Arctic Chess Challenge - Day three in pictures and text
The third round has started and it was going to be a lot more of action than you would expect. OK, the GMs have just started to meet, but this round only had one GM-encounter. But when all the IMs gave problems to the GMs it looked kinda strange. It was 5 of those meetings between a GM and a IM and the score ended 2.5-2.5. When GM Turner even gave away a half to an untitled player we safely can call this round tough for the favorites! And yes, we got another Norwegian youngster beating a much higher rated IM, but your used to it, isn't you?
IM Luca Shytaj (2455) (to the left) from Italy beat GM Yuri Drozdovskij (2620) from Ukraine on 1st board! Quite an upset and in the manner it happened it was also not the way you expect a super GM like Drozdovskij to lose. It became a Queen less middlegame from a French Tarrash variation where Luca managed to make the position unbalanced with pawn majorities on each flank. With 20.Nd6+! he got his edge and gradually it went whites way in a game where both players overlooked some posibilities. IM Luca Shytaj steared the game into a rook ending with a pawn up and since the black King was cut off from the action Shytaj won a nice and important win. He still has a perfect score after facing a 2620 GM!
GM Monica Socko (2449) did a good opening choice versus GM Emanuel Berg (2610) with black I think. She choose the Accelerated Dragon and since Emanuel is not the type of player that likes to go into a Maroczy-Bind with 5.c4! he opted for some sharp stuff that's not really blessed by theory. With 8...Qb6! Monika went into a sharp continuation that is OK for black. It was all theory a long way even though it looks fancy enough. Socko out manouvres her stronger opponent and got a completly winning ending with rook and a h-pawn versus a black squared Bishop. This should be a matter of technique for a GM even though many of these positions actually are a table base draw due to stalemate patterns. Anyway, finding those tablebase draws when the stronger side are trying out his chances is extremly hard in practical play and Monikas position was completely winning. But in the end she never found the right way to push her pawn till h2 and combined with mating threats win the game. GM Berg got a hard fought draw in 134 moves and he is still in the race for first!
GM Jon Ludvig Hammer (picture) told me that he wanted rain this week! As you can see the sun is shining and it's not really weather for chess, is it? But with Air condition it should be OK anyway and our excursions has to be a success with weather like this! Today Hammer played the routined IM Torbjørn Ringdal Hansen (2440) who has two GM-norms in his luggage and certainly wants the final one during Arctic Chess Challenge. Ringdal Hansen is unstable as a player and in the Norwegian Championships this summer everything went wrong for him it seemed. But in Tromsø he did well so far and today he played the English opening with white versus Hammer and even though black equalized early the middle game where pretty equal. GM Hammer won a pawn but he couldn't materialize it in a Knight ending due to whites active king and reduced material. A draw for the two Norwegians and they both can live well with that.
GM Vadim Malakhatko (2570) from Belgium played white against IM Aleksandar Wohl (2387) from Australia. IM Wohl got in a nice tactical shot with 22...a5! followed by 23...c5 and with 25...Nxc3! he could have got a clear edge with his strong passer at c4 in a simplified position. As it went Malakhatko got counter play and after the time control at move 40 the players agreed to a draw in a clearly drawn ending. Malakhatko is sure not happy to have wasted a white game but he got away with a bad position today.
IM Gerard Welling (2363) from France played white against GM Allan Stig Rasmussen (2536) from Denmark. In the advanced variation of a Caro Kann things developed slowly and black seemed OK. It's hard to believe in the anti positional 15...cxb5 instead of 15...axb5 but when white didn't find a good plan black took over all the play and with a natural move like 26...Nc4! I think black would have a clear edge to work with. Instead the young Danish GM forced matters in a way that gave white simplifications and he held the game to a draw. Credit to IM Welling for defending well at the end and finding a perpetual check.
Here you see Norwegian IM Bjørn Tiller (2371) with white and he just played the Kings Gambit with 2.f4!? against GM Sarunas Sulskis (2559) from Lithuania. This hardly came as a surprise as Tiller loves this romantic opening and Sulskis fast accepted the pawn. Since the Knight's Gambit is theoretically a bit dubious Tiller plays the Bishop's Gambit with 3.Bc4. At move 11 Tiller took his pawn back and when he got in the break 13.c4! he clearly was better. It ended up with white getting a strong center formation and a clear plus. But then Tiller misplaced his Queen at the king side and black got counter play. Sulskis is brutal with the initiative and when he got hunch by pushing his pawn from a7 to a2 in just 4 moves it really was not much to do. Sulskis concluded it all with a nice little tactical shot with Nxc5 and it was all over. Sulskis is one of only 4 players with a perfect score after 3 rounds.
Here you see FM Kjetil Stokke (2347) from Bergen playing white against IM Ray Robson (2491) from the US. In a Catalan Robson played the rather rare 6...c5!? instead of the main move here 6...a5. They early got out of book and the position became double edged and interesting. When Stokke as white went for 15.e4!? things got simplified and the players went into a clearly drawn ending after only 27 moves. Robson got a black game behind him and FM Stokke has done excellent so far with a TPR of 2479. Will he keep up the pace for an IM-norm?
Here you see the strong IM Marijan Petrov (2479) from Bulgaria who conducted a strong attack on the white King in a Modern opening as black. Petrov won in fine fashion over Tobias Petersson (2138) and he is the third player with a perfect score of 3/3!
Sondre Waage Tofte (2119) played the Italian IM Fabio Bruno (2455) as white in a Taimanov Sicilian. The 17 years old Junior Champion Tofte played it sharp and castled long. He then launched an attack with f4, f5 and after the strong sacrifice 17.Bb5! Waage Tofte got up a big edge versus the strong IM! After the sober 21.Nxd6+ Ke7 22.Nxc8+ Rxc8 23.Rf1! white would have excellent winning chances in a material unbalanced position. Instead Waage Tofte blundered with 21.Qxd6? and black got gradually better till the moment that he was completely winning. Then Bruno returned the favor with 26...Nb4?? and in time trouble for Bruno white had all the chances in the world to make a draw. But he didn't, and in a far from perfect game white was mated in two at move 38. That brought Bruno to 3/3 and who would believe that two Italian IM's with 2455 was sharing a 4 way tie for first after 3 rounds?
GM Igor Khenkin from Germany played the white side of a Samisch variation of the Nimzo Indian versus the local hope FM Espen Forså. Khenkin sacrifised the c4-pawn and got a strong attack that played all in. With the stunning 16.Nf5 he got Forså off-guard and Khenkin won a nice game today.
Here you see GM Julian Radulski from Bulgaria playing the white pieces against Peter Poobalasingam (2224) from England. Radulski won without to much fuzz in a classical Sicilian and he have now 2,5.
GM Matthew Sadler is smiling before the game versus Peter Vas (2232) from Sweden but I guess he wasn't quite satisfied with his second draw versus a much lower rated opponent. Peter Vas has done an excellent job so far with two strong draws versus Grandmasters!
Young Nicoli Getz (2219) from Oslo played a strong draw as black versus Spanish IM Bernal Moro in what turned out to be a Kings Indian. Getz had a pawn up with the Bishop Pair against IM Kalle Kiik in the 2nd round which only ended in a draw, but anyway the young Norwegian has done it well so far with 2/3 and a TPR of 2460!
WGM Natalia Zdebskaja (2412) from Ukraine won with the white pieces today and I guess it helped a little on a day where her husband GM Yuri Drozdovskij lost. The two of them married in July this year, a month before Natalia turns 23 years old.
The Socko family looks like this days winners for a looong period of time. GM Bartosz won his game against a much lower rated opponent and his son Szymon (7) got his first win so far! When Monika also looked like a winner it all was perfect until she failed to convert it. But 2.5/3 ain't bad either!
Two of the most talented Juniors in Norwegian chess met today. 13 years old Gregor Taube that did it sensational well so far and FM Joachim Thomassen (2300) who are hunting his last IM-norm! Thomassen became to strong for young Gregor but I'm sure we haven't heared the last word from Gregor during ACC 2009!
Kristoffer Madland (2017) from Norway played the white pieces against IM Nikolaj Mikkelsen (2399) from Denmark in a modern opening. Kristoffer got several chances to get a huge edge when the Dane went for a Kingside attack that left him with a highly dubious structure. Madland found one of the winning strikes and won a meriting victory against the IM.
IM Anna Zozulia (2341) won today against one of the young Norwegians. I bet she still feels the pain from losing a 100% winning game yesterday. There is justice in chess and yesterdays rival Sondre Waage Tofte lost today even though he played excellent for a long time and almost was winning.
13 years old Peter Flermoen continues to impress with his tactical muscles! Today he outplayed FM Kari Tikkanen (2283) in a Grünfeld Indian as black where he got in a nice c5-break at the right moment! Peter is also a talented footballer and of course he is a forward! Peter likes to attack and he never looked over his sholder today and won a fine game. Let me remind you that also GM Simen Agdestein was a forward at the Norwegian National Team in Football - it's cant be hard to imagine who Peters roll model is! So far Peter Flermoen has a marvelous 2/3 with a TPR of 2330! Just let it keep coming Peter!
This is another promissing Norwegian. 16 years old FM Frode O. O. Urkedal took his first IM norm under Svein Johannessen's Memorial earlier this year and he also does it extremly sharp in ACC! Today he won with the white pieces verus young Benjamin Arvola and with 2.5/3 he is ahead of GM Bartosz Socko (2656), GM Yuri Drozdovskij (2620) and GM Matthew J Turner (2517) on the tournament table - beat that!
Photo taken by Torstein Bae
Birk Anders Rølvåg (1906) (left) is from our neighbour city Narvik in south. He is the product of a chessplaying father and has two times won his rating group in Politiken Cup. Today he played a strong draw versus Kaj Engstrøm (2274) from Sweden with white.
A Local Derby between two veterans in chess here in Tromsø. Pål Røyset (2215) won with the white pieces against Sverre Karlsen (2013) in a Modern opening as white.
This is the guy with the coolest name of the tournament! Donaldo Paiva comes all the way from Mozambique to play Arctic Chess Challenge and he has won 1 game so far.
Paul Truong is married to Susan Polgar and I really don't know if that's why he is smiling all day long! Anyway he has a great sense of humor and is always interested if you tell a story with a little twist in it. Susan is amazing! She started the day out with an excursion to the lovely Summer Island where she took a lot of pictures you have to see at her blog. Then she spend some time at the Gym after first watching the first part of the tournament. At midnight she then took part in the fishing expedition and during all this she and Paul keeps her blog updated! I thought a dull day consited of only 24 hours - but I'n not sure anymore!
Ulf Hansen enjoys the lovely weather at the playing venue Scandic Hotell. He is the Moneyman for Arctic Chess Challenge and keeps track of every transaction! He is also a member of the Tromsø 2014 group and he is one of the hardest working men behind Arctic Chess Challenge.
Today it also was an excursion to the city before the round where the highlight was Polaria. This is an Arctic experience where you can see living Seals, an Arctic aquarium and a movie from Svalbard in the panoramic cinema among other things. People really enjoyed it!
After 12 O'clock an excursion to Hella out on a larger Island called Whales Island found place. It was highly popular!
Here you see one of the Africans warming himself over the fire.
Photo Ulf Ragnvald Hansen
GM Amon Simutowe won his game today and here you can see him eat fresh fish fried over the fire!
Photo Ulf Ragnvald Hansen.
Susan Polgar getting lessons in fishing from Rosi Floer, one of the organizers. Rosi speak fluent Hungarian and guess if these two ladies had a lot to talk about on Susans native language!
Photo Ulf Ragnvald Hansen.
You can see a lot more of pictures at The official homepage of Arctic Chess Challenge where you also find results, a table and games.
The entire text and all photos that not are credited others by Sven Wisløff-Nilssen (C) 2009.
Rolfo
04.aug.2009 kl.11:45
Sven
04.aug.2009 kl.11:50
Padda
04.aug.2009 kl.11:56
Sven
04.aug.2009 kl.12:24
Z.T.Hustra
04.aug.2009 kl.21:41
Atle G
04.aug.2009 kl.22:43
Sven
05.aug.2009 kl.12:23
Mark
08.aug.2009 kl.07:21
Sven
08.aug.2009 kl.13:19
Ane
08.aug.2009 kl.15:40
The Wiz
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