From the Brooklyn Bridge
07.05.2004 The fourth round of the Canarias en Red Internet Chess Festival brought eight new qualifiers for Sunday's final (plus two Spanish places). Amongst the top scorers was an old friend, Aleksander Wojtkiewicz, a leading Polish player who lives and teaches in Baltimore, USA. In the server chat Aleksander told us a harrowing story.
Tournament
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The Canarias en Red Internet Chess Festival
Once again 260 players participated in the fourth qualifier, so that now we
have already had a total of over 1000 participants. It was necessary to score
at least 9.5/13 in order to qualify for the final on Sunday. But a good Buchholz
rating was also necessary if you scored only 9.5 points. To get a good Buchholz
it is important to be in the top group as early as possible during the round.
Which means that every game, even the very first one, is important. Coming
from behind to score against lower-rated opponents (the "Swiss Gambit") can
easily backfire here.
The winner was 20-year-old Michail Panarin of Russia, playing
under his well known Playchess handle "topotun". Second was Russian GM Vladimir
Belov, the man who knocked out Alexander Grischuk in the first round
of the ACP
final. The other qualifiers were David Gochelashvili (david333),
GM Aleksander Wojtkiewicz (Alexwojt), GM Andrei Sokolov
(Andrei21), Sead Bicevic (cobise), Arnold Essing
(deadmold) and Jan-Peter Delfs (lion). The two best Spanish
players, Alberto Suares (topchess2) and Samuel Correa
Hernandez (sapinunc) also qualified.
A note on disconnections: the program that we use to run the tournament
pairs all players who are registered and in the room at the time a round begins.
If a player is not present he will not be paired. Naturally the software cannot
tell whether a participant has decided to withdraw from the tournament or whether
he or she has suffered a disconnect. It is not possible to play the game later.
If you have missed a round the only thing left to do is to continue playing
in the following round. Disconnects are part of Internet chess and people simply
have to accept it as bad luck, even if it is very frustrating.
For those of you who haven't qualified there is one more chance: tonight at
20:00h CET (= GMT +2) in the usual place (see below).
Martin Fischer, tournament director
Wojtkiewicz
One
of the participants in yesterday's fourth round was an old friend, Aleksander
Wojtkiewicz. This very strong Polish GM today lives in Baltimore, USA, where
he teaches chess and stages tournaments. We know him as a very entertaining
person with some of the best anecdotes that have come out of Eastern Europe
– an area not exactly famous for sophisticated
joke-telling.
During the tournament Alex complained in the chat window about the timing
of the final: 12:00h CET (= 10:00h GMT) was six a.m. in Baltimore. It's three
a.m. in California, where Hikaru Nakamura, another qualifier, lives. But while
Hikaru can stay up Saturday night for the final, Aleksander must actually set
up an alarm clock and get his head cleared (see Nigel
Short's rules) in order to be ready for the games.
We explained why the final is being held so early: the Spanish sponsors expect
a lot of spectators in Internet Cafes and chess clubs to watch. And the best
time for this is the Spanish "siesta" hours.
During the chat session Alex told us about a time, just over two and a half
years ago, when he returned from a trip to Los Angeles at the same unearthly
hour. "I flew into New York from Vegas at six in the morning. I was in my car
on Brooklyn Bridge, driving home, when there was a huge noise and commotion.
A plane had just hit the World Trade Center. Then there was the noise of the
second plane approaching, and women were screaming 'it's the fire brigade bringing
in water to put out the flames.' But it was the second plane that slammed into
the building. The bridge was closed for traffic, and thousands of people streamed
out of Manhattan by foot to escape the carnage. There was a terrible smell,
which hung around downtown for a month." Scary. We are reminded that the very
first report in our new ChessBase News page design was on the destruction of
the WTC, uploaded to the news database on September
12, 2001.
Results
Below it the cross table for the top 40 players. A total of 260 players participated.
1
| topotun |
2600
| 10.5 / 13 |
2 |
Vladimir Belov |
2540 |
10.5 / 13 |
3 |
david333 |
2460 |
10.0 / 13 |
4 |
alexwojt |
2580 |
10.0 / 13 |
5 |
Cobise |
1858 |
10.0 / 13 |
6 |
Andrei21 |
2740 |
9.5 / 13 |
7 |
Deadmold |
2244 |
9.5 / 13 |
8 |
lion |
2448 |
9.5 / 13 |
9 |
Rrhioua |
2068 |
9.5 / 13 |
10 |
ruudi |
2430 |
9.5 / 13 |
11
| badenia |
2500
| 9.5 / 13 |
12 |
Podgaets |
2445 |
9.5 / 13 |
13 |
rabiega |
2744 |
9.0 / 12 |
14 |
topchess2 |
2370
| 9.0 / 13 |
15 |
Bullmover |
2427 |
9.0 / 13 |
16 |
stirlitz |
2190
| 9.0 / 13 |
17 |
lietuvis |
2528 |
8.5 / 13 |
18 |
Kendo |
2400
| 8.5 / 13 |
19 |
Klosterfrau |
2575 |
8.5 / 13 |
20 |
ftorodent |
2383 |
8.5 / 13 |
|
|
21
| jek1975 |
2144 |
8.5 / 13 |
22 |
Tinz |
2406 |
8.5 / 13 |
23 |
Petr Hába |
2596 |
8.5 / 13 |
24 |
Robir |
2138 |
8.5 / 13 |
25 |
rpolaczek |
2334 |
8.5 / 13 |
26 |
real cheater |
2043 |
8.5 / 13 |
27 |
Rapaces |
2380 |
8.5 / 13 |
28 |
hanny |
1947 |
8.5 / 13 |
29 |
sapinunc |
2030 |
8.5 / 13 |
30 |
Sir Render |
1969 |
8.5 / 13 |
31
| Neverhood |
2343 |
8.0 / 13 |
32 |
FightingDragon18 |
2250
| 8.0 / 13 |
33 |
JFernandez |
2337 |
8.0 / 13 |
34 |
unkman |
2213 |
8.0 / 13 |
35 |
Todilla |
2314 |
8.0 / 13 |
36 |
Tih_dos |
2277 |
8.0 / 13 |
37 |
giul |
2216 |
8.0 / 13 |
38 |
Daniel vonTudosa |
1950 |
8.0 / 12 |
39 |
fermik |
2064 |
8.0 / 13 |
40 |
greyhoundz |
2064 |
8.0 / 13 |
|
The Canarias en Red Internet Chess Festival will be held from Monday May 3rd
until Sunday May 9th, 2004 on the Playchess.com
server, in the special Canarias en Red tournament rooms.
To play in this tournament you
can use Fritz or any Fritz-compatible program (Shredder, Junior, Tiger,
Hiarcs) to follow the lectures, or download a free
trial client. |
The qualifiers will be held from Monday May 3rd to Friday May 7th at 20:00h
server time (=CET, GMT +2). You do not need to book a place in advance, simply
go to the tournament room at the specified time and click "Join". It is possible
to play in more than one qualifier. The final will be held on Sunday, May 9,
at 12:00h server time (=CET, GMT +2). This is the time for registering, not
the start of the games. Qualifiers and the finals are 13 round Swiss tournament
with a rate of play of three minutes for each side plus one second increment
per move. The total prize sum is $5,600 (€4,800), the winner takes $1,575
= €1,350.
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