The Olympiad Trip - Day 15

Today was the big day as far as the non-chess portion of this Olympiad was concerned ... the election of the FIDE President was decided today while round 9 was underway a short distance away in Tromso ... and Kirsan Ilyumzhinov won the vote over Garry Kasparov 110-61. I decided to stop by the Expo area before the round started & it was very different ... completely deserted!

 No-one to be found at the FIDE First booth

Kasparov booth also with no staff

I was again on board 18 today, which had the clash between Croatia & Belgium. Croatia had the advantage in rating on all boards & for once, the rating favourites came out on top fairly convincingly, with a 3-1 win.

 The matchups on board 18 today

Boards all ready for the arrival of players

Players ready to start their games

For me the clear highlight & Game of the Round was watching Zdenko Kozul up close demolish young FM Thibaut Vandenbussche. Unlike some of the spectacular tactical games Kozul has produced over his career, today he simply outplayed Vandenbussche & squeezed him positionally, gaining space, improving his pieces & removing any opportunity for his opponent to get some counterplay. Indeed the final position is a triumph of this strategy - black is already two pawns down & is faced with the alternatives of an immediate checkmate, or blocking with a piece (leaving it pinned) as well as taking away the final safe square of another piece! A fantastic game to play through!



Did you know ... young Belgians Bart Michiels & Tanguy Ringoir warm up for their games by doing tactical exercises from a chess book before their games

 Bart & Tanguy solving puzzles before their games

Their book of choice: Tactical  Targets in Chess Volume 2

Did you know ... Englishman Matthew Sadler likes to meditate before his chess games. He has been photographed on more than one occasion in the pose below before his games

A quick trip to the Expo area after my match was finished revealed something else about the Kasparov booth ...

Not only is it deserted, but the tablets have been removed & covered in black Kasparov bags. I'll be interested to see the state of the display tomorrow ...

The Aussies had a mixed day, with the Open team having a narrow 2.5-1,5 win over Portugal, while the Women's team had a narrow 1.5-2.5 loss to Kyrgyzstan. Tomorrow the Open team face Tajikistan, while the Woman face neighbours New Zealand.

 The final games in the Australia v Portugal match (Illingworth won, while Smerdon lost)

An interesting clash with Latvia v Spain. Here Shirov is playing against former team mate Vallejo Pons. The game ended in a draw.

Magnus Carlsen in action against Turkey

The Olympiad Trip - Day 14

Today I returned to board 18 for the clash between Vietnam & Iran. Apart from board 1, the other boards were fairly closely matched on rating, so it promised to be an exciting match. All four games turned out to be decisive, with Vietnam winning the match 3-1, with the games on board 1 & 4 standing out for Game of the Round. On board 1 Quang Le managed to turn a fairly even looking queen & rook endgame to his advantage with a surprisingly effective attack on the king, while Huynh Nguyen played a Hedgehog Sicilian & once he managed to open the game up with d5, found a variety of tactical shots to ensure he grabbed the initiative & maintained it until the end of the game.

 The matchups for board 18 today

Some technical issues with the DGT board sorted out before the players arrive

Board all ready for the players

Players ready to start play

 

Quang Le generates strong threats against the king from a fairly innocuous position to bring home the point on board 1

 

Huynh Nguyen manages to unleash the potential of the Hedgehog in a nice tactical display



Also today with Australia's open team doing so well, they were playing on board 16, directly next to me, so I had a birds-eye view of  their clash with Uzbekistan. Although they ended up losing the match 3-1 (Moulthun & Max both drew, while David & Junta lost), they definitely had their chances & at different points may have been better on all three lower boards.

 The tough assignment for the Australian team today

The team is ready to go as the Uzbeki's arrive at the board

Fighting on late into the round, with team captain watching the games intently

Did you know ... Ukrainian GM Vassily Ivanchuk does things a little differently ... well if there was any doubt, he confirmed these suspicions during yesterday's match with Kazakhstan. Not once, but twice during the match he decided that he needed to wash his hands in the middle of the playing hall, so grabbed a bottle of water from his table, splashed water over his hands & proceeded to wash them in the playing hall in between the match tables. To make matters worse, he was rather liberal with his use of water, so there was a small puddle on the floor immediately after 'Chucky' had finished his cleaning routine! I was the arbiter for the adjacent match & when I saw this, simply looked at the arbiter for the match & we both shook our heads ... things definitely are done differently on Planet Ivanchuk!

I also discovered that in spite of the measures for keeping spectators away from games, there are still times when crowds gather around exciting games ...

Here Grischuk has quite a crowd gathered to see the conclusion of his game (it ended in a draw, so the match between Russia & Spain finished tied at 2-2)

I had a request for a photo of the Lebanese women's team ... but this is currently the best I can do - board 2, WFM Elena Nekrasova in action late in the round against South Africa.

I also noticed this spirited debate between Australian Women's coach GM Ian Rogers & an arbiter after the conclusion of Australia's match with Serbia (Serbia won 3-1). Although I am not sure of the exact details, it seems they were talking about the role of the Captain in the match & things the Captain is & is not allowed to do. I'll try to find out more about this in the coming days, but don't have anything to add at this stage.

The Olympiad Trip - Day 12

Today I was back at table 14 for the Germany v Belgium clash, which once again looked like a mismatch on paper, with the Germans outrating their opponents on all board & having 4 GMs playing against 2 GMs, 1 IM & 1 FM. However, as seems to be the case with matches I have been supervising, things didn't go to plan, with Germany eventually only just winning 2.5-1.5 thanks to a nice win on board 4 by Doeberl Cup winner Liviu-Dieter Nisipeanu, while the other three games were all draws, even though Germany looked to have the advantage in at least two of those games.

 The matchups for today's clash between Germany & Belgium

Boards ready for the arrival of players

Players ready to begin

 

Game of the Round for this round was Liviu-Dieter Nisipeanu's win on board 4

  

Did you know ... Armenian board 1 (and boyfriend of Australia's Arianne Caoili) Levon Aronian brings his own tea & plunger to games, similar to the ones in the photo below

He also managed to finish his game today with GM Michael Adams from England with, would you believe it, 1 hour 39 minutes on his clock (they agreed to a draw on move 31). That means he GAINED 9 minutes during the game (pretty impressive with a 30 second increment when playing one of the world's top GMs)!
Today I also saw Lennart Ootes, who played in last year's Australasian Masters, who is in Tromso working for New In Chess at their stand in the Expo area. People who visited the stand received a free copy of a back issue of New In Chess, as well as the possibility of subscribing to the magazine at a significantly discounted rate. Yes, I am now a subscriber, so will have a fantastic publication mailed to me every 6 weeks or so!

My free issue of New In Chess, from earlier in 2014

Also in the Expo area, at the Kasparov booth, is Chess Victoria President Leonid Sandler, talking with Ignatius Leong

There are also TV screens in the Expo area showing the Chess24 internet coverage - here with some fairly impressive shots from the cameras mounted at each of the top boards

I also managed to capture an important moment in the Australian Open team's match with Botswana - Anton Smirnov winning the final game of the match to secure a 3.5-0.5 win for the Aussies!

To clarify my description of the playing hall from the other day, I found a sign which shows the layout of the playing arena, as well as the various sectors (I'm in Sector 5)

I have also had plenty of people ask about the daily bus trip from Malangen Brygger (where most of the arbiters are staying) to the venue each day ... here is the Google Map view of the journey, along with its estimated travel time of 1 hour & 23 minutes!

 

To finish off the post, an update on the Aussies - both teams won today, but both face tough competition in round 7, with the Open team facing Mexico (who have 3 GMs in their squad), while the Women face England (who have an IM & 2 WIMs in their squad). Best of luck to both teams! 

The Olympiad Trip - Day 7

Now the routine begins ... no more first round teething problems, no more uncertainty about what to do ... its now game on & time for chess to take the priority in the Olympiad!
As an arbiter, with routine comes familiarity, so for me it was once again to table 13, which looks to be the boards I will be responsible for this tournament. Today it was Norway 3 against Germany in what looked on paper to be a one-sided match, with 4 GMs facing a young team with one of each title (1 IM, 1 GM, 1 FM & 1 CM) with a 200-300 point rating advantage on all boards. Although the result was the 4-0 German win that was expected, there were a number of hard fought games, particularly the two lower boards.

The pairings for my table today

Boards all ready for players to arrive

Teams are ready for the games to begin

At the next table the English team took on the team from Singapore (England won 3-1)

On the other side, Poland took on New Zealand (Poland won 3-1). The Kiwi's even brought some flags for the table!

The match I was supervising finished much earlier than yesterday's game, so I had some time to look around the playing hall & in particular at the Exhibition Hall

Merchandise stall & a display for the Arctic University of Norway

The Team Kasparov stall (Their motto is 'The future of chess')

The popular DGT stall

 Stalls for the 2016 Olympiad in Baku & FIDE First (Their motto is 'Onwards and Upwards')

 The Chessbase stand where they do live coverage on Playchess

 The Australian team giving the Armenians a tough fight (Armenia ended up winning 3-1)

David Smerdon fighting hard against world number 2 Levon Aronian. David eventually held Lev to a draw, which is a fantastic result!

Giang Nguyen was the last of the Aussie women playing & she held Anna Ushenina to a draw (and the team also lost 3-1 to their more highly fancied opponents)

The TV studio area, which almost floats over the playing area

In round 3, the Australians face El Salvador in the Open, while Monaco is the opposition for the Women's team. Best of luck to both teams!
The board 13 match in the Open (and my likely match) is Belarus against Israel, with both teams having all-GM lineups, with Israel headed by Boris Gelfand, with Smirin & Sutovsky also in the team, as well as having roughly 100 or more points over their Belarussian counterparts.

Also, I'll try to add a little titbit from the event ... which I will call 'Did you know?' ...
Did you know ... GM Anish Giri likes to walk around watching other boards while playing with a captured piece (usually a pawn) in one of his hands ...

To finish off, my 'Game of the Round' was between FM Lars Oskar Hague & GM Liviu-Dieter Nisipeanu on board 3. After seeing Nisipeanu in action at the Doeberl Cup, his style just seems so simple & is a treat to watch ...