Check_my_mate

These two game I've played on chess.com - one of my favourite sites to play chess. I do like chesscube more as there are always tons of players ready for a realtime game. I played white in both games.

Chess game 26

In this game I played black against arturo1113 on the chess site where the game was played.
This was really a tough game....one of those challenging games. If you play through the game you will see why. Luckily...as always... I had a Knight-to-the-rescue. I will even sacrifice a Rook just to have my Knight! Exactly like in real life... that's why Knights are there! hehehe... look at move 80! Fork! and from there one...it was really easy. If you play through the game, you will see why my opponent named this game after this nursery rhyme - ring-a-ring-a-rosie... See if you can work out why I couldn't really move away from that advanced Pawn of my opponent...He resigned this game at the end. Enjoy playing through the game.

Image: Wikipedia

A Game for Two

STELIOS KOUKOUVITAKIS presents NIKIFOROS VLASSIS, VASSILIKI VLACHOU "A GAME FOR TWO" Director of Photography PENY KAFIRA Sound Recordist TEO BABOURIS Editor PANOS ANESTIS Sound Designers ANDREAS SPANOS, PANOS ANESTIS, GEORGE CHRYSAFAKIS Art Director STELIOS KOUKOUVITAKIS Costumes by SOFI IOANNIDOU, RENATA KONSTANTINOU Produced by STELIOS KOUKOUVITAKIS Written and Directed by STELIOS KOUKOUVITAKIS


Synopsis


Victoria, a chess champion, enters Argiris’ bookstore.
A flirt begins. In post – feminist era, the roles of the hunter and the prey constantly change.


Is winning all that matters?


FESTIVAL SCREENINGS


42nd Houston Worldfest International Film Festival (2009)- PLATINUM REMI AWARD
6th Naoussa International Film Festival (2009)
4th Crashfest (2009)
1st London Greek Film Festival (2008)
Platforma Video8 International Digital Film Festival (2008)- OFFICIAL SELECTION, COMPETITION (top20 films internationally)
21st Panorama of European Cinema – Student Section (2008)
2nd Aza Digital Film Festival (2008)


Video here

Linares 2010

It is time for Linares 2010! These are the players taking part this year. Please click HERE for the official site.

Night at the concert

Enjoy some good music from James Last while playing through the game! This piece of music is called: Elizabeth Serenade. Image: sybervision.com

This chess game was played on the site of Chess.com and my first tournament to play. I don't have that much time to play tourneys, but have entered one now and finished the game last night. I was very lucky in this game. I played white. At one point I said to my fellow South African, also my opponent - after his comments of good play from my side - that I was going to resign as he was in a winning position. Earlier in the game I actually typed a message to ask for a draw as the game was even - play through it and you will see why I say this. I then thought it was a bit cheeky of me to ask for a draw and removed my message. At the point I was about to resign, I was actually waiting for my one pawn to run off, if the right move was made from my opponent's side and he did it! Like Philidor says...the Pawn is the soul of chess! This was pure luck! We have another game going, but my brain is now racked and needs a rest..[hehe] In the image you can see the end position when my opponent resigned.

In this next game I played black and a chess-friend has asked me to blog the game here as it was actually on my Wordpress-blog, but he couldn't play through the game. So, Dan, here goes...enjoy! I have also thought at one point this game was a lost for me, then I noticed my Queen-move and the pin with my Bishop helped too. I was earlier in this game counting my last days on this chessboard and I think I can count myself lucky in this game too.

Corus Round 12

Round 12 - Corus 2010 - Anand vs Kramnik. This image shows the position of the board after move 21 was made by Anand. Click on images for a larger view.

In this game you can see the position of the board after move 19 - This is Leko vs Carlsen.

Smeets vs Van Wely - position of the board after move 18.

Jean_Claude.Borelly-Dolannes.Melody


Jean-Claude Borelly - Dolannes Melodie

Standings after round 12 - Grandmaster Group A

Corus Round 10

Report of round 10 Corus 2010 Round 10

It was the day of the world champions Wednesday in Corus Group A with India’s Viswanathan Anand, the reigning title holder, notching up his first victory in tenth-round action, after an unbroken series of draws, and former world champ Vladimir Kramnik of Russia taking the sole lead in the standings of the annual chess tournament at Wijk-aan-Zee.

Kramnik surprised Vassili Ivanchuk in an unusual variation of the Queen’s Gambit sacrificing a piece at his 19th for a promising attack. But ‘Chuky’, who played black, found a way out and even held a slight edge in the resulting endgame. The peace was signed at the 40th when both players were in danger of getting into time trouble. The draw put Kramnik half a point in front of Norway’s Magnus Carlsen and Spain’s Alexei Shirov.

The Spaniard, who had been on top of the A-Group standings from round one, played a brilliant game from a Ruy-Lopez Archangelsk variation with black to reach a vastly superior position against Anand. Pressed for time, however, he missed the winning 39. …Ng3!! wasting his advantage and, in fact, the whole game, when he blundered with 39. …Rxe6?? instead. He fought on but never got back into the game and surrendered sixteen moves later.


“I’m not playing all that well,” Anand admitted, commenting on his victory at a press conference. “It’s not that I’m unwilling to show my hand in advance of the title match I’ll be playing against Veselin Topalov in Sophia, Bulgaria, next April. I’m really trying to win but it just doesn’t work. Today, for example, I got nervous in an already worse position. I don’t know what came over me; I was dreaming.” Even a world champion is only human, it seems.

Carlsen, who faced Russia’s Sergei Karjakin in a French game, got lucky, too. The Russian did well in the opening and had the upper hand until a rash exchange sacrifice around the 30th changed the situation drastically. Carlsen remained an exchange up to grab the full point in the ending fifteen moves later. As both players left the tournament hall straight away, there was no helpful comment available. Some experts admitted they failed to understand the encounter but GM Ivan Sokolov was so impressed by Carlsen’s performance that he decided the young Norwegian deserved the daily ‘Ymouth Versatile Prize’ of 500 euros.


Three other games were drawn in a more or less orderly fashion –although Hikaru Nakamura had to work hard for his half point against Leinier Dominguez- but in the final encounter of the round, Sergei Tiviakov defeated fellow Dutchman Jan Smeets with white in 34 moves from a Petroff Defence.


Dimitri Reinderman earned the 250-euro prize for the best game of the day in Group B with another lucky win. Playing white in an English game against India’s Pentala Harikrishna, the Dutchman obtained a winning position only to waste his advantage in time trouble towards the 40th. What followed was a virtually balanced endgame with two white rooks, one black queen and an equal number of pawns on both sides. Reinderman’s win came when Harikrishna committed a fatal blunder on the 58th.


Sounya Swaminathan of India defeated Sweden’s Nils Grandelius with white in 36 moves from a Sicilian Defence. It was the Indian’s first victory and earned her the daily prize of 100 euro’s. Holland’s Benjamin Bok defeated Dutch women’s champion Zhaoqin Peng with black in an English game to reach his second IM norm.

Images: Corus Chess 2010

Chess game

In this game I played black. My opponent resigned the game. I will start blogging more chess-stuff on this blogger-blog as I'm a bit frustrated with Wordpress.
The following song is an Afrikaans song. Read on the link more. This song is sung by one of my teachers from Secondary School. It is a beautiful song. The above image is a collage which I put together in Fireworks.

Read here about Sypaadjie Mense - translated into English too.[Sidewalk people]

South African Open Chess Championship 2009

If you have missed out on the South African Open 2009, you are still in time to catch-up with some news as this tournament ends only today!

Please click here to read more and to see the results of all the rounds.The final round - round 11 - is being played this morning at 11:00-16:00 South African local time. The link will open in a new window.

Exciting news: Ryan van Rensburg (2106) (SA) drew a game against GM Dimitri Komarov (2530) (UKR). Ryan has also beaten IM Watu Kobese (2493) (SA) in round 7 and in round 8 he drew a game against IM MABUSELA, JM (2244)! Ryan drew in round 9 his game against IM P Wang (2453) and in round 10: Ryan drew his game against FM NP van der Nat (2322) and also, FM CCA De Villiers -2179- (SA) drew against GM G Jones-2550-(ENG).


From Chesscube: The South African Open is being contested by 208 with the following nations being represented in the field: AUS, ENG, EB, EK, FRA, GER, HUN, KEN, MAW, MOZ, NAM, NWP, NZL, RSA, UK, UKR, WP, ZIM. With 2 GM’s, a handful of IM’s, and a couple of FM’s/CM’s in the field, you are for sure to see good chess. There are 3 games being played live exclusively to ChessCube of SA Open. To watch these games all you have to do is go into the SA room and you can watch straight away. Games are commencing at 9:30 and 18.30 each day – local time.
In a world first for chess, some of the matches will be played online. This is a format many internet chess players have been waiting for – an online event being played simultaneously over 2 continents, yet officially recognized and rated by FIDE!
From Melbourne, Australia, behind the computer screens will be GM Gawain Jones (GBR, ELO 2550), IM Puchen Wang (NZL, ELO 2453), IM Mirko Rujevic (AUS, ELO 2282), and IM Leonid Sandler (AUS, ELO 2332) on standby. On the other end of the computer terminal at Cape Town, South Africa, will sit their opponents. The South African opponents will be paired each round, as will all the other players, using the Swiss Pairing system. This means that three different South African players will play online every round.
“Having these players compete in the tournament from another location using the Internet is a world first. Each Australian player will use a computer to connect to ChessCube and play their game, and will be supervised by the arbiter on that side. Similarly the players paired against them in Cape Town will play their games online using a computer, and will be supervised by an arbiter on this side,” commented Mr. Mark Levitt, founder of ChessCube. FIDE rated event over the internet! FIDE have agreed to officially rate the games played over the Internet.ChessCube powering the community and the SA OpenChessCube as a playing platform has been bringing innovative ideas into online chess playing for the last couple of months, turning into one of the busiest and most populated web chess servers with player peaks reaching over 3000 players online simultaneously, and a growing base that has eclipsed half a million users. The platform has turned into something that the chess world has been missing at previous online chess communities – it is a place where one can socialize and have fun at the same time.
Now ChessCube are taking a step further and create a tournament, part of which will take place online, and will be officially recognized by FIDE.- source: chessdom

Dresden Olympiad 2008

The official blog of CHESS SA: http://chessaol.wordpress.com
Please click on THIS LINK to see chess graphics of the South African chess players at Dresden. The link will open in a new window.

Dortmund Chess Tournament 2008

Please click HERE to follow the games live and for results and more information.

Standings after round 6, Dortmund Chess
Today, Sunday 6th July, it's the final round, round 7



Participants…

Vladimir Kramnik, Russia 2788
Shakhriyar Mamedyarov, Azerbaijan 2752
Peter Leko, Hungary 2741
Vassily Ivanchuk, Ukraine 2740
Loek Van Wely, Netherlands 2676
Ian Nepomniachtchi, Russia 2634
Arkadij Naiditsch, Germany 2623
Jan Gustafsson, Germany 2603



Time Schedule Sparkassen Chess Meeting 2008

Saturday, 28th June 3 p.m. 1st round
Sunday, 29th June 3 p.m. 2nd round
Monday, 30th June no play
Tuesday, 1st July 3 p.m. 3rd round
Wednesday, 2nd July 3 p.m. 4th round
Thursday, 3rd July no play
Friday, 4th July 3 p.m. 5th round
Saturday, 5th July 3 p.m. 6th round
Sunday, 6th July 1 p.m. final round

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Aerosvit 2008, Foros

Please click HERE to play through games interactively.


Standings …Round 4

Van Wely, Loek vs Alekseev, Evgeny
Eljanov, Pavel vs Carlsen, Magnus
Svidler, Peter vs Nisipeanu, Liviu-Dieter
Ivanchuk, Vassily vs Onischuk, Alexander
Karjakin, Sergey vs Jakovenko, Dmitry
Shirov, Alexei vs Volokitin, Andrei

The standings after round 2:

1 Shirov, Alexei ESP 2740 ---2
2 Carlsen, Magnus NOR 2765 ---1½
3 Karjakin, Sergey UKR 2732--- 1½
4 Volokitin, Andrei UKR 2684--- 1½
5 Svidler, Peter RUS 2746--- 1
6 Eljanov, Pavel UKR 2687 ---1
7 Ivanchuk, Vassily UKR 2740 ---1
8 Alekseev, Evgeny RUS 2711--- ½
9 Nisipeanu, Liviu-Dieter ROU 2684--- ½
10 Van Wely, Loek NED 2677--- ½
11 Jakovenko, Dmitry RUS 2711--- ½
12 Onischuk, Alexander USA 2664 ---½

Schedule:

June 8th, 2008, Round 1, Time 15:00…ALL rounds start at 15:00 —every day!
June 9th, Round 2
June 10th, Round 3
June 11th, Round 4
June 12th, Round 5
June 13th, Round 6
June 14th, REST DAY
June 15th, Round 7
June 16th, Round 8
June 17th, Round 9
June 18th, Round 10
June 19th, Round 11

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Ivanchuk MTel Masters rounds 4 and 5

MTel Masters was a tournament played earlier in middle May...see other posts about it too... and Ivanchuk was the winner....

Chess puzzle - Ivanchuk tactic

Click on THIS LINK to solve the puzzle and you will find another one to solve too. Wait a few seconds for the board to load and slide down to the bottom of the page for the second puzzle - which is the one on this image. Enjoy!

Knights!

Some of the chess players I'm playing quite often will know HOW much I love my Knights...please click HERE to solve a puzzle involving Knights!

Chess puzzle

Can you solve this puzzle? Checkmate in about 4 moves. White to move first.

Please click HERE for the solution.

Boys/Girls...and Chess

What do you think about female/male chess players...who's the best...or do you think chess is only a game for boys...read an interesting research/study that was conducted...
Click HERE to read on my Wordpress-blog the article. You can also on this link see who the artist is of this beautiful piece of art! There is also a game I played on a chess site to play through. Enjoy!

Chess game 22

Follow THIS LINK to see more games I played recently....on two chess sites. The moves are also available.

Chess puzzle 3

My first chess book...at the age of 11




Click here for a puzzle!








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Chess puzzle 2

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