FIDE/ACP Anti-Cheating Chess Panel Meets at University of Buffalo, NY
Hello Chess Blog friends,
On April 21-23, the FIDE/ACP Anti-Cheating Committee met at the Department of Computer Science and Engineering of the University at Buffalo, NY, for finalizing the proposal to the General Assembly for the new Anti-Cheating regulations. The meeting was also an occasion for a first-hand evaluation, together with leading academic experts, of the sophisticated anti-cheating tool developed by Prof. Kenneth Regan. FIDE wishes to thank the University at Buffalo for hosting this very important meeting and for devoting its professors' time to this project. (Update via FIDE)
Left to Right: Konstantin Landa, Kenneth Regan, Israel Gelfer, Klaus Deventer, Yuri Garrett, Laurent Freyd
You can read all Chess Blog posts related to the subject of cheating in chess by clicking on the photo.
From Alexandra Kosteniuk's
Labels: ACP, cheating in chess, FIDE, university of buffalo
ACP President Emil Sutovsky Proposes Special Fund for Veteran Chess Players
Chess Blog for Daily Chess News and Trivia (c) Alexandra Kosteniuk, 2013
Hello everyone,
The ACP president Emil Sutovsky published an open letter in which he addresses FIDE president Kirsan Ilyumzhinov with a proposal to establish a special three-year program. Here is the letter:
"Dear Mr. President,
Let me address you on behalf of the ACP Board at a time when the cooperation between FIDE and the ACP is bearing important fruits in the World Championship cycle stability, Anti-Cheating effort and other important fields.
I'd like to address you on a topic which is at the very heart of the long life of a chess player.
Many living chess players, in the course of their career, have had a substantial impact on the chess and cultural life of their countries, and continue to be a powerful source of inspiration for the younger generations worldwide long time after they passed their prime.
True chess legends, who maintained the chess glory and tradition throughout the years, often without a significant financial reward. We all grew up on their games, read the books written by these noble veterans, and - more in general - the chess world owes a lot to these masters who preserved and enriched our unique chess culture.
The rewarding status of chess legend, however, often clashes with the resulting economic position, especially once age takes its toll and the time for retirement comes. Unfortunately, in most cases, the later years are very difficult years for these noble veterans, who often become forgotten by the contemporary world and usually have little or no access to pension funds or other sustenance. In these circumstances even a small help can sometimes make a big change.
Read more »Labels: ACP, emil sutovsky, FIDE, kirsan ilyumzhinov
ACP 'Chess Best' of 2012 Poll Results Announced
Chess blog for latest chess news and chess trivia (c) Alexandra Kosteniuk, 2013
Hi everyone,
The Association of Chess Professionals had recently conducted a poll to decide the best chess tournament of the year 2012. The ACP has just announced the results. All ACP members could vote for their favorite tournaments, having a choice out of 26 selected events of different formats. Voting for the best tournament of the year, the ACP members have shown their appreciation for the hard work done by the organisers. A total number of 769 votes were cast. The results are:
ACP Tournament of the Year 2012: Tata Steel Chess, Wijk aan Zee
Best Round Robin event of 2012: Tata Steel Chess, Wijk aan Zee
Best Open event of 2012: Tradewise Gibraltar Festival
Best official event of 2012: World Chess Championship Match Anand-Gelfand, Moscow
Congratulations to all the winners. The Tournament of the Year contest is organized for the second consecutive year. See the 2011-results here: link
Top-5 for each category:
ACP Tournament of the Year 2012
1 Tata Steel Chess, Wijk aan Zee
2 London Chess Classic
3 World Chess Championship Match Anand-Gelfand, Moscow
4 Tradewise Gibraltar Festival
5 Tal Memorial, Moscow
Best Round Robin event of 2012
1 Tata Steel Chess, Wijk aan Zee
2 Tal Memorial, Moscow
3 London Chess Classic
4 ACP Golden Classic
5 Chess Masters Final, Bilbao/Sao Paulo
Best Open event of 2012
1 Tradewise Gibraltar Festival
2 Aeroflot Open, Moscow
3 Reykjavik Open
4 Moscow Open
5 Biel Master Tournament
Best official event of 2012
1 World Chess Championship Match Anand-Gelfand, Moscow
2 ACP Women Cup, Tbilisi
3 European Club Cup, Eilat
4 Chess Olympiad, Istanbul
5 Women's World Blitz and Rapid Championship, Batumi
Labels: ACP, best chess tournament
Turkish Chess Fed vs GM Suat Atalik: ACP Open Letter To Fide and Chess Community
Chess blog for latest chess news and chess trivia (c) Alexandra Kosteniuk, 2012
Hi everyone,
Open letter to FIDE and the chess community
The ACP Board recently received a letter from GM Suat Atalik, from Turkey, requesting a reaction concerning his recent case with the Turkish Chess Federation (“TCF”) and the Greek Chess Federation (“GCF”)
The Facts
Mr. Atalik informed us that his national chess federation, the TCF, has inflicted him a 15-month ban from national and international events following his infringement of applicable Turkish regulations. Reportedly, the reason behind the ban was Mr. Atalik’s denial to ask for permission to play abroad and his refusal to sign an undertaking. The TCF’s decision was supported by the Turkish Judiciary.
Mr. Atalik also reported that, upon request of the TCF based solely on its internal ruling, the GCF contacted tournament organizers in Greece asking them to deny the participation of Mr. Atalik in their events.
ACP’s Understanding of the Case
It is the understanding of the ACP Board that this is a very sensitive case that demands the utmost attention by the whole chess community, especially FIDE, as it may become a dangerous precedent. We are already witnessing a vicious attempt at introducing a new rule, that aims at enabling an automatic ban of a player from all FIDE events based on the decision of his national chess federation (the proposal is included into the Agenda of the FIDE Congress in Istanbul).
Read more »Labels: ACP, FIDE, suat atalik, turkish chess fed
Association of Chess Professional Plans Return of Adjournments with Anna Muzychuk and 6 GMs
Chess blog for latest chess news and chess trivia (c) Alexandra Kosteniuk, 2012
Hi everyone,
The Association of Chess Professionals (ACP) is going to try and interesting new idea at a chess tournament in Amsterdam next month. The games will be adjourned after move 40 and resumed the next day! The time control will also be like in the old days: 2.5 hours for the first 40 moves.
The chess tournament named "Golden Classic" will be held July 14-22 July in Amsterdam on the sidelines of the Dutch National Chess Championship and the SPA Chess Open.
The tournament will be a single round robin with seven players: Vassily Ivanchuk (UKR, 2764), Gata Kamsky (USA, 2741), Baadur Jobava (GEO, 2721), Krishnan Sasikiran (IND, 2720), Le Quang Liem (VIE, 2703), Emil Sutovsky (ISR, 2687) and Anna Muzychuk (SLO, 2598).
Tournament director will be Jeroen van den Berg who also runs the Tata Steel tournament in Wijk aan Zee and the Univé Tournament in Hoogeveen each year. The tournament won't be rated. The players will be fighting for an overall prize-fund of US $35,000. The sponsor is private and doesn't want to be mentioned.
Do you know how adjournments work in chess?It's almost two decades since the adjournment rule went out of style and the rulebook. All games at top tournaments were adjourned after the after the time control (after either move 40 or 60). The player whose turn it was to move wrote the move on a piece of paper and the arbiter sealed it in an envelope. The players could then spend the day or a rest day as well analysing the position with their team. The game resumed with the arbiter opening the envelope and playing the move when the chess tournament resumed.
From Alexandra Kosteniuk's
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www.chessqueen.com
Labels: ACP, Anna Muzychuk, baadur jobava, emil sutovsky, gata kamsky, golden classic, krishnan sasikiran, le quang liem, Vassily Ivanchuk
Association of Chess Professionals Newsletter for First Quarter 2012
Chess blog for latest chess news and chess trivia (c) Alexandra Kosteniuk, 2012
Hi everyone,
As you know, the Association of Chess Professionals (ACP) has charted a new and fresh course with great chess events this year with their new president, Grandmaster Emil Sutovsky.
We just found the ACP newsletter with a summary of their chess activities in the first four months of the 2012. Their membership count is now 873 with representatives from 80 national federations.
Here is the summary of chess activities:
1) Dzagnidze wins play-offs against Cramling to take the 2012 ACP Women's Cup
2) Announcing the Women's Rapid and Blitz World Chess Championships 2012 - Batumi will be the venue for this important event from 30 May to 6 June 2012. The total prize fund is of 100.000 USD, by far the highest prize fund ever for a women rapid chess event (notably the former record was held by another ACP event: the ACP Women Cup 2012).
3) Cooperation with FIDE
4) Cooperation with continental federations
5) The new ACP Book of the Year contest
6) The new ACP Tournament of the Year contest
They have also asked members to vote for the best tournament of the year 2011. This is yet another new initiative from the ACP to promote professional chess at all levels!
7) The Elite GM Survey
The ACP is working with FIDE commissions to prepare a comprehensive survey on the possible introduction of a new GM title.
8) Jeroen van den Berg and Giovanni Vescovi join the ACP Board
9) The new ACP logo
You can read the full newsletter at the Association of Chess Professionals' website.
Here are some Chess Blog headlines we've posted on the ACP:
Labels: ACP, acp countries, association of chess professionals
Rapid, Blitz World Chess Regulations Approved: GM Sutovsky
Chess blog for latest chess news and chess trivia (c) Alexandra Kosteniuk, 2012
Hi everyone,
The latest chess news update about the World Rapid and Blitz Chess Championship to be held in Kazakhstan is that the regulations are in place and the prize fund is now $400,000.
This was announced by Association of Chess Professionals (ACP) president GM Emil Sutovsky during an interview with Chess-News. GM Sutovsky also spoke about several important decisions made during the FIDE Presidential Board meeting in Elista. "At last, the regulations were approved about the Rapid and Blitz World Championships to be held in Kazakhstan between 24 June and 1 July. I think it's great that it was possible to attract a serious prize fund of $400,000. As a person who is involved in writing the regulations for these championships (there were discussions about how many people should be invited according to their rating and how many selected), I always have the view that in these kind of tournaments there should be as many places as possible available for a selection, since it's not quite right to invite everyone according to their rating and provide 1-2 places for the selection. That's because, first of all, the official rating is for classical chess, while it's not quite clear why there must be invitations for the rapid and blitz tournaments according to the rating. At the end, a compromise decision was reached: there will be selection to the rapid and blitz tournaments. There will be six places selected for the rapid and five for the blitz. That's because one place in blitz is reserved for the previous World Championship winner, while there hasn't been a championship like that in the rapid before. Therefore, there will be sixteen participants [in each type of tournament] who will include five in the blitz and six in the rapid selected."
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Labels: ACP, emil sutovsky, kazakhstan chess, world blit chess, world rapid chess
Women's World Rapid and Blitz Chess 2012 in Batumi from May 30
Chess blog for latest chess news and chess trivia (c) Alexandra Kosteniuk, 2012
Hi everyone,
The Women's World Rapid and Blitz Chess Championship 2012 will be held from May 30 to June 6 in Batumi, Georgia. The event is organised and conducted by the ACP and the Georgian Chess Federation and approved by FIDE.
The format is as follows:
Rapid Swiss, 11 rounds
Blitz Swiss, 15 rounds
Time control
Rapid 25 min + 10 seconds
Blitz 4 min + 2 seconds
FIDE Rules for Rapid Chess and FIDE Rules for blitz are applied.
Zero tolerance rule will not be applied. The game is lost by the player who arrives at the chessboard after her flag has fallen.
Right of participation
Every female player with the Elo of 2500+ in one of the official FIDE rating lists as well as all former World Champions and Olympic Champions have the personal right to participate in the Championship. Besides, every national federation can nominate one player for participation in the Championship. In addition, up to five more players can be nominated from the same federation, provided they have Elo of 2300+ in one of the official FIDE rating lists in 2012.
Georgian Chess Federation will get three additional wild cards as a host of the event.
Schedule
30 May – Arrival, Opening Ceremony, Technical meeting.
31 May – Rapid (rounds 1-3) 15:00, 17:00, 19:00
1 June – Rapid (rounds 4-6) 15:00, 17:00, 19:00
2 June – Rapid (rounds 7-9) 15:00, 17:00, 19:00
3 June – Rapid (rounds 10-11) 15:00, 17:00
4 June – Blitz (rounds 1-8) 15:00, 15:30, 16:00, etc...
5 June – Blitz (rounds 9-15), 15:00, 15:30, 16:00, etc... Closing Ceremony.
6 June – Departure
Prizes
The total prize fund of the two events of 100.000 (one hundred thousand) USD is distributed as follows:
In case of a tie, all prizes will be split equally, except for the first prize.
In case of a tie for the first place, the tie-break will be played among the two players with the highest Median Buchholz.
The details of the tie-break match will be announced at the technical meeting. In case of a tie for the second and third places, the medals will be awarded based on the Median Buchholz.
The winners of the Championships will be declared Women's World Rapid Champion-2012 and Women's World Blitz Champion-2012 respectively.
From Alexandra Kosteniuk's
Also see her personal blog at
Labels: ACP, batumi chess, georgia chess, women's world blitz chess championship 2012, women's world rapid chess championship
Women's World Rapid and Blitz Championship 2012 from May 30 in Georgia
Chess blog for latest chess news and chess trivia (c) Alexandra Kosteniuk, 2012
Hi everyone,
The ACP has announced a fantastic new chess event for women to take place in Batumi, Georgia - Women's World Rapid and Blitz Championship 2012 (30 May – 06 June 2012).
The event will consist of an eleven-round Swiss Rapid (25 minutes + 10 seconds) and a 15-round Blitz (4 minutes + 2 seconds), using the FIDE rules for Rapid and Blitz, except for the "zero tolerance rule", which will not be applied – the game is lost by the player who arrives at the chessboard after her flag has fallen.
The tournament is open to any female player rated over 2500 in an official FIDE rating lists, as well as all former World Champions and Olympic Champions. In addition, every national federation can nominate one player for participation in the Championship. Up to five more players can be nominated from the same federation, provided that they have Elo of 2300+ in one of the official FIDE rating lists in 2012. The Georgian Chess Federation will receive three additional wild cards as a host of the event.
The total prize fund is US $100,000, with the winner of the Rapid obtaining $12,000 and the winner of the Blitz $10,000. All the players who have an official right of participation will be provided with full board and accommodation in the Sheraton Hotel, Batumi. All other participants are free to choose from the variety of the hotels in Batumi. The organizers will offer a special price for the official hotels.
Check out the official website for more details here.
From Alexandra Kosteniuk's
Also see her personal blog at
Labels: ACP, batumi, georgia, women world rapid and blitz
FIDE and ACP agreed on close chess cooperation
Chess blog for latest chess news and chess trivia (c) Alexandra Kosteniuk, 2012Hi everyone,
On Thursday January 19th, FIDE President Kirsan Ilyumzhinov met with the newly elected ACP President GM Emil Sutovsky. The meeting took place after preliminary talks between GM E. Sutovsky, FIDE Deputy President Mr. G. Makropoulos and FIDE Vice President Mr. I. Gelfer (all members of the FIDE Commission for the Olympiads and World Championships), in which several issues concerning the relationships between FIDE and the ACP were discussed.
Mr. Ilyumzhinov and GM Sutovsky agreed on the following mutual declaration:
Both parties are striving for a constant dialogue and cooperation regarding all issues, which concern the professional chess.
In this regard, the following points were agreed upon:
1. The ACP will be actively involved in the decision-making process within FIDE – The ACP President or his representative will be invited to all FIDE Presidential Board meetings. Additionally, the ACP will be represented in the following commissions of FIDE: World Championships and Olympiads, Modernization, Qualification, Ethics and Rules.
2. The ACP, having a comprehensive information about all major events in the chess world, will build a Calendar for all official events. This Calendar shall be approved by FIDE.
3. The ACP will participate in the process of choosing arbiters for the Olympiads.The shortlist of International Arbiters – members of the ACP will be submitted, and FIDE will appoint 10 arbiters from this list.
4. The ACP gets the right to organize 2012 ACP World Rapid Cup, 2012 Women’s World Rapid Championship and 2012 World Internet Championships/Cup. In case the ACP intends to organize such events in the future, they will have to get an approval from FIDE for using the “World” title.
5. One of the FIDE President nominees for the 2013 World Cup will be the highest ranked player of the ACP Tour 2012, who is not qualified by other way (Elo, Continentals, etc…)
6. For the next World Championship cycle (2013-2014), the winner of the ACP Tour, in the year, preceding the Candidates’ Competition will be included as one of the eight participants of the Candidates’ Competition.
In addition, the question of introducing new Grandmaster title was discussed, and the ACP will conduct a survey in this regard.
From Alexandra Kosteniuk's
Also see her personal blog at
Labels: ACP, emil sutovsky, FIDE, kirsan ilyumzhinov
Kosteniuk wins First ACP Women World Rapid Cup
Hello everybody!
The First ACP Women's World Rapid Chess Cup is over and now I have some time to tell you more about this interesting event.
As you may know the ACP (the Association of Chess Professionals) holds the ACP men and women chess tournament series. That means that almost all important chess tournaments are taken into account and the winners of these events get points which are later used to determine the top players of the year. Some time ago I made a post about the winners of the 2008/09 women's chess series. The top 8 ladies were invited to take part in the first ACP women's world rapid chess cup, together with 3 local players and one ACP nominee. Natalia Pogonina who recently gave birth to a son decided not to take part in this competition and was replaced by Monica Socko.
We played on the 1st, 2nd and 3rd of December. The time control of the tournament was 20 min + 5 sec per game. There were 4 rounds on the first day which I started very well and won each game. Four more rounds on the second day which happened to be the most difficult day for me in the competition as I lost my only game in the tournament to my compatriot Tatiana Kosintseva and was very close to losing to Pia Cramling. We finally played 3 more games on the last day. All the regulations of the tournament, together with the final cross-table, perfomance of the participants and photos of the organizers can be found on the official web-site.
I won this tournament with the impressive result of 10 out of 11 and my rating perfomance was 2746!
Here are my chess impressions of the tournament. As I posted after the first day I started the tournament with 4 out of 4 with wins in a pretty convincing style over Monica Socko, Natalia Zhukova, the local Turkish girl Menzi Ezgi and Nadezhda Kosintseva. Especially I liked my game against Nadezhda Kosintseva where after a mistake from Nadezhda I managed to find the most precise way to finish the game.
 After Black's mistake on the 16th move Ne7? I played 17. dxe5 and after Bxe3 we reached the following position. Before playing dxe5 I was planning to play here 18. Nxf7? with the idea after Rxf7? 19. Bxf7 Kxf7 to play 20. exf6! and get a winning position similar to the one that I got in the game. But when I was calculating this variation I suddenly noticed that after 18. Nxf7 Black has the very strong intermediate move 18. ... Bxf2+! and after 19. Kxf2 Nxe4+! and it's White who needs to think about equality here. That's why I found another move to continue the game with and this move is 18. Bxf7+! and after 18. ... Rxf7 19. Nxf7 I won in convincing style.
[Event "First ACP Women World Rapid Cup"] [Site "Konya"] [Date "2009.12.1"] [Round "4"] [White "GM Kosteniuk Alexandra"] [Black "IM Kosintseva Nadezhda"] [Result "1-0"] [Eco "C78"]
1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 a6 4.Ba4 Nf6 5.O-O b5 6.Bb3 Bc5 7.c3 d6 8.d4 Bb6 9.a4 Rb8 10.a5 Ba7 11.h3 O-O 12.Be3 Ra8 13.Nbd2 Bb7 14.Re1 Re8 15.Ng5 Rf8 16.Nf1 Ne7 17.dxe5 Bxe3 18.Bxf7+ Rxf7 19.Nxf7 Bxf2+ 20.Kxf2 Qf8 21.Nh6+ gxh6 22.exf6 Qxf6+ 23.Kg1 Ng6 24.Ne3 Re8 25.Nd5 Qe5 26.Qd4 c5 27.Qxe5 Rxe5 28.Rad1 Kg7 29.Ne3 Bxe4 30.Rxd6 1-0
During the third round a very interesting endgame arose in the game between Pia Cramling and Ozturk Kubra.
Pia is playing with white and despite being a Rook up White is not able to win the game. The game continued for quite a while but at the end White had to agree that it's a draw.
Event "First ACP Women World Rapid Cup"] [Site "Konya"] [Date "2009.12.1"] [Round "3"] [White "GM Cramling Pia"] [Black "WIM Ozturk Kubra"] [Result "1/2-1/2"]
111.Ke4 Re7+ 112.Kf4 Rd7 113.Rh2+ Ke1 114.Rh1+ Ke2 115.Ke4 Re7+ 116.Kd4 Rd7+ 117.Kc4 Rc7+ 118.Kd5 Rd7+ 119.Ke6 Rd3 120.Kf5 Rd8 121.Kf4 Rf8+ 122.Ke4 Re8+ 123.Kd4 Rd8+ 124.Kc3 Rc8+ 125.Kb3 Rb8+ 126.Kc4 Rc8+ 127.Kd5 Rd8+ 128.Ke6 Rd3 129.Ke5 Rd8 130.Rh2+ Ke1 131.Rh1+ Ke2 132.Rh2+ Ke1 133.Rh1+ Ke2 134.Rh4 Re8+ 135.Kf4 Rf8+ 136.Ke5 Re8+ 137.Kd4 Rd8+ 138.Kc3 Rc8+ 139.Kd4 Rd8+ 140.Ke4 Re8+ 141.Kf4 Rf8+ 142.Ke5 Re8+ 143.Kf6 Rd8 144.Ke7 Rd3 145.Ke6 Rd8 146.Rh2+ Ke3 147.Ra3+ Kf4 148.Rf2+ Kg4 149.Rg2+ Kf4 150.Rf2+ Kg4 151.Rxd2 Rxd2 1/2-1/2
The last game to finish on the first day was the encounter between Viktorija Cmilyte and Tatiana Kosintseva. The last 25 moves were played with seconds on the clock for both players but nevertheless both players played pretty well. At the end Viktorija was more precise and won this exciting game.
The position before the 28th move of White. White played 28. Rxe4!?
[Event "First ACP Women World Rapid Cup"]
[Site "Konya"] [Date "2009.12.1"] [Round "4"] [White "IM Cmilyte Viktorija"] [Black "GM Kosintseva Tatiana"] [Result "1-0"]
1.Nf3 d5 2.d4 Nf6 3.c4 e6 4.Nc3 Bb4 5.Qa4+ Nc6 6.a3 Bxc3+ 7.bxc3 Ne4 8.Bb2 O-O 9.e3 Qe8 10.Qc2 Na5 11.Bd3 dxc4 12.Bxe4 f5 13.a4 fxe4 14.Qxe4 Bd7 15.Ba3 Rf6 16.Ng5 Rg6 17.f4 Bc6 18.Qc2 Bxa4 19.Qe2 Bc6 20.e4 Rf6 21.O-O h6 22.Nh3 Nb3 23.Rae1 b5 24.f5 exf5 25.e5 Rf7 26.e6 Rf6 27.Qe5 Be4 28.Rxe4 fxe4 29.Rxf6 gxf6 30.Qxf6 c5 31.Qxh6 Qf8 32.Qg6+ Qg7 33.Qxe4 Re8 34.d5 b4 35.d6 Nd2 36.Qd5 Qxc3 37.e7+ Kh8 38.Qh5+ Kg7 39.Qg5+ Kh7 40.Qf5+ Kg7 41.Qg5+ Kf7 42.Qh5+ Kg7 43.Qxe8 Qa1+ 44.Kf2 Qf1+ 45.Kg3 Ne4+ 46.Kh4 Qf6+ 47.Kg4 Qe6+ 48.Kf4 Qxd6+ 49.Kxe4 Qe6+ 50.Kf3 Qf5+ 1-0
The second day started pretty badly for me. I lost to Tatiana Kosintseva, by overlooking a very nice combination.
I just played 26. ... Rae8? (26...g5 was better) and Tatiana found a nice way to finish the game 27. Qxe4! it turns out that I will be checkmated after dxe4 28. c4! Qb4 29. Rgh1 and I can defend from checkmate only by giving away my Queen. That's why I didn't take the Queen on e4 and tried to complicate the game after 27. ... f5 but I don't have enough compensation and soon I needed to resign.
[Event "First ACP Women World Rapid Cup"] [Site "Konya"] [Date "2009.12.2"] [Round "5"] [White "GM Kosintseva Tatiana"] [Black "GM Kosteniuk Alexandra"] [Result "1-0"] [Eco "C43"]
1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nf6 3.d4 Nxe4 4.Bd3 d5 5.dxe5 Nc5 6.Nc3 Nc6 7.Bb5 a6 8.Bxc6+ bxc6 9.Nd4 Bd7 10.O-O Ne6 11.f4 Nxd4 12.Qxd4 Bf5 13.Na4 Qb8 14.Be3 Qb5 15.b3 Ba3 16.c3 O-O 17.Rad1 Rfd8 18.Rf2 a5 19.h3 h5 20.Kh2 Be7 21.Rg1 g6 22.g4 hxg4 23.hxg4 Be4 24.Kg3 Rf8 25.Rh2 f6 26.e6 Rae8 27.Qxe4 f5 28.Qd4 Bf6 29.Qd2 Rxe6 30.Bd4 Rfe8 31.Bxf6 Re3+ 32.Kh4 Kf7 33.Kg5 d4 34.Rh7+ Ke6 35.Qxd4 fxg4+ 36.Nc5+ 1-0
But Viktorija Cmilyte with whom I was sharing the first place after the first day also lost the 5th game to Pia Cramling, so after the 5th rounds there were 4 players (me, Cmilyte, T. Kosintseva and M. Socko) with 5 out of 6. In the 6th round I got lucky since Pia in our game forfeited on time in a won position.
After lunch we continued the second day. I could manage all the worries after the rather shaky morning's games and won two games pretty easily.
Here is one more nice small combination by Tatiana Kosintseva against Menzi Ezgi.
It's White to move, try to find the best continuation for White.
In the 8th round Tatiana met her sister Nadezhda and as usual they agreed on a draw while I won my game and so after the second day I was leading alone with 7 out of 8.
In the 9th and 10th rounds I won two games. While my followers were losing points in their direct encounters.
This is the game between Tatiana Kosintseva and Monica Socko. It's Black to move. Try to find the best move for Black.
In the last round I was playing against Cmilyte. I was in a pretty comfortable tournament situation. I had 9 out of 10 and she was following me with 8 out of 10. So she needed to win in order to play the tie-break for the first place. After the opening I got a very good position and had a tremendous time advantage but at some point lost concentration and gave my opponent some counter-chances which she could have used at one point. But all is well that ends well and I managed to win this game and took 10 out of 11.
After the end of the tournament the organizers created for us a short touristic trip to the center of Konya. Konya is a city in the Central Anatolia Region of Turkey. It is the capital of the Konya Province, and had a city population of 980,973 in 2008. Konya has the reputation of being one of the more religiously conservative metropolitan centers in Turkey. We had time to visit the Mevlana Museum which is the mausoleum of Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi, a Sufi mystic also known as Mevlâna or Rumi and even got a permission to take some photos inside this building.
Immediately after the visit to the historical part of Konya we got back to the wonderful 5-stars hotel Rixos Konya where we were staying and had the closing ceremony.
I got the gold medal and a very nice cup. The second place with 8 points out of 10 was awarded to Viktorija Cmilyte and the bronze went to Tatiana Kosintseva who finished the tournament with 7.5 out of 11. From left to right: Ali Yazici, Tatiana Kosintseva, Viktorija Cmilyte and Alexandra Kosteniuk.
At the end of this post I'd like to thank the organizers of the event, the Turkish Chess Federation and its President Mr. Ali Yazici for making this final tournament of the ACP women's series 2008/09 possible and I'm sure we will meet many more times in Turkey in the future! Thank you and see you next year, Turkey!
All the participants and the organizers of the first ACP Women's World Rapid Chess Cup.
Posted by: Alexandra Kosteniuk Women's World Chess Champion Labels: ACP, Kosteniuk, Turkey
ACP Rapid Cup Cross Table after Day 2
Hello!
One more day to go in the ACP Women's World Rapid Cup which is taking place in Turkey. I'll write more about it tomorrow, only 3 rounds to go!| First ACP Women World Rapid Cup | | | | Organizer(s) : Association of Chess Professionals & Turkish Chess Federation | | Date : 2009/12/01 To 2009/12/03 | | | | Rank after round 8 | | | | Rank | SNo. | | Name | Rtg | FED | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | Pts. | | 1 | 1 | GM | Kosteniuk Alexandra | 2517 | RUS | * | 0 | | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | | 1 | 1 | | 1 | 7 | | 2 | 5 | GM | Kosintseva Tatiana | 2522 | RUS | 1 | * | 0 | | ½ | | 1 | 1 | | 1 | 1 | 1 | 6½ | | 3 | 11 | IM | Cmilyte Viktorija | 2480 | LTU | | 1 | * | | 1 | 0 | 1 | | ½ | ½ | 1 | 1 | 6 | | 12 | GM | Socko Monika | 2457 | POL | 0 | | | * | 0 | | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 6 | | 5 | 4 | IM | Kosintseva Nadezhda | 2518 | RUS | 0 | ½ | 0 | 1 | * | | ½ | ½ | | | 1 | 1 | 4½ | | 6 | GM | Cramling Pia | 2525 | SWE | 0 | | 1 | | | * | 0 | ½ | 1 | ½ | ½ | 1 | 4½ | | 7 | 2 | WGM | Zhukova Natalia | 2465 | UKR | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | ½ | 1 | * | | 1 | | | 1 | 3½ | | 10 | IM | Javakhishvili Lela | 2482 | GEO | | 0 | | 0 | ½ | ½ | | * | ½ | 1 | 0 | 1 | 3½ | | 9 | 7 | IM | Klinova Masha | 2305 | ISR | 0 | | ½ | 0 | | 0 | 0 | ½ | * | 1 | ½ | | 2½ | | 10 | 8 | WIM | Yildiz Betul Cemre | 2213 | TUR | 0 | 0 | ½ | 0 | | ½ | | 0 | 0 | * | 1 | | 2 | | 9 | WIM | Ozturk Kubra | 2177 | TUR | | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | ½ | | 1 | ½ | 0 | * | | 2 | | 12 | 3 | | Menzi Nezihe Ezgi | 1847 | TUR | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | | | | * | 0 |
Posted by Alexandra Kosteniuk Women's World Chess Champion Labels: ACP
First ACP Women World Rapid Cup
Hello everybody!
I'm in Konya, Turkey, right now, taking part in the first ACP Women World Rapid Cup.
Many of the world's strongest women chess players are participating, and it's bound to be one of the most fascinating rapid tournaments of the year.
Kosteniuk Alexandra Zhukova Natalia Menzi Nezihe Ezgi Kosintseva Nadezhda Kosintseva Tatiana Cramling Pia Klinova Masha Yildiz Betul Cemre Ozturk Kubra Javakhishvili Lela Cmilyte Viktorija Socko Monika
After the first 4 rounds I have 4 out of 4 and am sharing first place with Viktoria Cmilyte.
I won all my games today against Nadezhda Kosintseva, Monika Socko, Natalia Zhukova and Ezgi Menzi Nezihe.
Tomorrow, December 2 we will play 4 more rounds and then on December 3 we will finish the tournament with 3 more rounds. The games can be seen LIVE here. We play at 11:30 AM, 12:30 PM, 4 PM and 5 PM local time (GMT +2 which is one hour after Paris and one hour before Moscow, or 7 hours after New York EST).
The organization is excellent and during the opening ceremony the president of the Turkish Chess Federation Ali Yazici told everybody that in the next few years Turkey will organize many world class women chess events, including the Women's World Chess Championship in 2010 and Women's World Team Championship in 2011. Ali Yazici during the opening ceremony
The Playing Hall
Below are two fragments of my games of today. In both of them it's White to move, try to find the best continuation for White.
Kosteniuk - Zhukova, 1st round, White to move.
Kosteniuk - Nadezhda Kosintseva, 4th round, White to move.
I will let you know in more details how it went after the tournament will be over, in 2 days. The current crosstable can be found here.
Posted by: Alexandra Kosteniuk Women's World Chess Champion Labels: ACP, Turkey, women world rapid cup
First ACP Women's World Rapid Cup to be held in Turkey
Below you will find the official press-release with the rules and conditions for all the participants.
Tournament Regulations:
I. Place and date
The tournament will be held in Rixos Hotel, Konya, Turkey from November 30th to December 4th 2009.
II. Tournament’s system
The 1st ACP Women World Rapid Cup will be a Round Robin tournament with twelve participants including
- eight qualifiers from the ACP Women Series:
1. Kosintseva Tatiana 2. Kosteniuk Alexandra 3. Pogonina Natalya 4. Kosintseva Nadezhda 5. Cramling Pia 6. Cmilyte Viktorija 7. Zhukova Natalya 8. Javakhishvili Lela
- three Turkish Chess Federation nominees
- one ACP nominee
Games will be played with the following time control: 20 minutes each at the start of the game with an increment of 5 seconds per move from move 1.
In case of tie for the first place, a tie-break will be played to determine a winner.
III. Players conditions
All players are provided with a full board accommodation at the Rixos hotel, Konya. All players are provided with a free transfer from/to the Konya airport All players get a compensation of their travelling expenses up to USD 500.
IV. Prizes
The total prize fund of the event amounts to USD 20,000. Prizes will be distributed as follows: Winner USD 5,000 2nd place USD 4,000 3rd place USD 3,000 4th place USD 2,000 5th place USD 1,500 6th place USD 1,000 7th place USD 800 8th place USD 700 9-12 places, each USD 500
In case of tie for any place accept the first, prize money will be shared equally.
V. Tournament’s schedule
Nov 30
Arrival
9 p.m. Opening Ceremony
Dec 1
11:30 a.m. 1st round 12:30 a.m. 2nd round 3:00 p.m 3rd round 4:00 p.m. 4th round
Dec 2
11:30 a.m. 5th round 12:30 a.m. 6th round 3:00 p.m 7th round 4:00 p.m. 8th round
Dec 3
11:30 a.m. 9th round 12:30 a.m. 10th round 3:00 p.m. 11th round 4:30 p.m. tie-break
6 p.m.: Closing ceremony
Dec 4
Departure
VI. Miscellaneous
Games will be played under the current FIDE Rules, with the addition of the ’Corsican rule’ (draw offer is forbidden).
Illegal moves do not lose the game. Nevertheless, each illegal move will be penalized by a 2-minute addition on the opponent’s clock.
In all tie-break games, any illegal move leads to the immediate loss of the game.
Tie-break system.
If two players tie for the first place, a blitz match of 4 games will be played to determine the winner. The time control will be 3 minutes each at the start of the game with an increment of 2 seconds per move from move 1. If a match ends in a draw, two additional two blitz games will have to be played. The time control will be 3 minutes each at the start of the game with an increment of 2 seconds per move from move 1. If this tie-break match again ends in a draw (1-1), a last game will have to be played. This final tie-break will consist of a single blitz game where White starts with 5 minutes and needs to win the game in order to win the match (sudden death game). Black, on his part, only needs a draw to win the match, but has only 4 minutes at the start of the game. This final tie-break game will be played without time increment.
If three or more players tie for the first place, a round robin (or double round robin) blitz tournament will be played to determine the winner. An exact format will depend on a number of players and will be announced by the chief arbiter. The time control will be 3 minutes each at the start of the game with an increment of 2 seconds per move from move 1.
I have confirmed my participation to this tournament!
Posted by: Alexandra Kosteniuk Women's World Chess Champion Labels: ACP, Turkey
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