Ukrainian Spring Waltz

GM Hou Yifan

     Spring has started with a very interesting event to follow- Women's World Chess Championship
Match in Lviv, Ukraine.
     It is one of the most awaited "clash of titans" for me- GM Mariya Muzychuk (2563) vs GM Hou Yifan (2667). I think that none of the latest crown matches were as interesting as this one.
     I've known Mariya for many, many years, as we were constant opponents at the European and World Youth Championships. Coming from a chess family, it was no surprise that she was always among the best ones in her age group. Lots of hard work, ambition and preparation- will it be enough to keep the crown?
     On the other hand, her opponent- the Chinese Hou Yifan is no doubt the strongest woman in chess at this moment, competing successfully on top men's level. I admire her very calm and seemingly "easy" way of playing high level chess.
     I am no oracle, but if I would be, I'm not sure whom I'd place my bets on.


     Round 1

     The first round was a calm draw in a Giuoco Piano. The Chinese had no problems in equalizing with black and the draw was agreed as early as move 31.
     I am sure that both sides have their own strategy for the match and the 1st game might have seemed less ambitious only because of this. I think it was some sort of tapping and getting to know how's the opponent feeling and what's her current form.
     It was interesting for me to observe how Mariya's behavior during the game has changed. If she was usually very intense and even had some nervous tics like tapping with her legs, it was a completely different player I saw now. She had a smiling, confident and seemingly relaxed look for the whole game.

Mariya Muzychuk (left) vs Hou Yifan (right)

 
     The 2nd round will start at 3pm local time, though we'll be able to follow it only a half hour later due to the anti cheating measures.
     I am curious- what's Ukrainians' strategy with black in this match? We will know in a few hours!


P.S. I hope that the quality of broadcasting will be better today, as there were a lot of problems to be fixed yesterday...

(Photos taken from the official site of the event: lviv2016.fide.com )

Masters in Poland

     After a more or less agitated summer, with many tournaments played in a raw, the time has come for a "serious" chess exam.
     I am heading to a strong ladies tournament in Wroclaw, Poland. It will be very interesting for me to play against some of the strongest WGMs in Europe. As I missed the EIWCC this year, it will be refreshing to compete in a women's event. They all say women's chess is different from men's chess and it is a viable point of view, though I don't necessarily agree with it. Maybe we are somewhat more competitive and maybe short draws don't occur that often in our games, maybe we play a more romantic chess, but I believe that the strongest women players can compete on a very high level with men as well.
     All in all, I hope to have a good tournament and to play some quality chess! You can follow the results and the news of the event on its official webpage: http://wgmradzikowska.pl/?page_id=1242#
     I hope to be in good spirits for sharing impressions from there as well :)
  


P.S.  Hou Yifan's play from the World Cup in Baku can only inspire women to work more on chess and to have more confidence that everything is possible!



xoxo with high hopes :)

KO Fight

     The Women's World Championship is starting really soon (16th March) and I expect nothing less than the usual big fights, unexpected results and a lot of spectacular chess!
     I hope that one day I'll also be there, but until then, I'll settle with just following it and cheering for my friends. The tournament will take place in Sochi, under the patronage of the Russian Chess Federation. Here you can check the official page of the event: http://sochi2015.fide.com/en/main-page
     Here are the pairings for the 1st round, as well as the initial ranking list: http://www.fide.com/component/content/article/1-fide-news/8594-womens-world-championship-2015-ranking-list-a-pairings.html
     It is very difficult to predict a winner in such kind of events, especially in women's ones. I think that a lot depends on the preparation before the tournament, to concrete opponents and about the psychological approach. I find it very important to feel confident in your chess.
     The first thing that has caught my eye is that the reigning World Champion is missing- Hou Yifan. Despite this, the tournament announces to be very strong, with 10 players with 2500+ Elo:

Rank		Name	Title	Country	Rating	Games
1		Koneru, Humpy	g	IND	2581	0
2		Ju, Wenjun	g	CHN	2557	9
3		Muzychuk, Anna	g	UKR	2552	10
4		Cmilyte, Viktorija	g	LTU	2530	0
5		Kosteniuk, Alexandra	g	RUS	2529	0
6		Gunina, Valentina	g	RUS	2528	0
7		Zhao, Xue	g	CHN	2527	0
8		Muzychuk, Mariya	m	UKR	2526	10
9		Stefanova, Antoaneta	g	BUL	2522	12
10		Khotenashvili, Bela	g	GEO	2513	10

     Keep tuned for updates!


xoxo from Iasi ;)

Playing with monkeys

     The traditional "Tradewise Gibraltar Chess Festival" has started on the 21st of January. It's one of the strongest Chess Opens in the World and it usually gathers such renown names as Ivanchuk, Kamsky, Adams, Short. This year's edition hasn't been an exception.

Top seed of the tournament- Vassily Ivanchuk- 2758

1	GM	Ivanchuk Vassily	UKR	2758
2	GM	Kamsky Gata	USA	2740
3	GM	Adams Michael	ENG	2725
4	GM	Wojtaszek Radoslaw	POL	2723
5	GM	Vachier-Lagrave Maxime	FRA	2711
6	GM	Navara David	CZE	2710
7	GM	Shirov Alexei	LAT	2708
8	GM	Le Quang Liem	VIE	2705
9	GM	Vitiugov Nikita	RUS	2694
10	GM	Short Nigel D	ENG	2690

     Here are the Top 10 players from the starting rating list. You can find the full one here: http://chess-results.com/tnr89507.aspx?lan=11

     Though there have been played only 2 rounds, there are already several surprises. The biggest upset of the 2nd round was the loss of Nigel Short (2690) against Teran Alvarez Ismael (2399). Here you can see the game:

Nigel Short

     There's also a nice photo gallery on the official site of the event: https://picasaweb.google.com/MonRoi.Inc/2013TradewiseGibraltarChessFestivalRound1And2?authuser=0&feat=embedwebsite#5836460269774758722

     The main attraction of Gibraltar are the very friendly monkeys that one can see almost everywhere.

The former Women's World Champion and the heroine of the last year's edition of Gibraltar

    Hope to see some interesting fighting :)


   

Tata Steel Chess Tournament 2013

     The Tata Steel Chess Tournament starts today in Wijk aan Zee. It will be 2 weeks of exciting chess, I can't  wait to follow it! There are 14 players in the A group, with Magnus Carlsen as the top-seed.  Here's the list of participants:

Garry Kasparov awarding Alexandra with the Gold Medal

GM	Carlsen, Magnus	NOR	2861
GM	Aronian, Levon	ARM	2802
GM	Caruana, Fabiano	ITA	2781
GM	Karjakin, Sergey	RUS	2780
GM	Anand, Viswanathan	IND	2772
GM	Nakamura, Hikaru	USA	2769
GM	Wang, Hao	CHN	2752
GM	Leko, Peter	HUN	2735
GM	Giri, Anish	NED	2720
GM	Harikrishna, Pentala	IND	2698
GM	van Wely, Loek	NED	2679
GM	Sokolov, Ivan	NED	2663
GM	L'Ami, Erwin	NED	2627
GM	Hou, Yifan	CHN	2603

     The average rating of the tournament is 2732, which makes it a 20 category one. As a premier, we can see Hou Yifan, the former Women's World Champion playing in the A group.
     Another ineteresting player to follow is the 14 yo Alexandra Goryachkina who's the G18 World Champion and who already has an impressive 2402 Elo. She plays in the C group of the festival.
     The World Junior Champion- Ipatov Alexander (2587) participates in the B group of the event.
     It is very cool to see so many talented juniors being given the opportunity to play in such strong tournaments,I hope to be able to play there some
day too :)

Typical view of Wijk an Zee when winter 

     I hope we will see some amazing chess, and I will definetely free my tomorrow's afternoon in order to follow the Aronian-Carlsen encounter!