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FIDE has announced the October world chess rankings. Topalov is back in the saddle. There is an ironic twist to the World Chess Championship match between Anand and Kramnik since it will now be No. 5 vs No. 6. Not good for aggressive sellers of this match. Read More ..

Kramnik has a head to head edge over Anand in the Classical games. Anand is clearly much stronger in Rapid games. Updated to include 9 games of the ongoing World Championship Match. Classical Games 60 games, 47 draws Anand +1 (7 wins, 6 losses) Rapid 46 games, 34 draws Anand + 8 (10 wins, 2 losses) Blitz 8 games, 4 draws Blindfold 13 games, 6 draws Kramnik +1 (4 wins, 3 losses) Advanced Chess 8 games, 7 draws Kramnik +1 (1 win)

We continue the Kramnik - Anand matches with the game at Dos Hermanas, 1996. By this time, the two players were among the very top players in the world, with Anand having the advantage of having played the World Championship match against Kasparov. Watch the game and read more...

The Category 15 Spice Cup took place at the Texas Tech Student Union Building. Pentala Harikrishna finished first on tie break although he tied with GM Onischuk, GM Kritz, and GM Akobian. Defending champion Eugene Perelshteyn finished 7th. Read More ..

Anand achieved the first decisive result in games between the two great rivals (normal games). It was a long Sicilian Maroczy Bind game that lasted for 108 moves before Anand prevailed. Read more and watch the game here

The first decisive result in the games between Anand and Kramnik was a win by Anand with black in the Max Euwe Memorial at Amsterdam in 1996. But Kramnik struck back with a win at the Dos Hermanas tournament in the same year.

Did you know that the first eight games played between Anand and Kramnik were drawn? This does not seem very unusual but it is. The reason is that the rivalry started when they were aged 14(Kramnik) and 19(Anand) in 1989 and its usual to have decisive games at that age.

Kosteniuk won the title from 14 year old Hou Yifan, who was under tremendous pressure of expectations of the billion plus Chinese citizens. Kosteniuk completely dominated the finals and was in winning positions in all the four games. It is redemption in a way since Kosteniuk tasted defeat in one of her earlier attempts at winning the title. Yifan will almost definitely get several shots at the title provided she is interested. For all you know, she'll probably be seen in more Open events than women only events. World women's championship results: Alexandra Kosteniuk beat Hou Yifan 2.5-1.5

The Kosteniuk - Yifan match is turning out to be a demonstration of Rook endings and how they are always drawn. The third game was also drawn after a long drawn out debate. Kosteniuk again had two extra pawns but could not convert. The match score is now 2-1 and Kosteniuk needs just a draw with white pieces to win the match and the World champion title. Yifan appears nervous at the prospect of winning this title. She started out with a dubious opening and has been struggling ever since. The only gutsy performance from her so far has been excellent demonstration of how to hold rook endings with lesser number of pawns. Kosteniuk, Alexandra RUS 1 + ½ + ½ = 2 Hou, Yifan CHN 0 + ½ + ½ = 1

The 61st edition of the Russian Higher League is being held at Novokuznetsk. Round 11 Standings 1. Timofeev, Artyom RUS 2650 8 2. Vitiugov, Nikita RUS 2616 7½ 3. Inarkiev, Ernesto RUS 2675 7½ 4. Lastin, Alexander RUS 2639 7 5. Sakaev, Konstantin RUS 2635 7 6. Kobalia, Mikhail RUS 2618 7 7. Riazantsev, Alexander RUS 2617 7 8. Galkin, Alexander RUS 2615 7 9. Maslak, Konstantin RUS 2521 7 10. Najer, Evgeniy RUS 2670 7

Child prodigy Hou Yifan lost the first game of the World Women's chess championships at Nalchik. Three more normal time games remain for her to try and catch Kosteniuk. Alexandra is keen to make the most of this second chance at the title. Faced with a mate in 5, Hou resigned on move 48 in a closed Ruy Lopez game. Results: Game 1 - Hou Yifan vs Alexandra Kosteniuk 0-1 48 (Closed Ruy Lopez)

The European Union Championships are being held at Liverpool. The biggest news so far? Nigel Short's losing ringtone. Leading Standings after round 5: 1 Alberto David LUX 4½ 2 Viktor Laznicka CZE 4½ 3 Thal Abergel FRA 4 4 Michael Adams ENG 4 5 Emanuel Berg SWE 4 6 Bitalzadeh, Ali NED 4 7 Daniel Fridman GER 4 8 Daniel Gormally ENG 4 9 David Howell ENG 4 10 Georg Meier GER 4 11 Normunds Miezis LAT 4 12 Maxime Vachier-Lagrave 2681 4 Top Participants 1 Adams, Michael g 2735 2 Bacrot, Etienne g 2691 3 Vachier-Lagrave, Maxime g 2681 4 Short, Nigel D g 2655 5 Tiviakov, Sergei g 2645 6 Fridman, Daniel g 2637 7 L'Ami, Erwin g 2610 8 Beliavsky, Alexander G g 2606 9 Laznicka, Viktor g 2601 10 Baramidze, David g 2593 11 Smeets, Jan g 2593 12 Berg, Emanuel g 2592 13 Werle, Jan g 2591 14 Kotronias, Vasilios g 2574 15 Luther, Thomas g 2570 16 Andersson, Ulf g 2562 17 David, Alberto g 2562 18 Dgebuadze, Alexa

How to calculate Live Chess Ratings You can use FIDE's rating calculator to calculate changes to ratings for every game. Rtg = Rating of a player according to the previous list For single game calculations, keep the following values for W W=1 if the player has won W=0.5 if the player has drawn W=0 if the player has lost For the top player list, use Kval = 10 Example: If Kasparov returns to play rated events, plays Carlsen and wins one game, the calculation is as follows. (Assuming Carlsen's rating to be 2786) Rtg = 2812 Rc = 2786 W = 1 Kval =10 Click Calculate . Kasparov will gain 4.6 points for the win against Carlsen, who in turn, will lose that many points.

Hou Yifan eliminated top seed Koneru Humpy 4-2 to reach the finals of the World women's championship at Nalchik. The semi-final match between Humpy and Hou went to the blitz games where Hou swept both the blitz games to advance. In the end, it did seem fair. Hou's been really solid, except for a couple of glaring errors. Hou now meets Kosteniuk in the finals. This is the second attempt for Kosteniuk and Hou will definitely find her a tough nut to crack, although Hou should be a slight favorite in the finals since it is a 4 game match.

Alexandra Kosteniuk reached the world women's chess finals for the second time in her career. She awaits the winner of the Humpy - Yifan match. Yifan was very close to making it to the finals but for a huge blunder in an equal position. It was a mate in ten after taking a pawn and leaving her kingside open to attack. The match is now tied at 1-1 and the players battle it over rapid, blitz, and sudden death or Armageddon games. Yifan and Humpy have shown brilliant form in this tournament except for a few slips in the last couple of rounds.

Put a bunch of the highest rated players and this is what you get. The world No. 1 ranking has now been occupied by 3 players during the Bilbao tournament. And you may recount that Morozevich was recently the No. 1 for a short while. The live chess ratings are certainly attracting more attention than the static chess ratings list that changes only once in 3 months. Ivanchuk occupies the no. 1 position now thanks to his win over Teimour Radjabov. Anand lost a winning position with the white pieces. He cannot escape with the "cannot show preparation" excuse, since the mistake was made in the heavy pieces endgame. Topalov continued to shine by beating Carlsen twice in this tournament. In fact, Topalov is very near to the No. 1 ranking now. And looking at the way he is playing in this tournament, don't be surprised if he takes over that spot soon. 1 Ivanchuk 2791 2 Morozevich 2787 3 Carlsen 2786 4 Topalov 2785 5 Anand 2784 6 Kramnik 2772 7 Aronian 2761 8

Koneru Humpy, Aleksandra Kosteniuk, Hou Yifan, and Pia Cramling reached the Semi Finals of the World Women's Chess championships being held at Nalchik, Russia. They gifted themselves a rest day since none of them have to play the tie breaks. Humpy was the most convincing of the four as she crushed Yang Shen 2-0. Pia Cramling caused a mini upset. The remaining 4 are all over 2500 and the remaining matches are expected to be strong. Quarter final results: Kosteniuk vs Ushenina 1.5-.5 Humpy vs Shen 2-0 Yifan vs Mkrtchian 1.5-.5 Cramling vs Stefanova 1.5-.5

Topalov remains in the lead after the 5th round of the Grand Slam final at Bilbao. Carlsen is on his heels a point behind. The tournament adopts an unique 3-1-0 scoring system. Most of the games have been well fought and the winner will really deserve the huge prize money that the tournament offers. Round 5 results: Round 5 Ivanchuk, Vassily - Topalov, Veselin ½-½ (Nimzo Indian Defence) Radjabov, Teimour - Aronian, Levon ½-½ (Scotch ) Anand, Viswanathan - Carlsen, Magnus ½-½ (Ruy Lopez Schliemann)

Carlsen has ascended the throne of the live chess ratings. He is currently no. 1 with Anand now on 2nd. Topalov has started moving up rapidly. On home turf, he has now beaten the no. 1 and 2 on this list in this very tournament. Aronian too is making a sort of a comeback to the elite group though he has a lot of catching up to do. Current live chess rankings: 1 Carlsen 2792 2 Anand 2791 3 Morozevich 2787 4 Topalov 2786 5 Ivanchuk 2782 6 Kramnik 2772 7 Aronian 2754 8 Radjabov 2749 9 Leko 2747 10 Adams 2736

The Category XXII Super GM Grand Slam Chess Final Masters started at Bilbao. Magnus Carlsen is two points ahead of the field by virtue of his win against Aronian. Usually a 2 point margin is almost a tournament win. But at Bilbao, it is different because 3 points are awarded for a win and 1 point for a draw. The winner gets 150,000 Euros. Anand escaped a clever onslaught by Ivanchuk and finally escaped with a draw. Even the usually volcanic Topalov could not create anything exciting. Elsewhere on the live ratings, Carlsen has once again moved to the 2nd spot. We've had Morozevich running away impossibly in the first half of the Tal Memorial and actually tasting the World No. 1 spot (for a day). Carlsen and Ivanchuk have been close. Its really very interesting to watch. FIDE has to watch out ! Updated ratings once every three months may not be enough anymore !