Jan-19-12
 | | haydn20: 18...Na6 was questionable, but 23...Qe5 walked into a pit. It's amazing how a top GM can take you apart after a misstep in a quiet opening. |
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Jan-19-12
 | | Clodhopper: 31.h4 is quicker, but congrats to Naka on a forceful win. |
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| Jan-19-12 | | timhortons: navarra become 2700 player longer than naka, but he didnt made much progress, once i read ,they propose a match between short and navarra. its great he was given a chance at tata. |
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Jan-19-12
 | | Peligroso Patzer: <timhortons: navarra become 2700 player longer than naka, but he didnt made much progress, once i read ,they propose a match between short and navarra. It[‘]s great he was given a chance at tata.> For the record, Navara <earned> a spot in the “A” Group this year by his shared first in the “B” Group in 2011. As noted in the post quoted below from page 5 of the thread on the page for the 2011 Group “B” tournament, although McShane had a better tie-break score than Navara, both were extended invitations to play in the “A” tournament this year. <Eyal: In fact, both McShane and Navara will be invited to Group A next year:<McShane was declared Group-B winner on Sonneborn-Berger but the tournament organizers decided both players would receive an invitation to compete in Group A next year.> [Here a link is given to a page from the 2011 official site, but the page is no longer available.] Btw, the same thing happened when Motylev & Carlsen finished at the top of Group B with the same number of points in 2006.> [Link to source for quote: Tata Steel (Group B) (2011) |
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Jan-19-12
 | | Check It Out: I remember that. So where is McShane? |
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Jan-19-12
 | | Shams: <So where is McShane?> He could only get time off for one tourney and chose last month's London Chess Classic. |
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| Jan-19-12 | | Penguincw: Nakamura wins while Navara sinks the ship further. Tomorrow Navara gets white, but it might no help much when he has to face Carlsen. |
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| Jan-19-12 | | checkmateyourmove: Naka playing english , so is magnus alittle. maybe there onto page 8 of garrys openings.... just kidding :) |
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| Jan-19-12 | | King Death: Nakamura's move 6.e3 is new to me but I found another game where it was played with a different move order: V Zvjaginsev vs V Mikhalevski, 2011. It looks weakening though and Black's position didn't seem bad in the middlegame. |
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Jan-19-12
| | Shams: I wonder how long Hikaru took on 25.Nxh5+! It's a forcing line and probably nothing special for an elite player to calculate, but I find it really aesthetic. 30.Qf1! and even 31.Rxb7! (the exclams are for the loveliness-- eat it) are just crushing. I'd give anything to be able to visualize six moves prior that Black has no way to save his hide after 31.Rxb7. |
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Jan-19-12
 | | HeMateMe: White's pawn structure looked ugly, three pawn islands, but after chopping lots of wood he suddenly has that nice bind on the f-file, and a winning position. |
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| Jan-20-12 | | King Death: <Shams> Very often we can only guess at how far ahead a player had to envision how he might have played but
here I think Nakamura had to foresee the end of the game after Black played 24...h5. Why do I say this? In the game White's king may not be too safe either and if he gives Navara even one tempo in some lines he gets mated himself. Now that I've generalized a bunch, here are some variations to back it up some: after 25.Nh5+, 25...gh was impossible because of 26.Rf7+ Rf7 27.Rf7+ Kh8 28.Rf5. In the game 30. Qf1 was the only move to guard against ...Qb1+ and threaten 31.Rf6. After 30...Qh5 31.Rb7 really does threaten Qf6+ and Black's defenses are overstretched since he isn't able to guard both critical squares f6 and f8 One thing that's easy in a way is that Black is always losing in the variations where he gives up his queen for a rook. He's down material and his pieces don't coordinate at all. This was a nice combination but I agree, at this level probably not difficult. |
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Jan-24-12
 | | Calli: Lubosh analyses the game. Calls 6.e3 "Chipmunk Chess" http://www.huffingtonpost.com/lubom... |
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sac: 25.Nxh5+