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It was as good a start as can be for the Indian Chess Players at the World Cup at Khanty Mansiysk. The much lower rated Sriram Jha and Abhijit Kunte held higher rated Grischuk and Shirov to draws. In other matches involving Indian players, Abhijit Gupta held Vitiugov, Ganguly beat Filippov, Negi upset Milov and Chanda beat Kobalia. Sasikiran was held to a draw by L'Ami. Official Site

A case of the tail wagging. Kosteniuk, who finished at the bottom, beat topper Carlsen at the World Championship blitz. No reason to be alarmed though since it was a 3 mins+2 sec game.

The Top List for US Chess Players according to the US Chess Federation (Source: www.uschess.org) 1 Nakamura, Hikaru (12641216) NY USA 2824 2 Onischuk, Alexander (12625186) VA USA 2773 3 Kamsky, Gata (12528459) NY USA 2770 4 Seirawan, Yasser (10509459) WA USA 2711 5 Akobian, Varuzhan (12740522) CA USA 2705 6 Shulman, Yury (12741541) IL USA 2696 7 Ehlvest, Jaan (12514557) NY USA 2691 8 Christiansen, Larry M (10460921) MA USA 2663 Shabalov, Alexander (12544264) PA USA 2663 10 Hess, Robert L (12749774) NY USA 2655 11 Kaidanov, Gregory (12543746) KY USA 2643 12 Benjamin, Joel (10102511) NJ USA 2628 13 Ibragimov, Ildar (12576446) CT USA 2619 14 Kudrin, Sergey (11257585) CT USA 2618 Friedel, Joshua Edward (12593986) NH USA 2618 16 Robson, Ray (12847250) FL USA 2614 17 Stripunsky, Alexander (12715435) NJ USA 2612 18 Khachiyan, Melikset (12827326) CA USA 2610 19 Gulko, Boris (12473035) NJ USA 2609 20 Ivanov, Alexander (12513936) MA USA 2602 21 Finegold, Benjamin P (11264417) MI USA 2600 22 De

Is there any consistency to the effect that a World Championship has on all team members, seconds and all? Have any of you noticed a pattern at the last one and the ones before that? One thing's for sure. The winning horse's team is moving full steam ahead on the FIDE ratings chart list. In the immediate few months of the match, Kasimdzhanov has broken the 2700 mark for the first time, Ganguly has entered the top 100 for the first time, Wojtaszek is back to around where he was at his peak. Anand at least has the crown ;) maybe not enough points gain. Kramnik is the only player against the grain. He's overcome the slump of the loss of points at the match and shot past it now on the live list. His team mates though do not fare as well. Rublevsky, Fressinet, and Leko have lost or are more or less at the same level. Any of you noticed any such pattern in the previous matches? Will post again with your observations.

How much difference it make to a professional player if he is stripped of the time granted to make his moves? Not much if you see the progress of the World Blitz Chess Championship 2009. These strong GMs are making astonishing moves even with just 3 minutes + 2 seconds increment games. How has this become possible? If you just go back to the historic match between Kasparov and Karpov in 1984 and 1985, analyze the games with strong engines on, you will see that even these legends made mini-blunders once in a while. Such mistakes will be duly punished in these strong computing times. Strong Chess engines have made the process of human analysis almost redundant. Of course, you still can do it on the board after the game, but one is sure to find lines later in detailed analysis. You can clearly see that the top players are really playing almost to their usual strength and the progress is not erratic. The ones in form perform anyway. From this one can conclude that the game will get shorter

My apologies. It seems that the World Blitz Championship is of 42 gruelling rounds and the title has not yet been won. Carlsen leads with 14(!) more rounds to go. Anand was leading at the end of the first third section with an amazing 12/14 without losses. Veteran Karpov is 9th. Karpov was ranked 4th at the end of the first half. Judit Polgar is 19th and defending champion Dominguez stands 14th, two places ahead of another traditional favorite Ivanchuk. Top Ten Standings after Round 28 1 19 GM Carlsen, Magnus NOR 2801 21.0 2 20 GM Anand, Viswanathan IND 2788 20.0 3 16 GM Karjakin, Sergey UKR 2723 18.5 4 5 GM Kramnik, Vladimir RUS 2772 16.5 5 10 GM Svidler, Peter RUS 2754 16.5 6 11 GM Ponomariov, Ruslan UKR 2739 16.0 7 12 GM Grischuk, Alexander RUS 2736 16.0 8 1 GM Aronian, Levon ARM 2786 14.5 9 17 GM Karpov, Anatoly RUS 2619 14.0 10 9 GM Morozevich, Alexander RUS 2750 13.5

Anand is leading the 2009 edition of the World Blitz Championship by a whopping 2 points ahead of No. 1 (Carlsen on unofficial live rating list). Anand has a total of 12 points out of 14 with no losses! It appears as if Anand is furious about his loss at the hands of Aronian in the last round of the Tal Memorial tournament. Veteran Karpov is in a surprise fourth position with 9/14. Among the ladies, Judit and Kosteniuk are placed 15th and 22nd respectively. Highly rated Gelfand (in the normal time control games) is placed a low 20th. 1 Anand, Viswanathan IND 2788 12 pts 2 Carlsen, Magnus NOR 2801 10 pts 3 Karpov, Anatoly RUS 2619 9 pts 4 Kramnik, Vladimir RUS 2772 8.5 pts 5 Grischuk, Alexander RUS 2736 8.5 pts 6 Karjakin, Sergey UKR 2723 8.0 pts 7 Bareev, Evgeny RUS 2634 8.0 pts 8 Ponomariov, Ruslan UKR 2739 8.0 pts 9 Ivanchuk, Vassily UKR 2739 7.5 pts 10 Svidler, Peter RUS 2754 7.5 pts

The amazing kid, Carlsen is back at No.1 on the Live Ratings list (and not the official FIDE list yet). If you remember, he was No. 1 for a day last year during one of the top tier events. This time he is just a point ahead (rounded) of Topalov and a bit more ahead of Anand. The Tal tournament did not show Carlsen's class to the full as he was not 100% but it did show his grit since he remained unbeaten even though it was rumored that he had a flu type of condition. 1 Carlsen 2806 2 Topalov 2805 3 Anand 2790 4 Kramnik 2786 5 Aronian 2781 6 Gashimov 2763 7 Gelfand 2759 8 Ivanchuk 2753 9 Svidler 2745 10 Morozevich 2742 11 Leko 2739 12 Radjabov 2738 13 Wang Yue 2738 14 Ponomariov 2738 15 Grischuk 2736 16 Eljanov 2734 17 Vachier-Lagrave 2727 18 Mamedyarov 2726 19 Jakovenko 2725 20 Karjakin 2723

Vladimir Kramnik is proving that he is a winner all the way. Well, if you forget the World Championship match where he was bulldozed by the devastating weapons Anand brought to the match, he has grown from strength to strength. When anyone else would feel the effects of the demoralizing match, Kramnik has taken it positively and even changed his style from conservative to heavy risk taking. With just two rounds to go at the Tal Memorial, he is almost the surprise leader. Now, there is more action on the Live Chess Rating list. Kramnik is approaching Topalov, Carlsen and Anand who are almost bunched up. It is almost as fair as it can be. Aronian is sure to throw in his hat sooner or later but even without it, the ratings list is almost sure to change even before the end of the event, and definitely by the time the London event is finished.