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Vassily Ivanchuk
March 18, 2019
Nothing gives me more pleasure than to wish Vassily Ivanchuk a happy fiftieth birthday today.
From a Chessbase story:
In the late 1980s, Vassily Ivanchuk burst onto the tournament scene. Ivanchuk was one of the best players in the USSR behind Kasparov and Karpov. In 1988, he won silver at the Junior World Championships. Only Joel Lautier was better. He won the 1988 and 1990 Soviet Gold medals at the Chess Olympiad. The fate of the "eternal second" pursued Ivanchuk more and more even in the later years of his career. In July 1991, he was also second in the FIDE World Ranking. Only Kasparov was rated higher.
Following the collapse of the USSR, Ivanchuk continued his winning streak for the Ukrainian team and won silver in 1996, bronze in 1998 and 2000, gold in 2004 and 2010 and bronze again in 2013.
At the FIDE World Cup 2001-2002 Vassily Ivanchuk reached the final, but despite being the favourite he lost to his compatriot Ruslan Ponomariov.
Throughout his career, Ivanchuk has celebrated countless tournament successes, and is particularly strong in rapid and blitz chess tournaments, even if at the World Championships in these disciplines he often lacked that little hint of luck to win the tournament often after he had defeated the favourites. At least once — in 2007 — Ivanchuk did win the title of Blitz World Champion.
Ivanchuk is said to have a photographic memory. So he should be able to look at a page of a magazine briefly and memorize the text. Afterwards, he can recite the page by heart — even if the text is written in a language unknown to him.
Andre Schulz at:
https://en.chessbase.com/post/vassil...-50th-birthday
There is an article entitled, “Is Ivanchuk a genius?”
https://chess24.com/en/read/news/is-ivanchuk-a-genius
Two quotes from that:
Vassily Ivanchuk lost only one game in Wijk aan Zee, and in an interview afterwards mentioned it might have been because he failed to read enough Philippine folk-tales to understand his opponent, Wesley So. That's the kind of eccentricity for which we love Vassily, but is he, as so many claim, a genius? Does it matter that he's never been World Champion, rated no. 1 or dominated the chess world?
From his personal file
Vassily Ivanchuk began to play chess at the age of 10 and won the USSR Junior Championship as a 15-year-old. An impressive fact – the youngster memorised all 48 games of the first Karpov-Kasparov match by heart. A passion for training and an undeniably outstanding memory stayed with him over the years: Ivanchuk speaks four foreign languages – English, Spanish, Turkish and Polish, has memorised the squares of the numbers from 1 to 30 and knows many songs and poems by heart.
His greatest achievement on the world rating list: 2nd in 1991 and 2007. That coincides with the two times he got married.
By his own admission he found a large number of original ideas in church, during services.
For New Year 2009 he proposed a new game with the chess pieces called “Kiss the queen” on ChessPro.
He takes a serious interest in checkers, plays at the strength of a Candidate Master and took part in the Lviv Championship. He has a passion for roulette in the casino – with positive results.
He prefers to watch sports that involve a personal confrontation: tennis and boxing.
He usually studies chess without the help of a computer, either blind or using a big chessboard and pieces.
In Linares 2009 he offered a draw to Dominguez on move 47 in a winning position, since he considered his behaviour in mutual time trouble inappropriate (the offer was accepted).
The game and comment from chessgames.com
http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1536057
Linares 2009
Round 6, Feb. 25, 2009
Ivanchuk, Vassily – Dominguez Perez, Leinier
A3 English, symmetrical
1.Nf3 c5 2.c4 Nc6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.g3 Qb6 6.Nc2 e6 7.Bg2 d5 8.O-O Be7 9.cxd5 Nxd5 10.Nc3 Nxc3 11.bxc3 O-O 12.Be3 Qa5 13.Nd4 Ne5 14.Bf4 Nc4 15.Qd3 Qa4 16.Qe4 Re8 17.Rfd1 g5 18.Be5 Bd7 19.Bc7 e5 20.Nf5 Qc6 21.Rab1 Qxe4 22.Bxe4 Bxf5 23.Bxf5 b6 24.Rd7 Rac8 25.Bd3 Na5 26.Bxe5 Nc6 27.Bd4 Red8 28.Rb7 Kf8 29.e3 h6 30.Bf5 Rb8 31.Rc7 Nxd4 32.cxd4 a5 33.Rb5 Rd6 34.Bd3 Bd8 35.Rc2 Rb7 36.Kg2 Rdd7 37.Be4 Rbc7 38.Rcb2 Rc3 39.Kf3 Ke7 40.Kg4 Rd6 41.Rf5 Kf8 42.Kh5 Kg7 43.Bd5 Bf6 44.Bf3 a4 45.Be4 a3 46.Re2 Re6 47.Bd5 Rd6 1/2-1/2
Final position
- Anybody know why Ivanchuk agreed to a draw here?
- Both players were very short on time and Ivanchuk on several occasions knocked the pieces over accidentally. Dominguez, displaying a sportsmanlike attitude, put the pieces back on his own time despite risking a loss. The Ukrainian, in the end, rewarded his opponent with a draw despite having a decisive advantage., put the pieces back on his own time despite risking a loss. The Ukrainian, in the end, rewarded his opponent with a draw despite having a decisive advantage
- Out of curiosity, I ran the final position by Rybka 3.
After <47...Rd6>
[+3.26] d=20 48.e4 Bxd4 49.Rd2 Bf6 50.e5 Bxe5 51.Rxe5 Rd8 52.Ree2 Rc7 53.Re3 Rc5 (0:05.10) 37345kN
- with 39...Rxd4 Dominguez would have evened the game....
- Couldn't Dominguez have won by 18 ... f6 19 Bc7 Qd7?
March 18, 2019
Nothing gives me more pleasure than to wish Vassily Ivanchuk a happy fiftieth birthday today.
From a Chessbase story:
In the late 1980s, Vassily Ivanchuk burst onto the tournament scene. Ivanchuk was one of the best players in the USSR behind Kasparov and Karpov. In 1988, he won silver at the Junior World Championships. Only Joel Lautier was better. He won the 1988 and 1990 Soviet Gold medals at the Chess Olympiad. The fate of the "eternal second" pursued Ivanchuk more and more even in the later years of his career. In July 1991, he was also second in the FIDE World Ranking. Only Kasparov was rated higher.
Following the collapse of the USSR, Ivanchuk continued his winning streak for the Ukrainian team and won silver in 1996, bronze in 1998 and 2000, gold in 2004 and 2010 and bronze again in 2013.
At the FIDE World Cup 2001-2002 Vassily Ivanchuk reached the final, but despite being the favourite he lost to his compatriot Ruslan Ponomariov.
Throughout his career, Ivanchuk has celebrated countless tournament successes, and is particularly strong in rapid and blitz chess tournaments, even if at the World Championships in these disciplines he often lacked that little hint of luck to win the tournament often after he had defeated the favourites. At least once — in 2007 — Ivanchuk did win the title of Blitz World Champion.
Ivanchuk is said to have a photographic memory. So he should be able to look at a page of a magazine briefly and memorize the text. Afterwards, he can recite the page by heart — even if the text is written in a language unknown to him.
Andre Schulz at:
https://en.chessbase.com/post/vassil...-50th-birthday
There is an article entitled, “Is Ivanchuk a genius?”
https://chess24.com/en/read/news/is-ivanchuk-a-genius
Two quotes from that:
Vassily Ivanchuk lost only one game in Wijk aan Zee, and in an interview afterwards mentioned it might have been because he failed to read enough Philippine folk-tales to understand his opponent, Wesley So. That's the kind of eccentricity for which we love Vassily, but is he, as so many claim, a genius? Does it matter that he's never been World Champion, rated no. 1 or dominated the chess world?
From his personal file
Vassily Ivanchuk began to play chess at the age of 10 and won the USSR Junior Championship as a 15-year-old. An impressive fact – the youngster memorised all 48 games of the first Karpov-Kasparov match by heart. A passion for training and an undeniably outstanding memory stayed with him over the years: Ivanchuk speaks four foreign languages – English, Spanish, Turkish and Polish, has memorised the squares of the numbers from 1 to 30 and knows many songs and poems by heart.
His greatest achievement on the world rating list: 2nd in 1991 and 2007. That coincides with the two times he got married.
By his own admission he found a large number of original ideas in church, during services.
For New Year 2009 he proposed a new game with the chess pieces called “Kiss the queen” on ChessPro.
He takes a serious interest in checkers, plays at the strength of a Candidate Master and took part in the Lviv Championship. He has a passion for roulette in the casino – with positive results.
He prefers to watch sports that involve a personal confrontation: tennis and boxing.
He usually studies chess without the help of a computer, either blind or using a big chessboard and pieces.
In Linares 2009 he offered a draw to Dominguez on move 47 in a winning position, since he considered his behaviour in mutual time trouble inappropriate (the offer was accepted).
The game and comment from chessgames.com
http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1536057
Linares 2009
Round 6, Feb. 25, 2009
Ivanchuk, Vassily – Dominguez Perez, Leinier
A3 English, symmetrical
1.Nf3 c5 2.c4 Nc6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.g3 Qb6 6.Nc2 e6 7.Bg2 d5 8.O-O Be7 9.cxd5 Nxd5 10.Nc3 Nxc3 11.bxc3 O-O 12.Be3 Qa5 13.Nd4 Ne5 14.Bf4 Nc4 15.Qd3 Qa4 16.Qe4 Re8 17.Rfd1 g5 18.Be5 Bd7 19.Bc7 e5 20.Nf5 Qc6 21.Rab1 Qxe4 22.Bxe4 Bxf5 23.Bxf5 b6 24.Rd7 Rac8 25.Bd3 Na5 26.Bxe5 Nc6 27.Bd4 Red8 28.Rb7 Kf8 29.e3 h6 30.Bf5 Rb8 31.Rc7 Nxd4 32.cxd4 a5 33.Rb5 Rd6 34.Bd3 Bd8 35.Rc2 Rb7 36.Kg2 Rdd7 37.Be4 Rbc7 38.Rcb2 Rc3 39.Kf3 Ke7 40.Kg4 Rd6 41.Rf5 Kf8 42.Kh5 Kg7 43.Bd5 Bf6 44.Bf3 a4 45.Be4 a3 46.Re2 Re6 47.Bd5 Rd6 1/2-1/2
Final position
- Anybody know why Ivanchuk agreed to a draw here?
- Both players were very short on time and Ivanchuk on several occasions knocked the pieces over accidentally. Dominguez, displaying a sportsmanlike attitude, put the pieces back on his own time despite risking a loss. The Ukrainian, in the end, rewarded his opponent with a draw despite having a decisive advantage., put the pieces back on his own time despite risking a loss. The Ukrainian, in the end, rewarded his opponent with a draw despite having a decisive advantage
- Out of curiosity, I ran the final position by Rybka 3.
After <47...Rd6>
[+3.26] d=20 48.e4 Bxd4 49.Rd2 Bf6 50.e5 Bxe5 51.Rxe5 Rd8 52.Ree2 Rc7 53.Re3 Rc5 (0:05.10) 37345kN
- with 39...Rxd4 Dominguez would have evened the game....
- Couldn't Dominguez have won by 18 ... f6 19 Bc7 Qd7?
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