2014 Sinquefield Cup - Caruana cruises

Fabiano Caruana has continued his perfect start to the 2014 Sinquefield Cup with a 4th round win over Lev Aronian. It was a thoroughly 'modern' game, with Caruana firstly looking for play on the queenside, before breaking through on the kingside. A nice piece sacrifice on move 29 was just one of the many good moves he found the defeat Aronian.
Meanwhile the other two games ended in draws, with Carlsen recovery some equilibrium after yesterdays loss, while Nakamrua handled his second black in a row by drawing with Vachier-Lagrave.
Even though they have yet to reach the halfway point, Caruana already looks like a lock for first place. Not only will a win here cement his place as Carlsen's biggest threat, it also sets up another possible opportunity. If FIDE do carry out their threat to strip Carlsen of his title if he does not sign a contract for a match against Anand, then a Carlsen v Caruana match might become the headline act. Not for the World Championship of course, but certainly for the title of the Worlds best player.

Caruana,Fabiano (2801) - Aronian,Levon (2805) [C84]
2nd Sinquefield Cup 2014 Saint Louis USA (4.1), 30.08.2014

2014 Sinquefield Cup - Favourites crash and burn

The third round of the 2014 Sinquefield Cup saw the three games in which the rating favourites went down in a screaming heap. While wins by Topalov over Nakamura and Vachier-Lagrave over Aronian were newsworthy enough, it was Caruana's win over Carlsen which has really set the tournament alight.
Once again Carlsen tried an offbeat opening line (1.e4 e5 2.Bc4), which posed little problems for Caruana. At move 15 Carlsen then played a piece sacrifice, but when the smoke cleared, Caruana had a comfortable advantage. He maintined this edge simply aiming his pieces at the white king, and while looking for counter play, Carlsen played the wrong move in a line he previously calculated, and lost a few moves later.
The win by Caruana leaves him 1.5 points clear after only 3 rounds. Aronian and Vachier-Lagrave are on 1.5 points, while Carlsen, Nakamura and Topalov are all back on 1.


Carlsen,Magnus (2877) - Caruana,Fabiano (2801) [C24]
2nd Sinquefield Cup 2014 Saint Louis USA (3.1), 29.08.2014

Three new IM's (all from Canberra!)

It is a rare day for Australian chess when 3 players become International Masters at the same time. Despite what was a shambolic FIDE General Assembly, the subsequent Presidential Board meeting at least ratified the titles earned in the previous 3 months, and the list of title holders included 3 young Australian players.
Junta Ikeda earned his title with his final norm at the 2014 O2C Doeberl Cup,with an extra one at the 2014 SIO for luck. Anton Smirnov was a little more suprising, getting his third norm at the 2014 Politiken Cup just before the Olympiad, although FIDE seems to have used his IM performance at the 2014 Olympiad in its place, and accepted his rating will top 2400 on the September 2014 Rating List. The third title has been awarded to Rishi Sardana, who like Smirnov and Ikeda was born in Canberra, but mainly plays his chess away from Australia, and currently lives in India.
With both Smirnov and Ikeda playing on the Olympiad team, and Sardana not far off, it is looking like the next decade of Australian chess will see they, and a number of up and coming players, be the new force on the local and international scene.


Baramidze,David (2612) - Smirnov,Anton (2334) [D85]
41st Olympiad Open 2014 Tromso NOR (11.4), 14.08.2014

2014 Sinquefield Cup - Day 1

While there was only one decisive game in the first round of the 2014 Sinquefield Cup, it certainly looks like the spectators got their monies worth. The Aronian - Nakamura game was the first to finish, when the players felt that repeating the position around move 40 was the best plan. The Vachier-Lagrave - Carlsen game was probably the most interesting, with Carlsen showing of a bit of opening prep with a novelty in the Scotch Game. The idea involved a temporary piece sacrifice, but clearly it was all 'computer checked' at home, as Carlsen won back the piece and even held a slight edge. Vachier-Legrave kept his head and the game ended in a draw after Vachier-Lagrave sacrificed a rook for a perpetual.
In the only decisive game, Caruana beat Topalov after Topalov tried a speculative attack and then fell apart when it did not succeed. After move 23 Caruana had an advantage and it seemed to grow with every move, until finally Topalov realised his position was totally lost.


Topalov,Veselin (2772) - Caruana,Fabiano (2801) [A35]
2nd Sinquefield Cup 2014 Saint Louis USA (1.3), 27.08.2014

2014 Sinquefield Cup

The 2014 Sinquefield Cup is being billed as the strongest tournament in the history of chess. With Carlsen, Aronian, Caruana, Nakamura, Topalov and Vachier-Lagrave all in the worlds top 10, it would be hard to find a recent (post 1970) event that matches it in strength.
The tournament is a double round-robin, so each player gets White and Black against their opponents. While this removes the luck of the draw re colours, I have seen players adopt a 'draw with black, win with white' strategy in such events, which can bog the tournament down a little. However the assembled field looks top heavy with chess 'fighters' so this may not be a problem.
In terms of who I am tipping to be the winner, I am going to move away from my usual prediction of Carlsen. He seemed a little out of sorts at the Olympiad, and I am not sure he has recovered from the pressure of that event. The player who I think is still on the rise is Fabiano Caruana, and even though he lost to Carlsen at the Olympiad, I think he might just have enough to pull off a famous victory here.
The tournament starts early tomorrow morning Canberra time (5am!), which isn't the greatest time to start watching chess. However I'm assuming that most of the games will still be happening while I am eating breakfast, and work may see me distracted by some tough endgame play! Event details can be found here, and follow the links to the live coverage of the games.  

Freaky chessboard graphic

While at the Olympiad a number of people asked me what my normal job is. While at some previous Olympiads I could impress them with 'Roboticist', these days I am more of a web programmer (CMS systems being my thing). As a result I do like to play around with html and css, especially now they can create some pretty cool websites with nary a line of program code to make them work.
An example I came across is a rotating chess board, with the animation handled entirely by css. You can see a demo here, and the author is kind enough to list the html and css code that made it all happen.

Mating the queen

As the queen is such a powerful piece it is often hard to completely trap it. When it does get trapped it is usually because it has wandered off to the edge of the board, or ends up in a tactical unfavourable position. It is less common to see it caught in the middle of the board, with nowhere to run.
Hrant Melkumyan (well known to Canberra players), pulled this off on his way to 6/6 at the Riga Tech Open. Capitalising on his doubled rooks, he found the clever Rd6!, which forced Q-Mate! Melkumyan finished the event with 3 draws to take equal first with Richard Rapport. Melkumyan has been on a bit of a tear over the summer, winning a number of big swisses on the European circuit. If he continues this form he may get close to (or over) the 2700 mark, and into consideration for the next Armenian Olympiad team.


Melkumyan,Hrant (2655) - Iturrizaga Bonelli,Eduardo (2653) [E15]
Riga Tech Open A 2014 Riga LAT (6.1), 21.08.2014