FIDE Rating list for April 2008 is out. Viswanathan Anand heads the April FIDE list alone with a rating of 2803 15 points clear
of Vladimir Kramnik. Alexander Morozevich has moved into 3rd position after his win
in the Russian Championships. Veselin Topalov lies in 4th place after losing 13 rating points. In 5th
place is Magnus Carlsen who gains 32 points has arrived in the top 10 for the first
and more than likely a very long stay.
The Russian Team Championship took place in Dagomys, Sochi
1st-14th April 2008. A very strong field competed. The winners with a round to
spare were Ural - Ekaterinburg the only team with an average rating
above 2700 (Radjabov, Shirov, Kamsky, Grischuk, Malakhov, Akopian, Dreev and Motylev).
My thanks to Jonathan Berry for the final crosstable.
The Dutch Championship took place takes place 2nd - 13th April 2008 in a
television studio (Studio 2) in Hilversum Media Park. First prize was EUR 10.000.
Jan Smeets took the title with a final round win against Daniel Stellwagen.
Peng Zhaoqin dominated the women's event and won with 8/9.
The line ups for the FIDE Grand Prix events have
been announced. The top four players in the world, along with players
such as Morozevich and Shirov are missing. All this was more or less
known beforehand. However the players who have signed up make this a
very attractive and interesting series of events. The grand prix is
organised by Global Chess which is headed by Bessel Kok.
M-Tel Masters takes place 7th-18th May 2008 in the Central Military
Club in the Bulgarian capital Sofia. The event is a 10 round double
round robin with a 5 hour time control. In case of a draw at the top
there will be a tie break for determining the winner. Like in the
previous three editions of M-Tel Masters the rule for the draws
introduced in Sofia will be valid. According to it the players do not
have the right to agree a draw. This can be decided only by the chef
arbiter of the tournament.
World Championship Match
Anand against Kramnik in Bonn.
The World Championship match where Viswanathan Anand
will defends his World title against Vladimir Kramnik in Bonn, Germany
will now take place October 14th– 2nd November, 2008. The main reason
for the slight change in dates is to fit in with the sponsors and
politicians ability to attend the opening. The main sponsor is Evonik
Industries AG and the prizemoney 1,5 Million Euro. The contract was
signed by both players 18th December 2007.
Dates for the match: Gm1: Oct 14th, Gm2: Oct 15th, Gm3:
Oct 17th, Gm4: Oct 18th, Gm5: Oct 20th, Gm6: Oct 21st, Gm7: Oct 23rd,
Gm8: Oct 24th, Gm9: Oct 26th, Gm10: Oct 27th, Gm11: Oct 29th, Gm12: Oct
31st, Tiebreak Nov 2nd.
