by scribe | Sep 20, 2015 | current news, endings, games, positions, tournaments
In today’s fourth round of the FIDE World Cup, there were two big upsets: #16 Peter Svidler over #1 Veselin Topalov and #19 Shakhriyar Mamedyarov over #3 Fabiano Caruana. Two other games were won by the favorite: #2 Hikaru Nakamura over #16 Michael Adams and #8...
by scribe | Sep 18, 2015 | current news, endings, games, positions, tournaments
Before round three of the FIDE World Cup began, I wrote that one of the interesting matches would be Eljanov-Grischuk, because Eljanov so far had been the “irresistible force” (he had gone 4-0 to that point), while Grischuk had been the “immovable...
by scribe | Sep 16, 2015 | current news, endings, people, tournaments
If I had been alive at the right time, I would undoubtedly have predicted Napoleon to win the Battle of Waterloo. Robert E. Lee to win at Gettysburg. Edison’s direct current to win over Tesla’s alternating current. The dinosaurs to prevail over the...
by scribe | Sep 14, 2015 | current news, endings, people, tournaments
A couple days ago I asked, “What happened to Lawrence Trent and Susan Polgar?” For me, their witty and exciting commentary was one of the most enjoyable things about the 2013 World Cup. I missed that sparkle and that sense of excitement in this...
by scribe | Sep 11, 2015 | current news, endings, games, people, tournaments
There’s no question in my mind what the game of the day was on the first day of the 2015 FIDE World Cup. But first, let’s review what happened. Even though none of my prognostications can actually go wrong on the very first day, because every player who...
by scribe | Sep 7, 2015 | current news, endings, people, positions, tournaments
It’s right there in the French name of the game: échecs. Failures. Except that now, in the Internet era, we just call them “fails.” So in the CalChess Labor Day Championship I had four epic fails. Loss against Kostya Kavutskiy. loss against Michael...
