Over four million moves and €10,000 raised in a charity marathon
The French Chess Federation liaised with the Fondation de France to fights the coronavirus and organized 24-hour chess marathon in cooperation with Lichess, Blitzstream, Europe-Echecs, Chess24, Variantes, and Apprendre-les-Echecs. The event, held on May 2, was broadcasted by the most popular streamers in the country (including Kévin Bordi, FM Sylvain Ravot, and John Cappon) to mobilize the French-speaking chess community towards making online donations to the “Tous unis contre le virus” (all units against the virus) campaign run by the Fondation de France. The time control was blitz (5+2), and almost 3,000 players (GMs Anthonys Wirig, Tigran Gharamian, Rémi Trouville among others) joined this massive tournament playing close to 60,000 games. The winner, a French grandmaster Sébastien Feller played 183 games! Romain Bilquez, a nurse in the intensive care in a Covid-19 unit, finished second in the event. A chess enthusiast, member of the Chartres club, and a very young father, he frequently plays the French chess league after a night of work in his hospital. During the marathon, he only had a one-hour break: baby bottle time! He won online chess lessons, but he thinks about offering this prize to a friend. His story was covered in the French press: https://france3-regions.francetvinfo.fr/centre-val-de-loire/eure-et-loir/chartres/chartres-infirmier-reanimation-jeune-papa-il-joue-24-heures-dormir-tournoi-echecs-caritatif-1825172.html You can check out the final standings (nicknames only) here: https://lichess.org/tournament/yDTJ461h The chess community raised almost €10,000 during this charity marathon, showing great generosity in this difficult context. It is still possible to make a donation before May the 10th on https://dons.fondationdefrance.org/mettonslevirusechecetmat/~mon-don Many prominent figures took part in this marathon. The twelfth World Champion Anatoly Karpov played a few games during this event under a nickname Sokolov_Kirill-10. FIDE Deputy President and the President of French Federation GM Bachar Kouatly was in action for almost 4 hours, commenting his games on the live stream. FIDE President Arkady Dvorkovich made a donation to this initiative. This is a great symbol of the “gens una sumus” motto, proving that chess players form a worldwide community, joining efforts for great causes. One hundred prizes – chess books, online lectures, premium subscription for chess websites – have been awarded during the event. The first prize is an all-inclusive invitation for Rencontres Internationales des Échecs Francophones (international meeting of French-speaking players) organized by the Association Internationale des Echecs Francophone, which will be held in Djerba from December 26 to January 4.
FIDE Chess.com Online Nations Cup: Europe trailing China after Day 3
China continues to lead the FIDE Chess.com Online Nations Cup with four regular rounds to go. It’s Europe that’s having the best chances to join them in Sunday’s Superfinal. Team USA defeated and leapfrogged Russia in the standings, while India and the Rest of the World are out of contention by this point. Round 05 The round started with a stunning victory for Viswanathan Anand against Ian Nepomniachtchi, a game that was over in about five(!) minutes. Nepo got caught in preparation, and was already lost by move 14! In his post-game interview in the live broadcast, Anand said that 12.Nf3 (which seems mostly a tricky move order) was one of several ideas his second GM Grzegorz Gajewski had recently shared with him, adding that his former second, GM Radek Wojtaszek, told him that everything was already in their files 10 years ago! This shockingly quick win eventually did not bring India’s first victory in the tournament as Pentala Harikrishna suffered a painful loss against Vladislav Artemiev due to a mouse slip in a roughly equal position. China continued on their winning path with another victory in round five against the U.S. despite Fabiano Caruana’s scoring his third win in as many games. It seemed Wang Hao brought the pain over himself in a closed position with the unnecessary 39.h5 which had a tactical flaw. The #1 in women’s rating Hou Yifan doesn’t seem to be suffering much from her inactivity in recent years as she is playing powerful games so far in the Nations Cup. It must be said that her win against Irina Krush was based on one big miscalculation but after that Hou was merciless. Europe played itself to a second-place behind China halfway the round-robin phase thanks to a hard-fought victory over the Rest of the World. Levon Aronian scored his third win in a row this time over Alireza Firouzja in a basic but complicated rook ending in which both opponents were not precise. First, the Armenian GM untimely gave up his h-pawn then the Iran-born youngster was last to err in an equal position. Amin Bassem leveled the score by defeating Anish Giri, but Nana Dzagnidze again demonstrated her excellent endgame technique in the encounter with Dinara Saduakassova. Round 06 This is not Nepomniachtchi’s tournament. The Russian top GM ended up losing his second game as well, although in a very different way. This time he was the last one playing, against GM Maxime Vachier-Lagrave. Ian lost the thread in complications but finding himself in a hopeless position he gradually dug out of the hole. The draw seemed imminent when he blundered on move 91 to end a terrible day at the office. China bulldozed over the Rest of the World with a 3.5-0.5 win, further cementing their status as favorites to win the event. You might expect fireworks in a game between young guns Wei Yi and Alireza Firouzja, but in this case, the Chinese player won a beautiful, technical endgame that Anatoly Karpov would have been proud of. Even after six rounds, India is still waiting for its first win as they went down against the USA in their second match of the day. It was GM Wesley So who opened the score with a crushing win against GM Baskaran Adhiban that included the threat of a pretty combination. Unluckily for chess aesеts, the Indian GM chose a more prosaic way to lose the game. Another key game was the board-one encounter between Nakamura and Anand. With 2-1 on the scoreboard, Hikaru had to save the draw to secure two match points. After a few inaccuracies, he was completely outplayed on the kingside earlier in the game and was material down, but his fighting spirit coupled with a couple of rush moves by the Indian eventually saved the day for the US. The tournament will be broadcast live across multiple outlets including FIDE’s and Chess.com’s own channels across Twitch, YouTube, Mixer, Twitter, and other international streaming platforms. With an estimated audience of several million worldwide, commentary by chess experts will be conducted in multiple languages, including English, Spanish, Russian, Mandarin, French, German, Portuguese, Italian, Turkish, and Polish. You can watch live broadcasts and replays on FIDE YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hmDtpw5HJEQ Text: Peter Doggers (chess.com) FIDEwww.fide.comDavid Lladapress@fide.com+34 623 021 120 CHESS.comwww.chess.comNick Bartonnick@chess.com
Andor Lilienthal: 99 years of prowess
May 5 is the birthday of Andor (Andre) Lilienthal who lived a very long and eventful life. He was one of the 27 original grandmasters awarded the title by FIDE in 1950. His mother was a singer and father a racer, so the family traveled a lot. The future grandmaster was born in 1911 in Moscow, then the Russian Empire. In 1913, his mother with kids Andor and Margaret returned to Hungary. The family lived very poorly and Andor got used to working from the very childhood. At the age of 15, Andor left school to get a profession of a tailor but did not find a permanent job. At 16, he went into chess. Just three years later Andor scored 9 out of 12 in the international tournament in Czech Stubnianske Teplice (1930), ahead of Pirc and Flohr. His chess university was a famous Paris Café de la Regence in Rue de Rivoli where playing for money was normal practice. “Alekhine also was a customer of that café,” – recalled Andor. “One day they told him about me. They said that there was a boy who perfectly played simple games. He offered me to play four games, of course with no stake. To spectators’ surprise, he only managed to defeat me in the 4th game, whereas the three first games were won by me. Alekhine demanded revenge but I refused flatly: “I want to save this result for the rest of my life”, I said. Though Alekhine was a nervous and quick-tempered person, this time he saw my point and burst out laughing.” Soon Lilienthal stood neck and neck with Alekhine, sharing the first place in the prestigious Hastings tournament in 1933. A year later, he won the Ujpest tournament ahead of Pirc, Flohr, Gruenfeld, and other top players of that time. In Hastings 1935, Lilienthal shared 5-6 places with Botvinnik, but the tournament will be remembered for his sensational victory over Capablanca in just 26 moves with a queen sacrifice. Lilienthal – Capablanca, 1935 20.exf6!! “The motif of the queen sacrifice is to exploit the poor position of the enemy king and Black’s lag in development. A decisive factor in the attack is the opening of the e-file. In contrast to many similar sacrifices, the black king receives its first check only four moves later,” – Lilienthal. 20…Qxc2 21.fxg7 Rg8 22.Nd4 With a deadly threat Rae1+. 22…Qe4 23.Rae1 Nc5 24.Rxe4+ Nxe4 25.Re1 Rxg7 26.Rxe4+ Kd7 “Without waiting for my reply, Capablanca smiled and held out his hand, congratulating me on my win. I couldn’t conceal that I was happy,” – Lilienthal. Just a handful of players scored well against Capablanca. Along with Spielmann, with whom Lilienthal shares the birthday, Andor held his own; only Keres had a positive score against the Cuban world champion. During his career, Lilienthal played with almost all world chess champions and defeated Lasker, Capablanca, Alekhine, Euwe, Botvinnik, Smyslov, women’s world champion Vera Menchik. In the 1930s, Lilienthal played in three Chess Olympiads for the Hungarian team, with the total score amounting to an impressive 75.51%. In 1935, during the tournament in Moscow, Andor fell in love with a lady who came to watch the competition; he decided to stay in the Soviet Union. Evgeniya became his wife and in 1939 Lilienthal got Soviet citizenship. After her death, he married two more times connecting his life with Lyudmila (1976) and Olga (1987). Lilienthal’s major results came during the Soviet period of his life. In 1940, Andor won the Moscow Championship and tied for first in the USSR Championship ahead of Smyslov, Keres, Boleslavsky, and Botvinnik. In that event Lilienthal won a great game against Mikhail Botvinnik, proving that when it comes to positional play, he’s in his element too. Lilienthal – Botvinnik, 1940 (commentary by Andor Lilienthal) 14.Qd2! This “unnatural” move was obviously underestimated by Botvinnik. 14…a5According to Botvinnik, it was necessary to go for 14…c5, although after 15.dxc6 Nxc616.Nd3 Black’s position remains difficult. 15.a3 Na6 16.b4! Now the a6 knight plays a miserable role. 16…Bf6 17.Bb2 Qd7 18.Bxf6 Rxf6 19.Nd3 19…a4. 20.bxa5 was a threat, and 19…axb4 was lost: 20.axb4 Qb5 21.Nf4 (21.Ra3 is also not bad, “tripling” the heavy pieces on the “a” file) 21…Qxb4 22.Qxb4 Nxb4 23.Rxa8+Bxa8 24.Ra1 Rf8 25.Ra4! c5. Here I saw that Black is getting mated in a funny way: 26.dxc6 Nxc6 27.Bd5+ Kh8 28.Ng6+! 20.Rac1 Qf7 21.Nf4. The knight took the dominating position. The weaknesses on c7 and e6 squares cannot be protected well and Black’s position is strategically lost. 21…Bc8 22.Rc3 Bd7 23.Rfc1 h6 24.h4 Ra7 25.h5! Now the knight has fortified his position on f4. 25…Ra8. 26.Re3! Positional 26.e3 and 27.Bf1 promises less due to b6-b5. 26…Kh7 27.Rcc3 Rb8 28.Qd3 Ra8 29.Ng6 Rxg6. Forced in a view of Re7 threat. 30.hxg6+ Kxg6 31.Re6+Spectacular, but perhaps not the best move. Immediate 31.g4 was simpler, causing massive simplifications (31…Kh7 32.gxf5 Bxf5 33.Be4). White is completely winning anyway and Lilienthal convincingly converted his advantage: 31…Kh7 32.g4 c5 33.b5 Nc7 34.gxf5 Nxb5 35.f6+ Kg8 36.Rc4 Re8 37.Rg4 g5 38.Rxe8+ Bxe8 39.Re4 Kf8 40.Re7 Qg6. 41.Be4 Qh5 42.Bf3 Qg6 43.Rxe8+ 1-0 After the championship, Lilienthal, according to Botvinnik, “received the plaudits of all. His style of play was unique. As a rule, modest play at the start of the game, but then he would find his original plans for the middlegame, where he would create more problems for his opponent. I ‘suffered’ all of that myself. I saved myself more than once, but I also had to endure two heavy losses – in Moscow 1940, and 1941.” In 1950, Lilienthal played his only Candidates Tournament. The competition in Budapest was won Bronstein and Boleslavsky, Lilienthal finished 8th. His playing prime was behind and he turned to coaching, helping Tigran Petrosian from 1951 until 1960 and being second to his good friend Vasily Smyslov in his world championship matches against Botvinnik. “As a chessplayer, Andre stands out for his amazing intuition and feeling for the position. He is equally dangerous in positional play, as he is in the combinative. His victories over Capablanca and Botvinnik make a deep artistic impression.” Smyslov said. In 1976, at the request of his mother, Andor returned to Budapest and lived there since. Almost all chess kings of the XX century visited his apartment in the Hungarian capital, but Bobby Fischer was the only one who lived there for a month. It happened when he was hiding from the US authorities after the 1992 match with Spassky in Yugoslavia. “He could eat half a pot of Olga’s borsch and loved caviar,” – recalled Andor