The Queen of the chess world: Ju Wenjun defends Women’s World Championship title
Ju Wenjun (32) claimed her fourth Women’s World Champion title after clinching a crucial victory in the decisive, final, 12th game of the match against challenger Lei Tingjie With this victory, Ju has now equalled the record set by her compatriot Hou Yifan, both having won the world crown four times. Apart from defending the title, Ju also won €300,000 in prize money, while €200,000 went to the runner-up Lei Tingjie. Arkady Dvorkovich, the President of the International Chess Federation (FIDE) congratulated Ju on her victory: “To win a world crown is an amazing success, but to do it for a fourth consecutive time as Ju Wenjun did is something else. Congratulations to Ju for her victory but also to Lei for putting up a great fight. The chess world has another fantastic memorable event, and it was great to be a witness to it”. “This spectacular and tense match showed the best of women’s chess. The games played by the two Chinese players, the atmosphere and the excellent organisation of our Chinese hosts will be remembered”, Dvorkovich added. How the final game unfolded: This was the first time Ju Wenjun reached a final of a world championship match with a tied score – 5.5:5.5. In all three previous matches, she was either leading or trailing. Despite holding the world champion to a tie after 11 games, springing several surprises during the match and showing excellent opening preparation and tactical skills, the 26-year-old challenger Lei Tingjie cracked under pressure in the final round. Playing as White in what turned out to be the final game in the match, the defending World Champion Ju Wenjun punished her opponent’s errors in the middlegame to emerge significantly better. In the Queen’s Gambit Reversed Lei Tingjie opted for a lesser known line. Despite the position demanding Black plays more aggressively, Lei chose a more cautious approach. In an even position in the middlegame, Lei made a critical error after which White had a strong advantage. Luckily for Lei, the defending champion did not punish her but, instead, returned a mistake, by going for an exchange of material where White had a bishop and a knight for a pawn and a rook. Now Black was more comfortable. However, Lei’s luck ran out on move 22 when she made a positional blunder which gave the decisive advantage to White. This time, Ju executed a series of precise moves to secure victory. Following the exchange of queens, the two were in an endgame where Black had very weak pawns in the centre and no real counterplay. By move 29 she was in dire straits. As the world champion laid back in her seat, the challenger sank into deep thought, head in hand, realising this is the end. Following the famous chess quote that no one ever won a game by resigning, Lei fought on, hoping for a chance to make a comeback. Finally, on move 62, she had to resign. In all three games in this match that resulted in a victory, it was the player leading the white pieces who scored. Although she took the lead in the match in game five, Lei suffered a defeat in game eight after which her confidence somewhat cracked. In the final encounter of the match, she just fell apart in the middlegame. Despite this defeat, Lei Tingjie made history as one of the strongest challengers for the title of World Champion and is likely to make a comeback and fight for the crown again. Here follows a closer look at game 12 of the match: The first move in today’s game was made by Wang Yongquan, Deputy Director of the Standing Committee of Changshou District People’s Congress and Yang Shengyu, the President of Chongqing Chess Association. This game was the final chance for either side to make a push for the crown in the classical part of the match. The defending world champion Ju Wenjun was leading white pieces in her attempt to win the crown for the fourth time. As noted by Chinese Grandmaster Xu Yi, Ju Wenjun has never reached the final game of a world championship match with an even score! In the previous three matches, she was either leading or chasing the score by the final game. After 1.d4 d5 2.Nf3 Nf6 3.e3 Lei went for 3…c5 entering the Queen’s Gambit Reversed. With 4.dxc5 Ju took the most straightforward approach. An alternative was to play 4.c4 and offer an option to transition into different theoretical lines. The opponents quickly made a series of well-known moves. 4…e6 5.b4 a5 6.c3 axb4 7.cxb4 b6 8.Bb5+ Bd7 9.Bxd7 Nbxd7 10.a4 bxc5 11.b5 The position is roughly even. White has two passers on the a-and-b-files but slightly lags in development. Black is to develop the bishop and castle and is going to play in the centre and try holding White’s queenside advance. White will put her bishop on b2, on a powerful diagonal, aiming at the black king’s fortress. Wesley So has played this position three times with Black. He lost to Alireza Firouzja in 2020 but then won against Le Quang Lien and Bluebaum the following year. An interesting move for Black to consider here was 11… g5 to go for an extremely sharp game. 11…Qc7 A better place for the queen is on b8, as with being on c7, Black can lose a tempo if White manages to make a b6 push. 12.Bb2 Bd6 13.0-0 Black still had the opportunity to proceed here with the aggressive move 13…g5. In fact, 13… g5 was played in all the three previous games that reached that position – but they all ended in a draw. It seems that the position was inviting Black to play more aggressively or risk entering a slightly inferior game. Was this Ju Wenjun’s intention all along, assuming that Lei would not dare to play the gutsy moves like this one? 13…0-0 Lei played this move after 18 minutes of thinking. 14.Nbd2 Rfc8 14…e5 was considered a better move here for Black, increasing the pressure
Top players sign an open letter in support of GM Ivanchuk
Vasyl Ivanchuk at the World Team Chess Championship 2022 in Jerusalem Photo: FIDE / Mark Livshitz The FIDE World Cup will take place in Baku, Azerbaijan, from July 29 to August 25, 2023. The World Rapid Champion (2016) and four-time Olympiad gold-winner (1988, 1990, 2004 and 2010), Ukrainian Grandmaster Vasyl Ivanchuk received a wild card from FIDE to participate in this major competition. Vasyl Ivanchuk resides in Lviv, Ukraine. According to current legislation, he needs permission from the Ministry of Youth and Sports to leave the country for sports purposes as he is under the age of 60 (he is currently 54 years old). Such permission was not granted. The official request from the organizers of the World Cup, the Azerbaijan Chess Federation, was also declined. To address this situation, some of the world’s top Grandmasters signed an open letter to the Minister of Youth and Sport of Ukraine, Mr. Vadym Gutzeit. The signatories include Magnus Carlsen, Viswanathan Anand, Hikaru Nakamura, Fabiano Caruana, Wesley So, and Boris Gelfand. We are asking the chess community to support this motion by sharing the letter and hope that more Grandmasters will voice their support for GM Ivanchuk. Open letter in support of GM Ivanchuk (pdf)
FIDE seeks public discussion about proposed rating changes
One of the essential chess assets that FIDE is overseeing is FIDE ratings. Since adopting the Elo rating system in 1970, the rules and formulas for calculating ratings have undergone numerous changes, and the number of rated players has grown exponentially. In the past decade, certain innovations have caused rating deflation, a concern that has been raised by professional players and mathematicians and did not go unnoticed by FIDE. Players’ ratings are spread out too widely, and the situation is deteriorating with each passing year. The problem arises due to various factors, including the minimal rating being set too low at 1000 points, changes to the famous 400-point rule and the way the initial ratings are calculated. FIDE Qualification Commission and mathematician Jeff Sonas put significant effort into analysing the situation. As a result of this work, they propose two corrective measures. The first measure, which they called compression, aims to adjust for deflation. All players rated below 2000, which constitutes the bottom 85% of all rated players, shall be given a one-time rating increase on the January 2024 rating list. The additional points awarded will gradually decrease from 400 (for those rated 1000) to 0 for those rated 2000. For instance, a player with a rating of 1600 will receive an additional 160 points. The second measure, calculation improvements, focuses on improving the rating regulations to prevent future deflation. This includes raising the minimum rating from 1000 to 1400, restoring the 400-point rule to its earlier state so that it can apply multiple times in an event, and adjusting the formula for calculating initial ratings to incorporate two additional draws against hypothetical 1800-rated opponents. Understanding the significance of resolving the issue of rating deflation, we are sharing these proposals and inviting the chess community to engage in a public discussion. You can read the full text of Jeff Sonas’ suggestions here. We encourage the chess community to express their thoughts on this proposal and send us their comments, suggestions, ideas, and mathematical calculations. Please address your correspondence to Qualification Commission at qualification@fide.com until 30 September 2023. The Qualification Commission will thoroughly review all communication, analyse your suggestions, and present the final version of the rating regulation changes to the FIDE Council in October 2023. Once approved, the changes will be communicated to the public in December 2023 and will come into effect starting January 2024.
Third edition of Queens’ Festival goes big
Over 800 female players from 124 countries participated in the third edition of the Queens’ Online Chess Festival, a series of continental women’s online blitz tournaments that took place from July 2-16. The ambitious global project aiming at connecting women chess players from around the world was organized by FIDE Commission for Women’s Chess. The festival program included two competitions: Queens’ Women Open Tournament (all female participants with FIDE ID) and Unrated Princesses’ tournament (for girls without FIDE ID competing in U9 and U16 categories). The Queens’ Women Open Tournament saw the triumph of IM Deysi Cori from Peru, with WIM Nguyen Hong Anh and WGM Hoang Thi Bao Tram (both of Vietnam) finishing second and third, respectively. In the Unrated Princesses’ tournament, Melissa Wong from Malaysia scored 5 points and emerged as the winner in the U9 age category. Rajakaruna R M Sayuni Suhansa, with 4½ points and Lyayan Batyrova with 4 points, took second and third places, respectively. Medals in the older category – U16 girls – were won by Divya Bhavani Chembrolu from India (1st place, 7 points), Dariya Aukenova (2nd place, 5½ points) and Chetana Gopalakrishnan (3rd place, 4½ points). It is worth mentioning that refugee girls from FIDE’s “Chess for protection” project also took part in the Unrated Princesses’ tournament. Fifteen female students from Kenya, representing Angelina Jolie Primary School, Morneau Shepell Secondary School and Bhar-El-Naam Primary School, were competing in U9 and U16 categories. The main prize for the winners was really impressive! The winners of both events are invited to the 45th World Chess Olympiad 2024 in Budapest, Hungary. The ticket, full-board accommodation for 3 days and invitations to the Opening Ceremony of the Chess Olympiad 2024 for the winner and one accompanying person will be covered. In addition, the medal-winners and the top finishers in continental qualifications received training sessions with female grandmasters. “We believe that more chess tournaments for female players can bring lasting results to boost female participation in all aspects of chess life. Therefore we offer our winners training sessions with leading chess trainers as well as the chance to see the flagship FIDE event – the Chess Olympiad,” said the Chair of the FIDE WOM Commission, Anastasia Sorokina. The finals of the Queens’ Women Open Tournament and the Unrated Princesses’ tournaments were streamed live on the FIDE Youtube channel with expert commentary by WGM Anastasiya Karlovich and WIM Fiona Steil-Antoni. Link to the broadcast: youtu.be/72vbPHkL1A0