Chess Satranç ajedrez échecs schaken Schach scacchi escacs xadrez şah шахматы šahmaty

Anand won an amazing game against Stellwagen in the German league. Watch it to believe it!

Aronian won the Melody Amber tournament(rapid and blindfold), Tomashevsky the European Individual, Humpy the Women's Grand Prix and Kosintseva the European Women's titles.

Leaderboard at the European Individual Chess Championships Budva, Montenegro 1 20 GM Inarkiev Ernesto 2656 RUS 5½ 2 14 GM Volokitin Andrei 2671 UKR 5 3 53 GM Meier Georg 2608 GER 5 4 33 GM Navara David 2638 CZE 5 5 38 GM Fedorchuk Sergey A 2633 UKR 4½ 6 98 GM Sjugirov Sanan 2562 RUS 4½ 7 3 GM Naiditsch Arkadij 2693 GER 4½ 8 75 GM Banikas Hristos 2582 GRE 4½ 9 64 GM Bartel Mateusz 2594 POL 4½ 10 91 GM Shomoev Anton 2567 RUS 4½

Standings at the end of the 4th round of the European Individual European Individual Women's Chess Championships at St Petersburg 1 GM Hoang Thanh Trang 4.0 HUN F 2483 3051 +1.13 1 1 1 1 2 GM Socko, Monika 4.0 POL F 2449 3067 +1.39 1 1 1 1 3 GM Dzagnidze, Nana 3.5 GEO F 2518 2682 +0.61 1 1 1 ½ 4 GM Lahno, Kateryna 3.5 UKR F 2488 2669 +0.69 1 1 ½ 1 5 IM Mkrtchian, Lilit 3.5 ARM F 2460 2643 +0.70 1 ½ 1 1 6 IM Kovalevskaya, Ekaterina 3.5 RUS F 2442 2640 +0.77 1 1 ½ 1 7 IM Melia, Salome 3.5 GEO F 2422 2609 +0.71 1 1 ½ 1 8 IM Khurtsidze, Nino 3.5 GEO F 2421 2608 +0.72 ½ 1 1 1 9 WGM Shadrina, Tatiana 3.5 RUS F 2416 2633 +0.90 ½ 1 1 1 10 IM Foisor, Cristina-Adela 3.5 ROU F 2412 2611 +0.83 1 1 1 ½

The fifth round of the Women's Grand Prix tournament is on at Istanbul. Here's Hou Yifan's mature win over the experienced legend Pia Cramling. Yifan is now in the lead along with the other surprise leader, Martha Fierro Baquero.

Live Chess Rankings after Linares. Note that the following players are out of the top 20 - Karjakin, Mamedyarov, Kamsky, and Dominguez among others. 1 Topalov 2812 2 Anand 2783 3 Carlsen 2764,6 4 Kramnik 2759 5 Radjabov 2756 6 Aronian 2754 7 Jakovenko 2753 8 Leko 2751 9 Morozevich 2751 10 Grischuk 2748 11 Ivanchuk 2746 12 Shirov 2741 13 Gelfand 2739 14 Wang Yue 2738 15 Movsesian 2734 16 Svidler 2731 17 Gashimov 2730 18 Bacrot 2729 19 Ponomariov 2726 20 Ni 2724

Hou Yifan beat formidable Stefanova of Bulgaria to shoot into joint lead along with Humpy, Martha Fierro, and Zhao Xue. Humpy could only draw her game against Betül Cemre Yıldız. Martha Fierro upset legend Pia Cramling of Sweden while Zhao Xue beat Mamedyarova.

Alexander Grischuk of Russia won the Linares Chess Tournament, 2009. All the final round games were drawn. Grischuk drew his game against Aronian and Ivanchuk tried hard but had to be satisfied with a draw against Dominguez Perez of Cuba. Grischuk finished ahead of Ivanchuk due to the tie break which rewards more wins. Grischuk had 3 wins against 2 by Ivanchuk. Magnus Carlsen of Norway finished third while India's World Champion V Anand finished fourth. Final Standings 1. Grischuk, Alexander 8 2. Ivanchuk, Vassily 8 3. Carlsen, Magnus 7.5 4. Anand, Viswanathan 7 5. Wang Yue 6.5 6. Radjabov, Teimour 6.5 7. Aronian, Levon 6.5 8. Dominguez Perez, Leinier 6

The ever unpredictable Ivanchuk shocked Levon Aronian to move to the joint lead with one round to go at the Linares Chess tournament 2009. In a Semi Slav, Anti-Meran game, Ivanchuk showed that exprience matters and presented some problems to be solved from move 12 (with a novelty). A breathtaking sequence of moves by Ivanchuk and Aronian was already lost in a few moves. He tried some elementary tricks, which Ivanchuk avoided, simplified and won with a lot to spare. With just one game to go, Ivanchuk has a good chance to win the prestigious tournament since he plays tail ender Dominguez, albeit with the black pieces. Ivanchuk is clearly riding on a strong second wind, wish him all the best for the last game! In the other games, Carlsen missed a certain win against Radjabov in the late endgame and had to eventually agree to a draw. Here's Carlsen's disappointing draw against Radjabov

Magnus Carlsen conquered overnight leader Grischuk to move to joint second place at Linares. Carlsen presented complicated challenges for Grischuk in the middle game and then sacrificed a bishop to gain an unstoppable connected pawn pair. Grischuk resigned when Carlsen threaten Queening of the pawn and also win heavy material. All the other games ended in draws.

I first saw this shy but confident looking lad at Sangli, in a very small tournament. International Master Sethuraman was attending the tournament as a part of his family's journey to Shirdi, a favorite religious place for many. He was one of the two IMs participating at that tournament. Although he finished tied for the first position, it was obviously not his best performance, one reason being that he had played two consecutive tournaments before that tournament. After a couple weeks of rest and preparation, he proceeded to play at Parsvnath and Gurgaon, two major tournaments held in India. The results were there for all to see and appreciate. Sethuraman managed to get his GM norm at Parsvnath and just missed another by half a point. In the bargain, he beat some very strong GMs like Gleizerov, Iuldachev, Safin and drew against Kuzubov, Ulibin, Kunte, Ismagambetov. The only blip being his loss against GM Das. What an amazing turnaround! Here was one of India's most promising p

Live Chess Rankings to start the month of March 1 Topalov 2812 2 Anand 2786 3 Carlsen 2766 4 Aronian 2765 5 Kramnik 2759 6 Jakovenko 2753 7 Radjabov 2753 8 Leko 2751 9 Morozevich 2751 10 Grischuk 2750 Topalov sealed his position at the top. Note that the match against Kamsky did not get him too many points even though the final score was pretty one sided. Aronian is slowly creeping up to the top and regaining his earlier form of a couple years back. Jakovenko is No. 6! The most significant change in the past few days is definitely Grischuk's climb back into the top 10.