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Dark Knight / Le Chevalier Noir
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---- Nous avons besoin d'un traduction français!
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I once successfully downloaded all the FICS games (in PGN format - and there were a lot fewer than 200 million games) to do some analysis on them, but Chessbase crashed after converting about 15 million of them - I couldn't create one big CB file out of them. :-)
Anand Outprepares Aronian to Join Nakamura in the Lead
by Marc Lang
Its nice to see Marc Lang getting more exposure. Who is Marc lang? - the World Blindfold Chess Champion
Lawrence Trent and Jan Gustafsson are the commentators
Anand beats Nakamura to take the lead in the tournament.
Comments by Ramirez from the official site:
“Nakamura might have played too passively today. His decision to trade the knights on e5 and pull back with the bishop to g7 left him basically down a piece in the important queenside battle. Anand took full advantage of the situation, penetrating first with his major pieces and then bringing his knight to finish off the attack. Nakamura tried to lash out in the kingside with g5, but was quickly stopped by a nice sequence by Anand, forcing the American to close down the kingside again! With that battleground closed the immense pressure from White's pieces on the queenside proved too much; Nakamura's position simply collapsed.”
- Nice to see Vishy vs Naka postmortem...Man they are still fighting
- Naka is a sore loser
- Best sport after losing probably Levon, not easy to get up there and go over why you lost
- Naka is frustrated, he went through Gibraltar without a loss, this is his first loss in classical in a while... frustration is apparent.
A little non-chess joke on chessbomb made me laugh:
Two psychiatrists meet each other: first to second: "You are fine, how am I?"
This is Anand’s first win in classical chess over Nakamura.
______
Second game to finish is Aronian-Caruana. In contrast to the game above, this post mortem has a lot of laughter.
(Ramirez) - Aronian tried to prove that his queenside pressure was sufficient for the advantage, while Caruana turtled inside his solid pawn structure and hoped that his lack of weaknesses would allow him to have enough time to finish his development.
Even though these positions are always more pleasant for White, they are extremely difficult to crack. Aronian was unable to put real pressure on his opponent's position. After the Italian was able to exchange knights it was clear that White's edge had evaporated and the draw was agreed.
(Ramirez) - A rather odd opening choice from Kramnik, as after a very, very unusual transposition the players reached a variation of the 3.g3 Paulsen Sicilian, one in which Black was up a tempo as he did not have to waste time going e7-e6 and only then e6-e5.
Black did not experience any serious difficulties from the opening. He was able to equalize comfortably with his break on d5, and even though White had aggressively expanded on the kingside his attack there was halted and Kramnik had to be careful not to over-extend his position as his king did not have the pawn cover to protect him anymore.
After a series of trades down the e-file and the simplification of most of the queenside the players reached time control. Black was active, but he had no targets while White's king was too weak for his pieces to leave him undefended. Since neither side could make progress the draw was agreed.
The two Russian players with German-Swiss Yannick Pelletier but the post mortem is in English.
Marathon has made Anand the betting favourite (at 31/10) tomorrow against the tournament leader, Nakamura, despite the fact that he's never beaten Hikaru in 13 opportunities (4 losses and 9 draws) at classical time controls. And oddly enough, all 4 of those losses were with the White pieces which Anand will have tomorrow (:
We would have to be a little more specific about "more recorded games of chess than anyone in history". There are 204,201,058 games in the FICS database, and I'm sure that there are players with a lot more than 5,000 "recorded games" there! :-)
They did mean grandmasters and classical tournament games (not exhibition games or various forms of rapid). GM Timman would be second but well behind. But you are right - they should have been more specific.
Marathon is going the same route tomorrow, making Karjakin the betting favourite at 69/20 against the new tournament leader, Anand, despite the fact that Karjakin has never beaten Anand at any time control. He's plus zero, minus 2, equal 10 at classical chess and an abysmal plus zero, minus 6, equal 6 at quicker time controls for a composite plus zero, minus 8, equal 16.
Marathon is going the same route tomorrow, making Karjakin the betting favourite at 69/20 against the new tournament leader, Anand, despite the fact that Karjakin has never beaten Anand at any time control.
That seems like a lousy metric to me. After all Fischer had never beaten Spassky prior to the 1972 match.
True enough, Ed, but the sample size there was insignificant, a mere 5 games and only 1 in the 5 years preceding the match. With Nakamura losing to Anand today, and Grischuk to Tomashevsky, it certainly wasn't a good day for my empirical metric. And even if Karjakin does 'upset' Anand tomorrow, 3 games would not shake my confidence in this metric in the least (:
Last edited by Jack Maguire; Wednesday, 18th February, 2015, 01:49 AM.
Marathon is going the same route tomorrow, making Karjakin the betting favourite at 69/20 against the new tournament leader, Anand, despite the fact that Karjakin has never beaten Anand at any time control. He's plus zero, minus 2, equal 10 at classical chess and an abysmal plus zero, minus 6, equal 6 at quicker time controls for a composite plus zero, minus 8, equal 16.
You have to get it right to win a bet.
I don't gamble on chess games but figure a draw could be the outcome of that Anand game. I'm not sure of what they use for tie break. I think they showed the S/B tie break numbers. If that's the tie break system Anand might only need a draw to win the event but I haven't really figured it out. He's won their individual game.
The tournament doesn't end tomorrow, Gary. They play 5 Rapid games on Thursday with those games counting at 1/2 the rate of the Classical games (i.e. 1 for a win and a 1/2 point for a draw as opposed to the 2 for a win and 1 for a draw that they've been using for the Classical games).
The commentators are Jan Gustafsson and Ilja Zaragatski.
I believe Lawrence Trent is off trying to get another leg of his grandmaster norm.
They talk about Karjakin, who would have played Anand for the World Championship if Carlsen hadn’t signed the contract for himself to do so. Karjakin doesn’t seem to be much in the equation this cycle.
This question is tweeted to the guys – Anand hardly looks at the board when it’s his move. Do top players find it easier to calculate without reference to the board?
For pure calculation Jan likes to look at the board. To get some distance and objectivity, it is good to look away from the board. Often when you look away your are trying to access your theoretical lines or remember a game or a typical structure. There is a theory that if you look to the upper left, you are trying to access your long-term memory.
Ilja says that when you see a move you like, your pupils dilate and wonders if this is why poker players wear sunglasses so their opponents won’t see this interest/dilation.
It turns out that Jan has written a book on poker. It is only in German. Poker für Gewinner. Der systematische Weg zum Erfolg im Limit Texas Holdem. (Pokerschule) Taschenbuch (2007) von Marcel Luske und Jan Gustafsson.
Chessgames.com has this interesting quote:
"German Olympian Jan Gustafsson was motivated to learn poker when he went to New York City to visit his friend Yakov Hirsch, who was once a chess coach struggling to pay the rent. Yakov had just become a poker pro, had already bought a fancy car and designer clothes, and was dining regularly in restaurants like Nobu and Peter Lugar's, among the most expensive in New York City. Impressed by his friend's newfound luxury, Jan convinced Yakov to teach him. Only a year and a half later, Jan is making three times as much money in poker than he earns in chess. Still, he divides his time equally between the two games."
- Jennifer Shahade (NIC Mag 2006 #1)
________
Nakamura and Aronian shake hands
Zurich 2015 Classical
Round 5, Feb. 18
Nakamura, Hikaru – Aronian, Levon
C67 Ruy Lopez, Berlin Defence, Open Variation
At the post mortem they talk about the standard positions in the Giuoco. Fabiano says that they have been re-evaluated in the last few years. It seems like they could analyze for hours – the bottom line – it was draw all the way.
Tomorrow, the second part of the competition will begin: the competitors will play a second round, but in a Rapids. Points will be awarded on a typical system +1 = 0.5 -0, the winner of the entire tournament will be determined by the sum of the points obtained in the classics and rapid.
(ChessBase) - The bottom three players with 2.0/5 now have 4.0/10, way below Anand's 7.0/10. Only a miracle would allow Karjakin, Aronian or Caruana to win the tournament, but if there is one time control in which miracles do happen, that is rapid!
There are betting lines on all Rapid games tomorrow. Draw odds are significantly higher since there are fewer draws at Rapid. Kramnik would seem to be the weakest link since he's the only player here with a Rapid rating (2770) less than 2800 (:
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