Playing a WGM

Last week, I got a chance to play against WGM Ruan Lufei in a simultaneous at Stanford. Ruan is among the top female chess players. Her best known result is reaching the 2010 Women's World Chess Championship final and losing only to World Champion Hou Yifan.

The game started with a balanced position, but then I had a dubious sacrifice of a knight for three pawns (that turned out to be two only) and spent the rest of the game struggling for drawing chances. After the other games were over, I rushed in the endgame to lose my final chance and the game. It was a good experience though.

Caruana wins Bucharest Kings Tournament

Caruana was also close to enter the 2800 club, but missed it due to his loss to Wang Hao in round nine. We show this complex game, where Caruana achieved a large advantage but then lost it in time trouble. Luckily, he still had enough points to win the tournament even after Hao following final round win.

Svidler wins Russian Super Final

Svidler won the Russian Championship Super Final after defeating Nepomniachtchi in the rapid playoffs. Nepomniachtchi was able to catch Svidler after beating Kramnik in the last round, while Svidler was drawing against Karjakin. We will show the final round draw, which is an instructive game on how to use the extra pawns to compensate for an exchange. 

Aronian wins Bilbao Masters Final

At the time, when the whole chess world seems to be waiting for the Anand-Carlsen world championship match, there are at least three major and exciting tournaments going on. The first is the Bilbao Masters Final, which just ended with Aronian as the winner. Then there's the Russian Super Final with a fierce competition between Kramnik and Svidler. And finally Bucharest with Caruana leading ahead of Ponomariov and Radjabov.

In this post, we show the two decisive games for Aronian victory. The first is a fiery game that has a rook sacrifice and Aronian surviving a devastating attack. The second is his win over the initial leader Adams also with black from an inferior position.

Double Sacrifice!

Kramnik started the Russian Championship with a double sacrifice and spectacular win!

Caruana ties for First, but misses Qualifications

In the last round of Paris FIDE Grand Prix tournament, Caruana had to win in order to qualify to the 2014 World Championship Candidates, but instead he had a short draw by repetition. This result favors Shakhriyar Mamedyarov who would qualify instead.

Some believe he should have avoided repetition in the final position and continued with other move, even it would have been so risky.

Nakamura loses the Lead

It has been an exciting day in Paris! Nakamura lost an exciting game and his lead to Gelfand, and Caruana also won to join in the lead. With only one round to go, Caruana will have a chance to qualify for the 2014 World Championship Candidates tournament. Following are the two critical games.