Making a Draw

It used to be easy to make a draw in the old days. Play a Semi-Slav, keep the position symmetrical, shake hands after 20 moves, and avoid the accusing glares from the spectators. But the advent of the "Sofia", "Gibraltar" or "Corsica" rules on draw offers has made it much harder to reached the agreed result. But chess players can be inventive when they choose, and the last couple of FIDE Grand Prix events have seen a number of new "theoretical" draws enter the books.
These new kind of draws all seem to come from much sharper openings than the Slav, usually involve the investment of material for one side or the other, and normally end in some sort of perpetual/repetition. The most recent example comes from last nights round of the GP tournament in Sochi. Grischuk and Svidler go down a very sharp line of the Sicilian, with Grischuk playing two thematic Sicilian sacrifices, the knight on e6 followed by the bishop on b5. Svilder looks as though he is in trouble, until he liberates a rook and forces a perpetual. While it might have looked scary over the board, the only player who was really worried may well have been Yuferov, who played this identical game as black against Vitolins back in 1972. It has been played at least 5 times since, including one game between Nisipeanu and Shirov in 1999.

Grischuk,A (2728) - Svidler,P (2738) [B96]
Grand Prix Sochi 2008 Sochi (5), 04.08.2008

1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 a6 6.Bg5 e6 7.f4 Nbd7 8.Qf3 Qc7 9.0-0-0 b5 10.e5 Bb7 11.Qh3 dxe5 12.Nxe6 fxe6 13.Qxe6+ Be7 14.Bxb5 axb5 15.Nxb5 Qc6 16.Nd6+ Kd8 17.fxe5 Kc7 18.Qxe7 Rxa2 19.exf6 Ra1+ 20.Kd2 Qd5+ 21.Kc3 Qa5+ 22.Kd3 Qd5+ 23.Kc3 Qa5+ 24.Kd3N Qd5+ ½-½

Of course players with good memories for games now have an extra way of agreeing to "short" draws with a willing opponent. As you sit down at the board simply state that you have been studying "Grischuk v Svidler from Sochi" (or some other well known perpetual) as part of your prep, and see where that leads.