Congratulations to Vishy Anand

Chessvibes.com has pretty good coverage of the rapid-game tiebreak stage of the match. Whether the World Champion's title should be decided in rapid chess to begin with is another question... Either way, Vishy Anand, who won the title in 2007 and has since defended it against Kramnik and Topolav, has now added Gelfand to the list of defeated challengers.

College Days

It was great having these guys around nearly 24/7. From the Chicago: Maroon: http://chicagomaroon.com/2012/05/04/in-back-of-hutch-a-nightly-game-of-kings/

DC Chess League Final

The final week of the DC Chess League season, I thought I was going to get a shot at GM Larry Kaufman, my first rated game with a GM in over a year. When the other team's captain arrived though, he jokingly told me that Larry refused to play me out of solidarity over our past experiences on the same summer league team. I think he was just out of town. Instead I played with a 2190 rated high school freshman from the prestigious Thomas Jefferson High School. I like to think that I experimented in the opening, then slowly developed a good position and and converted into a winning endgame. You could also say that I played a boring game and then my opponent blundered a pawn so I won. I'll let you decide.

Finally, Someone Wants to be World Champion

Chessbase provides interesting analysis of the decisive game here: http://chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=8172. In other tournament news, it looks like two players badly wanted to win the US Championship. Hikaru Nakamura won by catching Gata Kamsky in the final two rounds. Kamsky's game vs. Seirwan, was my favorite game of the event. You can see analysis here: http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1666528 Based on the final game of the rapid playoff it looked like no one wanted to win the US Women's Championship. IM Krush pulled out a win there through no fault of her own. First the opponent missed an elementary tactic to win a rook, then hung a rook of her own to throw away the game.

Another Queen's Gambit Trap?

This line has always worked as a trap for me, as the following blitz game attests. Strangely enough, most white players don't go for the chance to win material. Do they not see it, or does the note to black's 7th move scare them off? What would you play in the position below?

Grandmasters

It's been a busy couple of weeks, but I'm back blogging again. I'm in preparation for the final match of the DC Chess League season, which will likely put me up against a GM. In a probably unwise strategy I spent way too long today trying to get my 3-minute ICC rating back from what I considered too low to be seen with. Eventually I got it back in the normal range, thanks in part to wins at the end against GMs Eugene Torre and Aleksa Strikovic. The final game against Strikovic looked lost for a long time, but eventually we reached the following position, where black made the wrong move and lost despite his extra rook. What would you play?