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Re: U.S. Championships, St. Louis 2017
U.S. Championships
April 9, 2017
Round Eleven (continued)
A caller suggests that after a draw, that the two combatants have to play a ten-minute game and if there is a draw again, then they play a five-minute game.
Jennifer loves the idea and she doesn’t think if that rule were in operation, that Daniel would have forced the draw today, because he would be playing rapid chess against Wesley.
Maurice says that Greg Shahade, Jennifer’s older brother, and Alejandro Ramirez favour that idea too. But the one who has expanded on it is Fabiano’s second in this contest - Rustam Kasimdzhanov made this suggestion back in 2011:
And here is how it works. We play classical chess, say with a time control of four to five hours. Draw? No problem – change the colours, give us 20 minutes each and replay. Draw again? Ten minutes each, change the colours and replay. Until there is a winner of that day. And the winner wins the game and gets one point and the loser gets zero; and the game is rated accordingly, irrelevant of whether it came in a classical game, rapid or blitz.
This way the expectations of the crowd will never be deceived. There will always be a winner, there will always be blood. There will come an age of great champions, since with this system there will be times when Vishy or Magnus will win Wijk-aan-Zee with 13 out of 13; and there will be winning streaks, when some of the great champions will win 50 games in a row. We'll make front pages.
See:
https://en.chessbase.com/post/kasimd...ith-a-proposal
For replies to this proposal, see:
https://en.chessbase.com/post/kasimd...-readers-react
_______
A caller asks which games of this tournament could a lower-rated player study for his profit? Yasser answers that the gem has been the brilliant game between Wesley So and Jeffery Xiong, a complicated game where Wesley uncorked a beautiful combination that lasted many moves. The game between Fabiano and Yaroslav, where Yaroslav limited his opponents play and carried this through with great patience to the win. Jennifer mentions a close study of the endgames.
Yaroslav comes in to talk with Maurice, saying that he had been just hoping to survive and then near the end, ran out of energy. He lost two games as white and so has to work on his repertoire as white. He is a student at St. Louis University with Alejandro Ramirez as his chess coach. He finished a game against Daniel at 6:05 and had to run to attend a lecture at 6:00!
Jeffery Xiong had a tough tournament. He says that ever since Round Four, the cards were against him. He was spending too much time on single moves. He also walked into some nasty preparation. It was just not his event. After his loss to Gata Kamsky, he lost a lot of confidence and played slower after that. His next event is the Spring Classic in St. Louis in May.
He will be representing the US in the World Team in Khanty-Mansiysk, Russia. He says that is a dream come true to play for the U.S. This competition takes place June 16 to June 28 of this year.
Maurice also talks to Daaim Shabazz, who has written the biography of Emory Tate. He has been doing the site The Chess Drum for fifteen years. Emory would send him emails about his endeavours and when he passed in November of 2015, Daaim knew that writing the biography was something he had to do.
Maurice said that he didn’t have time to do a biography, he was a five times Air Force Champion, spoke Russian fluently, had a lot of grandmaster scalps and could dramatically explain his wins. After his win against Kudrin, he gave a post mortem performance that had the audience applauding.
http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1272523
His favourite game was one against Yudasin in 1997. Emory spoke eight languages and could describe his games in any one of them.
Daaim also put three of Emory’s losses in the book and probably Emory would not have liked that.
______
Kamsky-Onischuk is looking like a draw. Akobian had an advantage at first, missed something around move 27 but now has a severe time disadvantage against Nakamura with 10 moves to make in 8 minutes against 56 for his opponent. Jennifer thinks things don’t look good for him and he may be left out of the party tomorrow.
In the endgame, it looks lost for Akobian; Nakamura is in control.
Fabi wins his game against Ray Robson. No one paid any attention to it during the day. At the end he had two queens on the board. If he had not lost to Akobian when two pawns up, he would have been fighting for his title. He tells Maurice that it was one of his most interesting games of the tournament.
He is leaving tomorrow to play in Baden-Baden. He will be in Paris for the Grand Chess Tour later on.
Varuzhan Akobian has just resigned to Hikaru Nakamura, so the playoff tomorrow will be between Wesley So and Alexander Onischuk.
Hikaru is heading off to Switzerland for his next tournament. He says that Wesley is 90% certain of winning the playoff tomorrow.
Varuzhan thanks his second, Akshat Chandra (born 1999) for his preparation in this tournament. Too bad that Nakamura didn’t play 1.e4 (everyone laughs).
The games:
Round 11, Apr. 9, 2017
Naroditsky, Daniel – So, Wesley
C67 Ruy Lopez, open Berlin Defence
1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 Nf6 4.O-O Nxe4 5.d4 Nd6 6.dxe5 Nxb5 7.a4 Nbd4 8.Nxd4 Nxd4 9.Qxd4 d5 10.exd6 Qxd6 11.Qe4+ Qe6 12.Qd4 Qd6 13.Qe4+ Qe6 14.Qd4 Qd6 1/2-1/2
Round 11, Apr. 9, 2017
Nakamura, Hikaru – Akobian, Varuzhan
A07 Reti, King’s Indian Attack, Yugoslav variation
1.Nf3 Nf6 2.g3 d5 3.Bg2 c6 4.O-O Bg4 5.h3 Bxf3 6.Bxf3 Nbd7 7.d4 e6 8.Nd2 Be7 9.e4 dxe4 10.Nxe4 Nxe4 11.Bxe4 Nf6 12.Bg2 Qb6 13.c3 O-O 14.Qe2 Rfe8 15.Kh2 Rad8 16.b4 a5 17.bxa5 Qxa5 18.Bd2 Qa4 19.Rfb1 Rd7 20.Rb3 Rc8 21.Be1 b5 22.Rc1 c5 23.d5 exd5 24.Rxb5 c4 25.Rcb1 Bd6 26.Qd1 Qxd1 27.Rxd1 Be7 28.a4 Ra8 29.a5 Bd8 30.Ra1 Rda7 31.Bxd5 Nxd5 32.Rxd5 Bxa5 33.Bd2 h6 34.Be3 Ra6 35.Ra3 Bc7 36.Rxa6 Rxa6 37.Rc5 Bd6 38.Rc8+ Kh7 39.Rxc4 Be5 40.Rc8 Ra3 41.c4 Kg6 42.Kg2 h5 43.Re8 f6 44.Re7 Rc3 45.c5 Kh7 46.Kf1 Rc4 47.Ke2 Kg6 48.Kd3 Rc3+ 49.Ke4 h4 50.g4 Bh2 51.f4 Rc2 52.Kd3 Ra2 53.c6 Ra6 54.c7 Rc6 55.Kd4 f5 56.Kd5 1-0
Round 11, Apr. 9, 2017
Kamsky, Gata – Onischuk, Alexander
C78 Ruy Lopez, Moeller Defence
1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 a6 4.Ba4 Nf6 5.O-O Bc5 6.c3 b5 7.Bb3 d6 8.d4 Bb6 9.a4 Bg4 10.axb5 axb5 11.Rxa8 Qxa8 12.h3 Bh5 13.d5 Ne7 14.Bc2 Qc8 15.Qe2 O-O 16.Bg5 Ng6 17.Nbd2 h6 18.Be3 Bxe3 19.Qxe3 Bxf3 20.Qxf3 b4 21.Ra1 Qb7 22.g3 Ra8 23.Rxa8+ Qxa8 24.cxb4 Qa1+ 25.Kg2 Qxb2 26.Qb3 Qd4 27.Nf3 Qa7 28.Qc4 Ne7 29.Qb5 g6 30.Qa5 Qb8 1/2-1/2
Round 11, Apr. 9, 2017
Robson, Ray – Caruana, Fabiano
C11 French Defence
1.e4 e6 2.d4 d5 3.Nc3 Nf6 4.e5 Nfd7 5.Nce2 c5 6.c3 Nc6 7.Nf3 Qa5 8.a3 cxd4 9.b4 Qc7 10.cxd4 b5 11.Nf4 Qb6 12.Rb1 a5 13.bxa5 Rxa5 14.Bd3 Ba6 15.O-O Bxa3 16.Be3 Be7 17.Qd2 g6 18.Rfc1 b4 19.h4 Ra3 20.Bxa6 Qxa6 21.Nh3 Na5 22.Bg5 Nb3 23.Rxb3 Rxb3 24.Qe2 Qa8 25.Qb5 Rc3 26.Rxc3 bxc3 27.Bxe7 Qa1+ 28.Kh2 Kxe7 29.Qb4+ Kd8 30.Nfg5 Rf8 31.Nxh7 c2 32.Nxf8 c1=Q 33.Nxd7 Kxd7 34.Qd6+ Kc8 35.Qf8+ Kb7 36.Qxf7+ Qc7 37.Qxg6 Qxd4 38.f4 Qe4 39.Qxe6 Qg7 40.g4 Qc7 0-1
Round 11, Apr. 9, 2017
Xiong, Jeffery – Zherebukh, Yarolslav
E60 King’s Indian
1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 g6 3.g3 c6 4.Bg2 d5 5.cxd5 cxd5 6.Nf3 Bg7 7.Nc3 Ne4 8.Qa4+ Nc6 9.Ne5 Nxc3 10.bxc3 O-O 11.Nxc6 bxc6 12.O-O Qb6 13.Ba3 Qa6 14.Qxa6 Bxa6 15.Rfb1 Rfb8 16.Bxe7 Bxe2 17.Bd6 Rd8 18.Bc5 Bf8 19.Bxf8 Kxf8 20.Rb7 Rdb8 21.Rc7 Rc8 22.Rd7 Rd8 23.Rc7 Rdc8 24.Rd7 Rd8 25.Rc7 Rdc8 26.Rd7 Rd8 1/2-1/2
Round 11, Apr. 9, 2017
Shabalov, Alexander – Shankland, Samuel
B82 Sicilian, Scheveningen, Tal variation
1.e4 c5 2.Nc3 d6 3.f4 Nc6 4.Nf3 e6 5.d4 cxd4 6.Nxd4 Nf6 7.Be3 Be7 8.Qf3 e5 9.Nf5 Bxf5 10.exf5 O-O 11.O-O-O Qa5 12.Bc4 Rac8 13.Bb3 exf4 14.Qxf4 Rfe8 15.Kb1 Bd8 16.g4 Qe5 17.Qxe5 Rxe5 18.Bf4 Ra5 19.h3 Bc7 20.Bxd6 Bxd6 21.Rxd6 Kf8 22.Rhd1 h6 23.a3 Re5 24.R6d3 Rce8 25.Nd5 Ne4 26.Nc7 Rc8 27.Rd7 Re7 28.Nb5 a6 29.Rxe7 Nxe7 30.Rd4 Nf2 31.Nc3 Nxh3 32.Rd7 Nf2 33.Nd5 Nc6 34.Nb6 Ne5 35.Rxb7 Rd8 36.c4 Ne4 37.Rc7 Rb8 38.c5 Nxc5 39.Rxc5 Rxb6 40.Rxe5 Rxb3 41.Ra5 Rb6 42.Re5 1/2-1/2
Final Standing
1-2 So, Onischuk 7.0
3-5 Nakamura, Akobian, Caruana 6.5
6 Zherebukh 5.5
7-9 Kamsky, Shankland, Naroditsky 5.0
10 Robson 4.5
11 Xiong 4.0
12 Shabalov 3.5
U.S. Championships
April 9, 2017
Round Eleven (continued)
A caller suggests that after a draw, that the two combatants have to play a ten-minute game and if there is a draw again, then they play a five-minute game.
Jennifer loves the idea and she doesn’t think if that rule were in operation, that Daniel would have forced the draw today, because he would be playing rapid chess against Wesley.
Maurice says that Greg Shahade, Jennifer’s older brother, and Alejandro Ramirez favour that idea too. But the one who has expanded on it is Fabiano’s second in this contest - Rustam Kasimdzhanov made this suggestion back in 2011:
And here is how it works. We play classical chess, say with a time control of four to five hours. Draw? No problem – change the colours, give us 20 minutes each and replay. Draw again? Ten minutes each, change the colours and replay. Until there is a winner of that day. And the winner wins the game and gets one point and the loser gets zero; and the game is rated accordingly, irrelevant of whether it came in a classical game, rapid or blitz.
This way the expectations of the crowd will never be deceived. There will always be a winner, there will always be blood. There will come an age of great champions, since with this system there will be times when Vishy or Magnus will win Wijk-aan-Zee with 13 out of 13; and there will be winning streaks, when some of the great champions will win 50 games in a row. We'll make front pages.
See:
https://en.chessbase.com/post/kasimd...ith-a-proposal
For replies to this proposal, see:
https://en.chessbase.com/post/kasimd...-readers-react
_______
A caller asks which games of this tournament could a lower-rated player study for his profit? Yasser answers that the gem has been the brilliant game between Wesley So and Jeffery Xiong, a complicated game where Wesley uncorked a beautiful combination that lasted many moves. The game between Fabiano and Yaroslav, where Yaroslav limited his opponents play and carried this through with great patience to the win. Jennifer mentions a close study of the endgames.
Yaroslav comes in to talk with Maurice, saying that he had been just hoping to survive and then near the end, ran out of energy. He lost two games as white and so has to work on his repertoire as white. He is a student at St. Louis University with Alejandro Ramirez as his chess coach. He finished a game against Daniel at 6:05 and had to run to attend a lecture at 6:00!
Jeffery Xiong had a tough tournament. He says that ever since Round Four, the cards were against him. He was spending too much time on single moves. He also walked into some nasty preparation. It was just not his event. After his loss to Gata Kamsky, he lost a lot of confidence and played slower after that. His next event is the Spring Classic in St. Louis in May.
He will be representing the US in the World Team in Khanty-Mansiysk, Russia. He says that is a dream come true to play for the U.S. This competition takes place June 16 to June 28 of this year.
Maurice also talks to Daaim Shabazz, who has written the biography of Emory Tate. He has been doing the site The Chess Drum for fifteen years. Emory would send him emails about his endeavours and when he passed in November of 2015, Daaim knew that writing the biography was something he had to do.
Maurice said that he didn’t have time to do a biography, he was a five times Air Force Champion, spoke Russian fluently, had a lot of grandmaster scalps and could dramatically explain his wins. After his win against Kudrin, he gave a post mortem performance that had the audience applauding.
http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1272523
His favourite game was one against Yudasin in 1997. Emory spoke eight languages and could describe his games in any one of them.
Daaim also put three of Emory’s losses in the book and probably Emory would not have liked that.
______
Kamsky-Onischuk is looking like a draw. Akobian had an advantage at first, missed something around move 27 but now has a severe time disadvantage against Nakamura with 10 moves to make in 8 minutes against 56 for his opponent. Jennifer thinks things don’t look good for him and he may be left out of the party tomorrow.
In the endgame, it looks lost for Akobian; Nakamura is in control.
Fabi wins his game against Ray Robson. No one paid any attention to it during the day. At the end he had two queens on the board. If he had not lost to Akobian when two pawns up, he would have been fighting for his title. He tells Maurice that it was one of his most interesting games of the tournament.
He is leaving tomorrow to play in Baden-Baden. He will be in Paris for the Grand Chess Tour later on.
Varuzhan Akobian has just resigned to Hikaru Nakamura, so the playoff tomorrow will be between Wesley So and Alexander Onischuk.
Hikaru is heading off to Switzerland for his next tournament. He says that Wesley is 90% certain of winning the playoff tomorrow.
Varuzhan thanks his second, Akshat Chandra (born 1999) for his preparation in this tournament. Too bad that Nakamura didn’t play 1.e4 (everyone laughs).
The games:
Round 11, Apr. 9, 2017
Naroditsky, Daniel – So, Wesley
C67 Ruy Lopez, open Berlin Defence
1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 Nf6 4.O-O Nxe4 5.d4 Nd6 6.dxe5 Nxb5 7.a4 Nbd4 8.Nxd4 Nxd4 9.Qxd4 d5 10.exd6 Qxd6 11.Qe4+ Qe6 12.Qd4 Qd6 13.Qe4+ Qe6 14.Qd4 Qd6 1/2-1/2
Round 11, Apr. 9, 2017
Nakamura, Hikaru – Akobian, Varuzhan
A07 Reti, King’s Indian Attack, Yugoslav variation
1.Nf3 Nf6 2.g3 d5 3.Bg2 c6 4.O-O Bg4 5.h3 Bxf3 6.Bxf3 Nbd7 7.d4 e6 8.Nd2 Be7 9.e4 dxe4 10.Nxe4 Nxe4 11.Bxe4 Nf6 12.Bg2 Qb6 13.c3 O-O 14.Qe2 Rfe8 15.Kh2 Rad8 16.b4 a5 17.bxa5 Qxa5 18.Bd2 Qa4 19.Rfb1 Rd7 20.Rb3 Rc8 21.Be1 b5 22.Rc1 c5 23.d5 exd5 24.Rxb5 c4 25.Rcb1 Bd6 26.Qd1 Qxd1 27.Rxd1 Be7 28.a4 Ra8 29.a5 Bd8 30.Ra1 Rda7 31.Bxd5 Nxd5 32.Rxd5 Bxa5 33.Bd2 h6 34.Be3 Ra6 35.Ra3 Bc7 36.Rxa6 Rxa6 37.Rc5 Bd6 38.Rc8+ Kh7 39.Rxc4 Be5 40.Rc8 Ra3 41.c4 Kg6 42.Kg2 h5 43.Re8 f6 44.Re7 Rc3 45.c5 Kh7 46.Kf1 Rc4 47.Ke2 Kg6 48.Kd3 Rc3+ 49.Ke4 h4 50.g4 Bh2 51.f4 Rc2 52.Kd3 Ra2 53.c6 Ra6 54.c7 Rc6 55.Kd4 f5 56.Kd5 1-0
Round 11, Apr. 9, 2017
Kamsky, Gata – Onischuk, Alexander
C78 Ruy Lopez, Moeller Defence
1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 a6 4.Ba4 Nf6 5.O-O Bc5 6.c3 b5 7.Bb3 d6 8.d4 Bb6 9.a4 Bg4 10.axb5 axb5 11.Rxa8 Qxa8 12.h3 Bh5 13.d5 Ne7 14.Bc2 Qc8 15.Qe2 O-O 16.Bg5 Ng6 17.Nbd2 h6 18.Be3 Bxe3 19.Qxe3 Bxf3 20.Qxf3 b4 21.Ra1 Qb7 22.g3 Ra8 23.Rxa8+ Qxa8 24.cxb4 Qa1+ 25.Kg2 Qxb2 26.Qb3 Qd4 27.Nf3 Qa7 28.Qc4 Ne7 29.Qb5 g6 30.Qa5 Qb8 1/2-1/2
Round 11, Apr. 9, 2017
Robson, Ray – Caruana, Fabiano
C11 French Defence
1.e4 e6 2.d4 d5 3.Nc3 Nf6 4.e5 Nfd7 5.Nce2 c5 6.c3 Nc6 7.Nf3 Qa5 8.a3 cxd4 9.b4 Qc7 10.cxd4 b5 11.Nf4 Qb6 12.Rb1 a5 13.bxa5 Rxa5 14.Bd3 Ba6 15.O-O Bxa3 16.Be3 Be7 17.Qd2 g6 18.Rfc1 b4 19.h4 Ra3 20.Bxa6 Qxa6 21.Nh3 Na5 22.Bg5 Nb3 23.Rxb3 Rxb3 24.Qe2 Qa8 25.Qb5 Rc3 26.Rxc3 bxc3 27.Bxe7 Qa1+ 28.Kh2 Kxe7 29.Qb4+ Kd8 30.Nfg5 Rf8 31.Nxh7 c2 32.Nxf8 c1=Q 33.Nxd7 Kxd7 34.Qd6+ Kc8 35.Qf8+ Kb7 36.Qxf7+ Qc7 37.Qxg6 Qxd4 38.f4 Qe4 39.Qxe6 Qg7 40.g4 Qc7 0-1
Round 11, Apr. 9, 2017
Xiong, Jeffery – Zherebukh, Yarolslav
E60 King’s Indian
1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 g6 3.g3 c6 4.Bg2 d5 5.cxd5 cxd5 6.Nf3 Bg7 7.Nc3 Ne4 8.Qa4+ Nc6 9.Ne5 Nxc3 10.bxc3 O-O 11.Nxc6 bxc6 12.O-O Qb6 13.Ba3 Qa6 14.Qxa6 Bxa6 15.Rfb1 Rfb8 16.Bxe7 Bxe2 17.Bd6 Rd8 18.Bc5 Bf8 19.Bxf8 Kxf8 20.Rb7 Rdb8 21.Rc7 Rc8 22.Rd7 Rd8 23.Rc7 Rdc8 24.Rd7 Rd8 25.Rc7 Rdc8 26.Rd7 Rd8 1/2-1/2
Round 11, Apr. 9, 2017
Shabalov, Alexander – Shankland, Samuel
B82 Sicilian, Scheveningen, Tal variation
1.e4 c5 2.Nc3 d6 3.f4 Nc6 4.Nf3 e6 5.d4 cxd4 6.Nxd4 Nf6 7.Be3 Be7 8.Qf3 e5 9.Nf5 Bxf5 10.exf5 O-O 11.O-O-O Qa5 12.Bc4 Rac8 13.Bb3 exf4 14.Qxf4 Rfe8 15.Kb1 Bd8 16.g4 Qe5 17.Qxe5 Rxe5 18.Bf4 Ra5 19.h3 Bc7 20.Bxd6 Bxd6 21.Rxd6 Kf8 22.Rhd1 h6 23.a3 Re5 24.R6d3 Rce8 25.Nd5 Ne4 26.Nc7 Rc8 27.Rd7 Re7 28.Nb5 a6 29.Rxe7 Nxe7 30.Rd4 Nf2 31.Nc3 Nxh3 32.Rd7 Nf2 33.Nd5 Nc6 34.Nb6 Ne5 35.Rxb7 Rd8 36.c4 Ne4 37.Rc7 Rb8 38.c5 Nxc5 39.Rxc5 Rxb6 40.Rxe5 Rxb3 41.Ra5 Rb6 42.Re5 1/2-1/2
Final Standing
1-2 So, Onischuk 7.0
3-5 Nakamura, Akobian, Caruana 6.5
6 Zherebukh 5.5
7-9 Kamsky, Shankland, Naroditsky 5.0
10 Robson 4.5
11 Xiong 4.0
12 Shabalov 3.5
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