September 29, 2006
Bathroom Dispute Halts Chess Championship
By DYLAN LOEB McCLAIN
The world chess championship came to a halt today when a player who had been locked out of his private bathroom after insinuations that he was cheating refused to play and forfeited the fifth game of the match.
A day after a written protest by the team of Veselin Topalov of Bulgaria about the frequent bathroom breaks of Vladimir Kramnik of Russia, the World Chess Federation, which is organizing the match, locked the private bathrooms for both players and said they must use the same bathroom for the rest of the match.
The bathrooms had been the only part of the players’ private rest areas behind the stage where they are playing that was not subject to video surveillance by the match referees.
In filing the protest, Mr. Topalov implied that Mr. Kramnik might somehow be cheating when he was in the toilet. Before the protest, Mr. Kramnik led the match 3-1, with 6.5 points needed to win. The match is being played in Elista, the capital of Kalmykia, a Russian republic on the Caspian Sea.
The rest can be read here.
I was missing the old colored yogurt controversies. So nice to see that today’s grandmasters are up to the entertainment challenge.
Oh dear. I am a 1400-rated player who drinks many soft drinks and water out of nervouseness, paces the tournament hall out of nervousness, and consequently goes to the bathroom frequently, still out of nervousness aggravated by Reason #1. I have never resorted to any private materials while in the bathroom (and don’t see any point to it).
I’ve seen some substantial problems in world championship matches (Fischer complaining in Game 1 and forfeiting Game 2 over television cameras; he came back from a 2-0 deficit caused by these incidents nonetheless); the suspiciously early demise of Korchnoi-Petrosian in 1974; the whopper of Korchnoi-Spassky in 1977 where both players sat in private rest areas all the time; Karpov-Korchnoi “Chess Scandals of 1978; and the infamous halted Karpov-Kasparov match of 1984-85 (I’m not at all sure Kasparov would have won despite the two-game winning streak; we saw similar winning streaks in Korchnoi-Spassky and Karpov-Korchnoi). I walked away from USCF largely because of its partisanship in these incidences.
But it’s either cheating or a sign of worse nerves than I have when Kranmik has to leave the room 50 times a game.
Followup to previous comment:
Fischer fumed and fussed and finally played anyway despite the forfeit, and outscored Spassky 12-1/2 to 6-1/2 the rest of the way. I think Kranmik should take the forfeit and win the match anyway.
“The bathrooms had been the only part of the players’ private rest areas behind the stage where they are playing that was not subject to video surveillance by the match referees.”
Do you mean the chess players can go and rest, even lie down at some point in the game? They don’t have to be at the board all the time, except for WC?
“I was missing the old colored yogurt controversies. So nice to see that today’s grandmasters are up to the entertainment challenge.”
Topalov and Kramnik have yet so much to learn from the masters of chess enteretainment, which happens so often on tournaments that don;t reach the media. Anyway, they show talent here.
Kramnik fell into the genious bathroom trap set by the Bulgarian masterminds. Not coming to the game? Bad idea.
He he, guess we will see a lot of embarrasing headlines and punchlines the days ahead. A pic of Kramnik waiting for the WC to be opened should be great 😀
http://www.enpassant.dk/chess/pic/wc.gif
😉
Kramnik is suspected of using a small chess set to reproduce moves physically thus aquiring a minimum of 300 ELO points of advantage (better than a computer for blunder checking). Since there are not cameras in the bathroom and neither player is searched physically for non-electronic material, this suspicion is really serious (especially in light of Krmanik arriving at his best moves after being a long time in the bathroom).
Anonymous is a bad guy starting a hoax.
dcax you obviously work for Kramniks camp! Refute the arguments not just engage in slander!
This is very sad. My 8 year old son is getting interested in Chess and is following the matches with me in the morning before school by watching the moves play out on Internet. He is fascinated in the game and even commented on possible moves as he watched the games play out.
I am at a loss to explain to him what is happening. I am old enough to remember most of the Championships since 1972 and it always seems like the players are engaging in psychological “games” to get the upper hand. I think this is a “game” on the part of Topolov that has gone very badly. How do you explain two grown men behaving as children to an 8 year old child?
I guess I will find out soon.
One of the Polish newspapers mentions the similar problem during Kramnik-Kasparov match (Polish article: http://sport.gazeta.pl/sport/1,65025,3653186.html).
Rough translation:
Similar case happened during Kramnik-Kasparov match in London.
The arbiter (Andrzej Filipowicz) told us:
According to Kasparov (who officially protested), Kramnik used toilet too often. I delegated the person, who
made notes about the time spent by Kramnik there, and who did not found reasons to be suspicious. Kasparov agreed to this interpretation.
So, Topalov is not the first, who protests against Kramnik toilet habits. Kaspy did the same.
So apparently Kramnik used the portable chess set cheat against Kasparov too. No wonder he won!
If going to the toilet 50 times is true in such a small time frame that alone would be a new world record…how distracting that would have been…Kramnik had to expect a reaction ….Tennis Players play 3 to six hours in 100FH 35C with one or two toilet breaks…
Care to show some evidence that Kram used a portable set? Or that he violated any match rules?
Anyway, I agree with solution offered by Yaseer Seirawan in his open letter.
http://chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=3379
Look at the smirk here on Topa and Danailov’s face after successfully pulling off the cheap trick.
http://chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=3377
Class.
One of the things that really raises my blood pressure, is people ignorantly accusing others of cheating with no proof whatsoever.
They make a claim, and then ask others to refute it. This is just stupid.
If you really believe that Kramnik is carrying a tiny board in his clothes, and going into the toilet to play out moves, it is up to you to prove it.
They then repeat the allegation time and time again, hoping that if they throw enough mud, some of it will stick.
This whole situation is the result of Danailov panicing about Topalov losing his title before the game he so arrogantly scheduled against Radjabov.
My evidence for this claim? The match with Radjabov was certainly scheduled, and Topalov is 3-1 down in this match. Danailov can not afford to have Topalov lose his title.
I fail to see what rule Kramnik has broken, and why Danailov felt he had the right to protest, unless he genuinely thought Kramnik was cheating. He didn’t have the evidence or the courage to make such an allegation of course, so he finds the best way to embarrass Kramnik.
From what I see of Kramnik he appears to be a very honourable and private man. Talking about his bathroom requirements would be guaranteed to upset him.
In this Danailov has suceeded.
It’s a disgrace.
Kramnik explanation of his frequent bathroom visits is completely insatisfactory. He claims that he uses it to “walk”. Is the bathroom so big that he can walk inside it for 1 to 2 minutes at a time? (he claims he uses it as an “extension” to the restroom yet he “disapears” inside for such lenghts of time many times, some obviously for actually relieving himself but many others for “walking”). His “need” to go to the restroom so frequently (and his “need” to walk so much because of his disease) was proven false by his “sit in” in front of the restroom for 82 minutes (60 minutes till the forfeit and 22 minutes before that until they starte the clock), he did not need to go a SINGLE time to the bathroom in that time span, nor he needed to walk “so much” during it. There are only two reasonable explanations for such behaviour: either Kramnik has some sort of psychiatric disorder that forces him to be in the restroom so frequently (his claimed inordinate “thirst” was also proven false in this 82 minute interval) or that he is “somehow” cheating. Since electronics are carefully inspected for (and there is even interference) we can rule out radio intervention and chess computers (except if he uses a sophisticated water pipe morse code like one source claims) so the only other way for him to cheat is by using said portable chess set.