Tuesday 15 October 2013

Svidler does the biz

Peter Svidler has continued his successful run in Russian Championships, winning his 7th title. He defeated Ian Nepomniachtchi in a playoff match, after the two players were tied on 6.5/9. Nepomniachtchi defeated Kramnik in the final round, while Svidler guaranteed at least 1st place with a draw.
The 7th win for Svidler is a record for the Russian Championship, and assuming that this title is a successor to the USSR Championship, also beats Tal's and Botvinnik's record of 6 wins. Kramnik's last round loss dropped him to the middle of the field, and surprisingly, means he is still to win the national title.


Svidler,Peter (2740) - Motylev,Alexander (2676) [D43]
66th ch-RUS 2013 Nizhny Novgorod RUS (6.3), 11.10.2013



2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Kramnik won the championship of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (RSFSR) in 1990 back when the USSR Championship still existed. Shame they didn't continue with a CIS Championship...

Technically, the RSFSR is the direct antecedent to the current Russian Championship for obvious geographical reasons, but it is probably fairer to consider the Soviet Championship to be such as many Russian players did not bother with the championship of the "local" republic, focusing on the big prize. - James

Anonymous said...

Posted a bit hastily. Kramnik claims the RSFSR Championship in his web bio, but he didn't win it outright as he was only =1st alongside Andrei Kharlov, Ruslan Sherbakov, and Maxim Sorokin.

He might have had the right to claim co-champion rights but a tiebreaker (SB by the looks of it) seems to have established that Kharlov was the winner: http://al20102007.narod.ru/ch_repub/1990/ch_rus90.html

- James