Judit pulled out a win in a nerve wrecking game against Topalov. Both sides missed opportunities but at the end, Topalov’s reckless play costs him the game. When was the last time the #1 player in the world lose 2 straight games to a woman?
In the mean time, Mamedyarov pulled out a miracle win against Sokolov. Ivan managed to find his way into a King and Pawn endgame trap and lost for the 5th time in 6 games in this tournament.
Congratulations to Judit and Skak! Well done!
Final Standings:
1-2 Judit and Shak Mamedyarov 4.5 / 6
3. Topalov 2.5 / 6
4. I. Sokolov .5 / 6
Chess Daily News from Susan Polgar
Does she win on tie-breakers? I certainly hope she does! If performance rating is the deciding factor I think she wins (not sure).
A really amazing victory right at the end, rather feeling sorry for Sokolov as well, he would probably have a leading spot were he playing in say, the open section.
Congratulations Judith! Well done!
Congratulations to Judit, the best ever female chess player !
She has beaten twice the former WC Topalov and terminates first !
She and Shack are the true champions, with sensible, realistic and strong play !
Awesome
Awesome
Awesome
Great Tournament the sponsors certainly are pleased. This will be long remembered.
Certainly very strong and extremely bold and competitive but me I feel game 5 may have possibly been somewhat dubious. I am very happy to see her take a very well earned first place though and think this will really do wonder’s for her reputation. Yet another feather in her cap.
I am very happy with this result too. Any other result would put Mamedyarov sole first and Topalov 3rd. Now Judit shares first place and Vesko remains solid 3rd. He needs a rest and then back again as we know him. I wish Judit on her way to grab the World Champion crown from its Russian “homeland”.
Congratulations to Judit: tied for 1st is much better than a clear 2nd or a tie for 2nd-3rd. 🙂
I hope Essent puts up a complete PGN file soon. I could only find one on their site that goes through round five.
Does Judit have something scheduled before Mexico 2007. I would like to see her win another tournament.
Judit for World Champion! Judit for World Champion!
Come on, guys.
Polgar didn’t win it. Topa’s blunders were the deciding factors. Had he not made those bad wreckless moves, he would have beaten Polgar badly. Go, Topa! He is still the No.1 in the world. Attack forever! He is the true winner!
Does she win on tie-breakers? I certainly hope she does!
I think its a tie with no breakers, but why would she win on tie breakers?
Clearly SHak should win on tie breakers, if they had them, since he beat Judit and Judit never beat him.
I am so sorry that Mamedyarov doesn’t play in Mexico. 4.5/6 is impressive, and beating every player in the tournament.
Judit is also very impressive.
Congatulations to both!
It is actually Shahriyar Mamedyarov who wins in the tiebrek. Am I right?
As an Azeri, I am so proud of these two kids – Shakh and Radja. I hope one of them will bring the crown to the country.
Azer/Baku
Surely we are talking ‘reckless’ and ‘wreckful’?
First of all, congratulations to Judit! And Shahriyar!
Susan, can you tell us how many times Judit has won or tied for first in Essent? I think she won in 1998, tied for first in 1999, and won outright in 2003.
Shak’s and Judit’s win was well-deserved. On the other hand Sokolov clearly had a bad period and Topalov was playing under solid pressure (if there was anybody to prove something, it was him). My biggest complaint however is the “shortness” of the event: anything can happen in 6 rounds and it’s not that fair. Yes, I understand such short and action-packed events are what spectators like, but what about chess and chess players themselves? E.g. what could Topalov do after being -2 and with only 4 more games to go? Take unjustified risk. From the sports point of view a draw or a loss in the last game didn’t make any difference for him, so the fact that he was over-aggressive against Judit is quite understandable. Who would care about a draw in such situation? He had the third place anyway 🙂
Congratulations to Judit, outstanding performance! If she would have settled for the draw in round 4, imagine the shock of her finishing in clear 1st place in this tournament!
To celebrate, we are having a “free money” tournament online. $1000 first place, $500 2nd place, no entrance fee.
Details are here:
http://www.gothicchess.com/cyborg.html
apparently according to chessbase they show Shak having higher tiebreaks than Judit. Probably because Judit lost to Shak directly.
“Come on, guys.
Polgar didn’t win it. Topa’s blunders were the deciding factors. Had he not made those bad wreckless moves, he would have beaten Polgar badly. Go, Topa! He is still the No.1 in the world. Attack forever! He is the true winner!”
I can’t believe people still believe in Toppleoff.
The operative sentence, which you should have actually laughed when you wrote it is: “Had he not made those bad wreckless moves, he would have beaten Polgar badly.”
😉 Well, yeah…
Toppleoff has fallen and will not regain his crown.
Go Kramnik, but I like “Go Judith!” even more!
I would prefer “Go Judit!” as that is her real name.
Polgar didn’t win it. Topa’s blunders were the deciding factors. Had he not made those bad wreckless moves, he would have beaten Polgar badly. Go, Topa! He is still the No.1 in the world. Attack forever! He is the true winner!
All games are decided on mistakes, but someone has to have the talent and skill to eplxoit those mistakes. Judit outplayed Topalov, plain and simple. She earned her wins by playing better than Topalov, and no amount of hands-to-the-ears denials changes that fact.
I’m surprised Danailov hasn’t issued an open letter hinting at a conspiracy.
Congrats to Judit, she is truly a joy to watch play chess with her daring tactical style. She has inspired me to take up the Nimzo-Indian against 1.d4. Unlike her opponent, Topalov, she has always been a shining example of integrity and good play in chess.
**********JUDIT the QUEEN of CHESS!
World Championship next!
Topalov is unreckonizable! Kramnik beat the chess out of him!
He has got to stop being a crybaby, dump Danialov and play chess again.
irishspy said…
“All games are decided on mistakes, but someone has to have the talent and skill to eplxoit those mistakes. Judit outplayed Topalov, plain and simple. She earned her wins by playing better than Topalov, and no amount of hands-to-the-ears denials changes that fact.”
Are you implying that Polgar is more talented and is more skillful than Topa? Well, please check the record. How many times did she beat Topa? And everytime she does, she was merely stealing the victory from Topa simply because Topa made some trivial overreaching blunders. One should never use such blunders to judge the quality of a GM’s chess. Topa plays real fighting chess and entertains the whole world. And he’s world No. 1, the strongest player undisputably. Polgar has never won any big tournament. Also she hid home lately for an excessively long period of time without any contribution to the chess world. No comparison in achievement with Topa. So, tell me, please: Who is the better player?
Has anyone noticed that the King and Pawn ending in Mamedyarov-Sokolov was always drawn? After 50 Kxb3 Kd5 51 g5(!) Ke6 52 Kc4 Ke7, I think Mamedyarov already saw the problem and took an extra chance with 53 Kb5!?, when Black would have been fine with 53…Ke6 54 Kc6/b6 f6!, but 54 Kc5 returns to the main line. Then 54…Ke7 55 Kd5 is the same position White could have had with 53 Kd5, so I’ll continue with 55…Kd7. Now White has
(a) 56 e6+ fxe6+ 57 Ke5 Ke7 There is no Zugzwang here, even Black to move is fine with …Kd7.
(b) 56 Kd4 Ke6 (Black doesn’t even need to care about possible triangulations; 56…Ke7 is fine too) 57 Ke4 Ke7! (but 57…Kd7? 58 f5!+- he does care about!), when White has:
(b1) 58 f5 gxf5+ 59 Kxf5 g6+! (the point of 57…Ke7 is covering f6) 60 Kf4 Ke6 (again, no triangulation worry) 61 Ke4 Ke7! and White has nothing better than 62 e6+ fxe6+ 63 Ke5 Ke7 drawing as in (a).
[Note also that here 61…Kd7?! is careless for a different reason: 62 Kd5 Ke7 63 e6! fxe6 64 Ke5 with a Zugzwang, but not fatal after 64…Kf7 65 Kd6 e5! 66 Kxe5 Ke7, when Black has the opposition, the same triangle freedoms f7,e7,e6 opposite White’s e5,e4,f4, the ability to come in via f5 if WK goes queenside, and the fact that WK-on-g4, BK-on-f7 is OK with either side to move.]
(b2) 58 Kf3 Ke6 59 Kg4 Ke7 60 h5 gxh5+ 61 Kxh5 Ke6 and now:
(b21) 62 g6 f6! 63 exf6 Kxf6 and White loses the g-pawn.
(b22) 62 Kh4 g6! 63 Kg4 and now Black has a good choice:
I. 63…Ke7 64 f5 gxf5 65 Kxf5 Ke8! 66 Kf6 Kf8= is a classic case of “bend but don’t break”. If White hadn’t traded the pawns on h4 and g6 then White would win by e6, but with just the one pawn left it’s a draw.
II. 63…Kd7 64 Kf3 Ke7 65 Ke3 Kd7 66 Kd3 Ke7 67 Kd4 is a case of triangulation, since Black must avoid 67…Kd7? 68 Kd5 Ke7 69 e6! fxe6+ 70 Ke5 and this time Black has no escape as in the footnote to line (b1). But the opposition White angled for with 67…Ke6 68 Ke4 is nothing after 68…Ke7! 69 f5 gxf5+ 70 Kxf5 Ke8! as in the “bend-but-don’t-break” line above.
III. 63…Kd5 64 Kf3 Kd4 65 Kf2 Ke4 66 Kg3 Kd5! (not 66…Ke3? when loss of contact with the e5-pawn allows 67 f5! queening) and White does not even get to make Black “bend”!
However, White can cut out option III. by playing:
(b23) 62 Kg4 g6! 63 Kf3, and now Black must “bend” because 63…Kf5!? 64 Ke3 Kg4? (prudent retreat draws as above) loses to 65 Ke4 Kh5 (or 65…Kh4 66 Kf3 Kh5 (66…Kh3 67 f5! queening) 67 Kg3! and Black is trapped) 66 Kd5 Kg4 67 e6! fxe6+ 68 Kxe6 Kxf4 69 Kf6. So 63…Kd5 64 Ke3 Ke6 65 Ke4, but as in line (b22) I & II this doesn’t bring home the prize!
The Essent site still says that the pawn ending was lost http://www.essentchess.nl/index2006.htm (“Een afwikkeling leidde uiteindelijk tot een …. verloren pionneneindspel voor hem.”—A (something) made a…lost pawn ending for him.) Nor has anyone commented here or at the Chess Ninja message boards, and I haven’t seen it at a news site…anyway, I thought people would appreciate a full rendition of this analysis. So Judit Polgar would have been clear 1st except for the 53…f6?? howler!
Congrats to Judit!
In the analysis someone gave me in the Mamedyarov-Sokolov game post (http://vaatleja.blog-city.com, Ular Lauk, Estonia) is the first I realize that White was winning with 49.f5!, the main point being a combination seen in books: 49…gxf5 50 gxf5 b3 51 axb3 axb3 52 Kc3 Kd5 53 e6! fxe6 54 f6! gxf6 55 h5! and Black’s King is blocked by his own pawns from catching White’s passer! I hadn’t looked earlier than Move 50 yet :-).
So in an ultimate sense no “injustice” was done in Judit Polgar not being clear first—Mamedyarov and Sokolov traded mistakes equally.
The analysis by Ular Lauk is wrong to give the impression that 53…Kd7″!” was needed—53…Ke6 is fine too. One further point then is that 54 Kc5 Ke7 (or 54…Kd7 55 Kb6 Ke6 56 Kc6) 55 Kc6 Ke6 gets the key position with White to move, and he can try 56 Kc7. But Black just keeps the opposition with 56…Ke7.
Actually it is amazingly hard for Black to lose even with carelessness. E.g. 53 Kb5 Kd7 54 Kb6 Ke7?! 55 Kc7, and Lauk points out the save with 55…f6 56 Kc8! fxe5 57 fxe5 Ke8! But even 55…Ke8?! seems to hold: 56 Kd6 Kd8 57 e6 fxe6 58 Kxe6 Ke8, and my Fritz knows from 5-man tablebases that 59 f5 gxf5 60 Kxf5 Kf7! is a draw. The only traps in the position are 61 Ke4 g6? 62 Kd5! with diagonal opposition, and 61 Kf4 Kg6? 62 Kg4! Kf7 63 Kh5! and White has the tempo h4-h5 needed to make penetration to g6 decisive, or 62…Kh7 63 Kf5! ditto. (But not straight opposition in these cases since 63…g6+! would hold!)
Lauk has one other nice line: after (by a different move order) 53 Kb5 Ke6 54 Kc5 Ke7 55 Kd4 Ke6 56 Ke3!?, 55…Kd7? loses to the surprising 56 f5! gxf5 57 h5 Ke7 58 h6 gxh6 59 gxh6 Kf8 60 Kf4 +-. The point of White’s crafty 56 Ke3!? was that …gxf5 is not check! But the sensible 55…Ke7 is fine.
Chessbase published a wrong analysis even though I e-mailed them the above overnight. Nor do I see it at the Essent site or at ChessNinja.com or TWIC (http://www.chesscenter.com/twic/twic.html)?
Have any of you seen another site besides the Estonian one with correct analysis? I also meant before to acknowledge that “anonymous” correctly tabbed the position as drawn in the 2nd comment in this thread—do you know the analysis?
Actually, Frederic Friedel at Chessbase points out that my analysis has an error too! Not an essential one, but a case where I made some moves in my head between two positions that I did check with Fritz 9, but didn’t check the transition. Since it’s a beautiful shot, I’ll leave it as a puzzle.
Your hint is to take an idea I related in my second post, and apply it at the weak point of my first one! And for a more important version, ask yourself how you defend against the “more natural” 53 Kd4(!)—? Whether playing thru my lines on a computer engine and finding it that way is “fair” is up to you…meanwhile, I have to do the same to check the rest! 🙂
Here’s PGN of this fascinating analysis (I interpolated my guess as to best play based on IM Regan’s hints, and assume that White has no way to do coordinate square dance around e3 (Ke2-Kf2 and such) to play for the f5 break…)
[Event “Essent”]
[Date “2006.10.28”]
[Round “6”]
[White “Mamedyarov, S.”]
[Black “Sokolov, I.”]
[Result “1-0”]
[ECO “D10”]
[WhiteElo “2728”]
[BlackElo “2670”]
[Annotator “IM K.W.Regan, Ular Lauk, & Fritz”]
[PlyCount “119”]
1. d4 d5 2. c4 c6 3. e3 Bf5 4. Nc3 e6 5. Nf3 Nd7 6. Bd3 Bxd3 7. Qxd3 Ngf6 8.
O-O Be7 9. e4 O-O 10. cxd5 exd5 11. exd5 cxd5 12. Ne5 Bd6 13. Re1 Re8 14. Bf4
Bb4 15. Re2 Qa5 16. Nd1 Nf8 17. Ne3 Ng6 18. Nxg6 hxg6 19. a3 Rac8 20. Be5 Nd7
21. Qb3 Qa6 22. Rc2 Rxc2 23. Nxc2 Bf8 24. Bg3 Qb6 25. Qc3 Nf6 26. f3 Re6 27.
Ne3 Rc6 28. Qd2 Qb3 29. Rc1 Rxc1+ 30. Qxc1 Qd3 31. Be5 Nd7 32. Qc3 Nxe5 33.
dxe5 Qxc3 34. bxc3 Bc5 35. Kf2 d4 36. cxd4 Bxd4 37. f4 b5 38. Ke2 Bc5 39. Nc2
Kf8 40. Kd3 a5 41. Ke4 Bg1 42. h3 Ke7 43. Kd5 Kd7 44. g4 Bf2 45. Nd4 Bxd4 46.
Kxd4 Kc6 47. h4 b4 48. axb4 axb4 49. Kc4 (49. f5 gxf5 50. gxf5 b3 51. Kc3 Kd5
52. e6 fxe6 53. f6 gxf6 54. h5) 49… b3 50. Kxb3 Kd5 51. g5 Ke6 52. Kc4 Ke7
53. Kb5 (53. Kd4 Ke6 $2 (53… Kd7 $2 54. f5 $1) (53… Ke8 54. Kd3 Ke7 55. Ke2
$5) 54. f5+ $3 Kxf5 (54… gxf5 55. h5) 55. Kd5 Kg4 56. Kd6 Kxh4 57. Ke7 Kxg5
58. Kxf7) 53… f6 (53… Ke6 {[%emt 0:00:00]} 54. Kc5 (54. Kc6 f6) 54… Ke7
55. Kd5 Kd7 56. e6+ (56. Kd4 Ke6 57. Ke4 Ke7 58. f5 (58. Kf3 Ke6 59. Kg4 Ke7
60. h5 gxh5+ 61. Kxh5 Ke6 62. Kg4 (62. Kh4 g6 63. Kg4 Ke7 (63… Kd7 64. Kf3
Ke7 65. Ke3 Kd7 66. Kd3 Ke7 67. Kd4 Ke6 68. Ke4 Ke7 69. f5 gxf5+ 70. Kxf5 Ke8)
(63… Kd5 64. Kf3 Kd4 65. Kf2 Ke4 66. Kg3 Kd5) 64. f5 gxf5+ 65. Kxf5 Ke8 66.
Kf6 Kf8) (62. g6 f6 63. exf6 Kxf6) 62… g6 63. Kf3 Kd5 (63… Kf5 64. Ke3 Kg4
$2 65. Ke4 Kh5 (65… Kh3 66. f5) 66. Kd5 Kg4 67. e6 fxe6+ 68. Kxe6 Kxf4 69.
Kf6) 64. Ke3 Ke6 65. Ke4 $11) 58… gxf5+ 59. Kxf5 g6+ 60. Kf4 Ke6 61. Ke4 Ke7
(61… Kd7 $6 62. Kd5 Ke7 63. e6 fxe6+ 64. Ke5 Kf7 65. Kd6 e5 $11)) 56… fxe6+
57. Ke5 Ke7) (53… Kd7 54. Kc5 (54. Kb6 Ke7 55. Kc7 f6 (55… Ke8 56. Kd6 Kd8
57. e6 fxe6 58. Kxe6 Ke8 59. f5 gxf5 60. Kxf5 Kf7 61. Ke4 (61. Kf4 Kg6 62. Kg4
Kf7 63. Kh5) 61… g6 $2 62. Kd5) 56. Kc8 fxe5 57. fxe5 Ke8) 54… Ke7 55. Kc6
Ke6 56. Kc7 Ke7) (53… Ke6 54. Kc5 Ke7 55. Kd4 Ke6 56. Ke3 Kd7 (56… Ke7 $1)
57. f5 gxf5 58. h5 Ke7 59. h6 gxh6 60. gxh6 Kf8 61. Kf4) 54. gxf6+ gxf6 55. Kc5
Ke6 56. Kd4 Kd7 57. Kd5 Ke7 58. e6 Kd8 59. Kd6 Ke8 60. e7 1-0
Bill Brock
Chicago
Great come back Judit!!
I wasn’t at home for a few days, having a kibbitz-time in cap d’agde, then : what a surprise!
Congratulation Judit! wish more and more marvelous fighting wins like that!
ps:Topalov should have have a rest after elista… his play was not at his best there…