A nice endgame trick

The diagrammed position came from a game at last weekends ANU Open. White had been winning for much of the game, although Black had recovered somewhat after White had lost the exchange to a skewer. This piece of good fortune had impressed Black so much he celebrated it with a double fist pump, although the game was still in progress.
Nonetheless the game eventually ended in a draw, although it shouldn't have. It is White to play in this position. What should he play? (but didn't)

British Championships

The 2008 British Championships has started in Liverpool. Top seed for the event is GM Gawain Jones, a recent and popular visit to these shores. While missing the absolute top of British Chess the event is still pretty solid with the top 10 seeds rated above 2500 and the next ten above 2400.
The whole event is quite an extravaganza, with 26 separate events being held over the 2 week periods, including events based on rating and age, as well as weekend events and single week events.
Full coverage of the event, including live games, can be found on the Britchess08 website.

More chess gifts

As I've said in the past, chess players are hard to buy for. The obvious gift of a chess set often doesn't work as anything other than a standard tournament set can be annoying. Chess books are tricky as the ones you find in regular bookshops are pretty basic, and buying from a chess retailer runs the risk of duplicating a previous purchase.
However my wife cam across something that might be suitable, in that it is chess themed, without having real utility. Chess Candles. The ones she showed me were about 30cm tall and you could choose either a King or a Queen. The only drawback is the price (around $100 per piece) so I suggest you avoid trying to buy a whole set.
(NB The link given above is one I've pulled at random. There may be other and better sellers of chess candles in Australia. Just do a search on "Chess Candles" if you wish to find more)

ANU Open - Notable performances

There were a number of notable performances at the 2008 ANU Open, especially in regards to the Australian Womens Olympiad Team. The Open attracted quite a strong group of female players with WIM Arianne Caoili, WIM Heather Richards and WIM Narelle Szuveges outnumbering their male counterparts, IM's Smerdon and Toth.
However the best performed Women player was Giang Nguyen (Board 3 for Australia) who finished in 3rd place overall with 5/7. She score 3/4 on the first day and 2/3 on the second with her last round win over FM Brian Jones putting her into the prizes.
Also notable was the performance of Luthien Russell. After her first round win over Dizdarevic she also defeated Leon Kempen and WIM Heather Richards to reach 3.5/5 and a chair at Board 3 in round 6. Two tough defeats in rounds 6 & 7 left her on a score that didn't reflect her performance.
As was to be expected the play of WIM Arianne Caoili attracted a lot of interest. It was her game against Milan Grcic that was a real talking point of the event. Going into a rook and pawn ending 2 pawns up, she made it 3 pawns when Grcic blundered his last pawn during the 10s per move stage of the game. But the pawns were a h pawn and doubled f pawns, and there are positions with R+f+h v R which are drawn. And by the time the game reached the diagrammed position this game was one of them. By pushing the Black king into the corner, Caoili allowed Grcic a stalemate trick based on offering the rook. Caoili refused the offer, but the following occurred.
1...Re6+ 2.Kf4 Re4+ 3.Kg5 Rg4+ 4.Kf6 Rg6+ At this point Arianne tried one last idea to win the game, but it turned the draw into a loss. 5.Ke7?? Rg7+ 6.Ke8 Rxb7 7.f6 Kxh7 8.f7 Rb8+ 9.Ke7 Kg7 0-1

WIM Heather Richards finished alongside on Arianne with 4/7. She started the tournament strongly (including taking the only half point off Smerdon) but a couple of mid tournament losses slowed her down. Hopefully we'll see a lot more of Heather on the Australian tournament scene, as she hopes to be here for the next 4 years while completing an Engineering degree.

2008 ANU Open - Round 7

The 2008 ANU Open has been won by local Canberra player, IM David Smerdon. After ending day 1 with 3.5/4 Smerdon defeated IM Andras Toth, FM Igor Bjelobrk and Ian Rout to finish on 6.5/7. Outright second was taken by another Canberran IM Andras Toth, after he draw his final round game with Endre Ambrus. Toth's 5.5 left him half a point ahead of 5 players on 5. They were FM Igor Bjelobrk (NSW), Endre Ambrus( ACT), Giang Nguyen, Michael Dunn (NSW), and Sam Grigg (QLD). Dunn picked up the prize for bets player rated between 1800-1999 and Sam Grigg won the best Under 1800 prize.
In the Minor Canberra Junior Satya Chitturi also scored 6.5/7 to win this Under 1600 tournament. In outright second on 6 points was the ever popular Phil Bourke, while Sophie Eustace, Alana Chibnall and Andrew Farley finished equal 3rd on 5.5.
The very badly formatted cross tables can be found in the comments section (hint: Copy and paste into an editor and change it to a fixed sized font for better reading).

2008 ANU Open - Round 6

IM David Smerdon won a complicated game against FM Igor Bjelobrk to reach 5.5 points after the 6th round of the 2008 ANU Open. This result left a somewhat fragmented group at the top of the tournament with IM Andras Toth on 5 and Endre Ambrus and Milan Grcic on 4.5. Last round pairings are

• Smerdon v Rout
• Ambrus v Toth
• Grcic v Bjelobrk
• Sales v Dunn

In the Minor the top board clash between Sophie Eustace and Sathya Chitturi ended in a draw, leaving them in the share of the lead on 5.5/6 Eustace now plays Phil Bourke(5) and Chitturi plays Erik Jochimsen (5) in the final round to determine the destination of the big prizes.

2008 ANU Open - Round 5

One thing that is great about this years event is the players are very committed to the tournament. We've only had 1 "no-show" at the start, and only 1 withdrawal. This commitment was tested this morning with Round 5 starting at 9:30am (although 1 complaint about the start time came from someone who lives 200m from the venue).
Almost every one trooped in on time, which was pretty good considering the late night attractions of the Tour de France and the Canberra party scene.
As for the chess IM David Smerdon took over the "Yellow" by defeating IM Andras Toth on Board 1. Ian Rout's colours were lowered for the first time, losing the FM Igor Bjelobrk on the next board. Further down FM Brian Jones made it two losses in a row for Junta Ikeda, while WIM Arianne Caoili went from winning, to drawing, to tragically losing to Milan Grcic. Luthien Russell scored yet another upser, this time over WIM Heather Richards to move onto the top boards for Round 6.
In the Minor Sophie Eustace and Sathya Chitturi (juniors both) share the lead on 5/5 and their 6th round game may decide that tournament.