Corus 2003 at Wijk aan Zee, Round 10

by Aviv Friedman

Corus chess tournament round 10:

One of the most remarkable players in this year's B group, is local GM Harmen Jonkman. Many of you might know him from his Tournament Chess calendar and web site (www.jonkman.demon.nl/) clearly the best online calendar for international tournaments. Harmen, who hails from Bewerwijk, the next village over, certainly practices what he preaches. He is probably the most active player I know:

WGM Cmilyte vs WGM Kosteniuk

Having met him in 1995 or so, well before he was even an IM, I was already impressed by his amazing stamina. The man goes from one tournament to another, with little or no rest! From all over Europe, to the Middle East, from Africa to the Americas he is there playing game after game, move after move. It is a genuine love for the game, a true dedication not many can make. I know that when I travel and (sometimes!) play, after 2-3 events max, I can't wait to go back to the comfort of home, but not Harmen! Of course his rating similarly fluctuates, almost as if he played long sessions on ICC it has been well over 2500 and now it is down some, but rest assured it will climb back up. This very pleasant GM might lose and here and there to lower rateds but he can beat anyone on a good day. Keep it up Harmen!

Another word of appreciation for someone from the GM B group: 15 year old Daniel Stellwagen who has been improving rapidly. When I saw him in Greece 2 months ago, he has missed winning the boys under 16 title after leading the entire event. A bit disappointed he played last month in a closed tournament in Groningen, Holland and scored his final IM norm! Just when one wondered what's next for this outgoing junior, he decided to go 'on fire' for Corus, scoring an impressive 5.5/8 guaranteeing himself a GM norm regardless of how he did in round 9! In honor of this achievement he was asked to show his 8th round tough draw against Dutch GM Nijboer in the pressroom. His confidence and high-level analysis leave no doubt that only time stands between him and the coveted GM title. Keep an eye up for this guy and best wishes for success to him!

And today's chess:

Krasenkov - Radjabov:

GM Krasenkow vs GM Radjabov

An expected King's Indian defense by Radja, but this time he is not tested by the Bayonet. I guess his win against Pono impressed enough for a change. Michal went for the 6.h3 line, perhaps seeking revenge for his loss to the same opponent in the same line at the Dos Hermanas tournament. Teimour is getting very strong in the KID, and once again he outplayed his strong opponent from early on. 13.Kh2 left a frown on many of the GM's faces. Clearly after 20…Ne4! Black was already at least equal, and 21.Bd3?! Nxc3 black was in complete control. In time trouble, both opponents were shuffling their pieces to make time control, and when white lashed out with 39.g4 and 40.g5?! black's advantage was quite significant. White quickly lost a pawn and was worse, and the young Azari mopped up in admirable fashion. Plus one (5.5/10) is fantastic score for him in such a debut.

Ponomariov - van Wely: A small surprise with Ponomariov opening with 1.e4 instead of his usual 1.d4. Loeky loyally invites him to a Sveshnikov debate, but the Ukrainian prefers a Rossolimo he must have prepared especially for today. Van Wely drifted into an inferior position 18…Kh8?! Should have been replaced with 18…Re8 and then perhaps 20…Bxf6 was best. After 23…Kg8 Pono had the strong 24.Ne5! with the idea of Ng4 to follow. After missing that white was still better of course, and black had to suffer in the lesser evil of a R ending. Loek defended very well and was extremely close to a draw actually, but misplayed his position with the poor 43…f4? Evidently, he missed a little trick where in the game if he played his intended 54…Rxh6 55.Rf8+! winning. Another proof how cruel chess can be.

Bareev - Karpov: Anatoly has been playing the classical Nimzo - Indian for many many years and has great understanding and experience with it. Today they repeated their games from France last year and 13.Rd1 was new. Not atypically to this variation, a quick endgame arose but strangely Bareev took a full hour to play the consistent and obvious 20.Nc7. Perhaps he counted on it and now saw and calculated 20…Bb3 that he initially missed. That continuation happened and a R and minor plus pawns endgame was all that was left. Evgeny pressed as hard as he could, later trading into a slightly better ending of B vs N plus pawns, but the former world champ held mightily and although at a few points black looked in serious danger, it was only optical. White tried to entice Karpov into taking on b2 on move 38, naturally this would have trapped the N and leading to a very bad pawn endgame and so Karpov passed on it. Finally after move 59 with a 3-fold repetition, the game was called a draw. A well earned one for 'Tolya'.

GM Shirov VS GM Anand

Shirov - Anand: Anand once again shows great flexibility and adaptability playing the Caro knowing full well he would face the advanced variation, which he, himself plays as white too. There is always a mess happening from this line, and this game was no exception! After Vishy's unusual (new?) 11…Be7, which is designed to enable a quick 0-0, the ever-combative Alexey struck with a piece sac on d5, A speculative sac, which White should have followed with 13.Rxd5 as a best chance to follow. After 13.f4 Anand answered just as sharp with the strong 13…d4! The idea was to reply to 14.fxe5 with 14…Bg5! Now Shirov was spending oodles of time looking for his best compensation and on move 20 already had only 15 minutes left. To quote Vishy a piece is a piece and he never felt in danger or that his opponent has enough compensation for the piece. He was especially proud of his very strong 19…a5! Threatening Nb4. As a final 'insult' black returned an exchange to freeze any white hope for progress and won with little effort thereafter.

Grischuk - Polgar:

GM Grischuk vs GM Polgar

It is no secret that the Hungarian GM often plays the Taimanov Sicilian and so Alex must have prepared for it. At first black looked fine, but with the strong maneuver of Ne2-f4-h5 white looked in good shape with very limited counter play for black. Things only got worse with the black K traveling and white winning the g7 pawn. 21.Be2 was a bit unexpected, as 21.f4 seemed to have led to a huge edge for white. So after 21…Rh7 white might have had to settle for 22.f4 now but Sasha decided to sac a piece, and things started to decline for him since. He might not have been that bad, but probably still euphoric about his position previously, he passed on some moves that would have likely ended the game better for him (for example, 31.Bxa6 instead of the poor 31.Qf2?) In time trouble Judit almost let her opponent back in the game and her last move of the time control must have given her a minor heart attack after she saw 42.Rf1. (40…Rgxg7? Where 40…Qf4 was easy) lucky for her she was still winning technically despite having to return a whole piece so it wasn't too tragic for her. What a fantastic tournament for the world's new 2700 player!

Kramnik - Topalov: Another interesting opening choice! First Vlad for the first time in the event returned to his 1.d4, next it was very gutsy of Topalov to play the Benko against of all people the world champ - someone who is very good at restraining aggressive openings played against his 1.d4. Quickly opinions were heard that the Bulgarian is going to have an uphill day. 15.Rfe1 looks like the new move of the game, soon thereafter black decided to get his pawn back but that hardly solved his problems. To do that he had to temporarily give up on his dark squared B and later compromise his pawn structure. The major piece ending was certainly funner from the white side thanks to a safer king, more activity, and most significantly his passed a pawn. Amusingly enough, after black succeeded in trading Q and a pair of R, white managed to get a classical position with his R behind the passed pawn. After more suffering for black, Vlady gave up his passed pawn to make kingside progress. By then he made sure the black K was cut off far on the queenside. It was tricky with the limited number of pawns and at one time 53…Ra1! Looks to me like it held. My disclaimer is that this is the end of the day and I am tired J but I don't see a win… for example: 54.Kg4 Ra4! (threat e5) 55.g6 e5 56.Rf7+ Kg8! Or if 54.Ke4 Re1+ 55.Kd4 Kg8! Also I see no win. In the game black lost an important tempo with 53… Rc4? And lost. After 56.Rf7+ Ke8 loses but also 56…Kg8 57.Re7 wins. Tough life being worse for so long against Vlady.

GM Ivanchuk vs GM Timman

Ivanchuk - Timman: Will this be draw number 10 in a row for Chuky, or is today the day he can cash in against an opponent who is having a really rough time and bad luck in this tourney? It is known that Timman can play literally anything with black or white, and today he went for a modern Steinitz against the Ruy Lopez. Matters got odd when Timman after moving 5…Bd7 moved his light squared B again with 7…Bg4?! and Ivanchuk after burning a lot of time hit with the very dynamic 8.d4! Soon it got clear that black is not so happy. …Qxf3 would have been followed with a white Ra3. 14…Nb6 seemed stronger than 14…Rc8, and then 16…d5?? Was just horrible! Timman's grief ended on move 21 when he once again had to concede defeat. What a terrible tournament for him.

GM Anand

Photos by Jan van de Mortel, courtesy Corus Tournament Organization.

ICC Coverage of Corus 2003 Copyright © Internet Chess Club 2003