Dynamic and Positional Pawn Sacrifice

The seminar Chess 431 – Dynamic and Positional Pawn Sacrifice was concluded this Sunday on one of the best chess sites.
Among the examples that were covered was the following masterpiece by Veselin Topalov:
Topalov,Veselin (2812) - Wang Yue (2738)
Sofia MTel Masters 5th Sofia (4), 16.05.2009
[Rogozenco. D, Topalov V.]

1.d4 d5 2.c4 c6 3.Nf3 Nf6 4.Nc3 dxc4 5.a4 Bf5 6.Ne5 Nbd7 7.Nxc4 Nb6 8.Ne5 a5 9.f3 Nfd7 10.e4 Nxe5 11.dxe5 [11.exf5 offers prospects of a slight advantage (Huebner,R): 11...Nec4 (11...Ned7) 12.Qb3 Nd6 13.Bd3 g6 14.g4 Bg7 15.Be3 Nd7 16.0–0–0 Qb6 17.Qxb6 Nxb6= Ѕ-Ѕ Carlsen,M (2770)-Wang Yue (2738)/Leon 2009 (47)]

11...Qxd1+ 12.Kxd1 Be6 13.Kc2 f6 [13...Bc4 14.Bxc4 (14.Be3 Bxf1 15.Rhxf1 is slightly better for White.) 14...Nxc4 15.e6 fxe6 16.b3 Nd6 17.e5 Nf7 18.Re1 gave good compensation to White in Berczes,D (2232)-Carlsen,M (2250)/Heraklio 2002]

14.Rb1



14...Nd7 An over-the-board novelty according to Topalov. Previously: [14...fxe5 was played, for example- 15.b4 Nc4 16.bxa5 (16.Bxc4 Bxc4 17.bxa5 0–0–0 18.Rd1 Rxd1 19.Nxd1 e6 20.Ne3 Ba6 21.Ng4 Bd6 22.Bb2 Rd8 23.Rd1 h5 24.Nxe5 Bxe5 25.Bxe5 Rxd1 26.Kxd1 g6= Ѕ-Ѕ Vallejo Pons,F (2629)-Kasparov,G (2847)/Linares 2003 (41)) 16...Nxa5 17.Be3 Bc4 18.Bb6 Bxf1 19.Rhxf1 Nc4 20.Kd3 and White was slightly better in Berkes,F (2614)-Kiss,P (2394)/Hungary 2005]

15.b4! [15.exf6?! exf6 would be better for Black only.]

15...Nxe5 [15...axb4 16.Rxb4 0–0–0 17.Be3 Nxe5 18.a5 would give strong initiative to White.]

16.bxa5 Bc8 [16...0–0–0? 17.a6+–]

17.a6!



The positional sacrifice disconnects the black pawns and creates plenty of weaknesses in the opponent's camp which can be used by the White pieces.]

[17.Bd2 Rxa5 18.Nd5 Rc5+ (18...Rxa4 19.Nb6) 19.Nc3]

17...bxa6 18.a5 [Black's queenside is very weak, he has problems completing his development and finding any activity. Therefore White's compensation for the pawn is more than enough and secures him better prospects.]

18...Nd7 [18...Be6 19.Rb6 Bc4 20.Bf4 Bxf1 21.Rxf1 Nc4 22.Rxc6 Nxa5 23.Rc7



23...e5 24.Bd2±]

19.Na4 e5 [19...Rb8 20.Rxb8 Nxb8 21.Nb6 Bb7 22.Bc4 e5 23.Be3±]

20.Bc4 [20.Be3!?]

20...Bc5 [White's compensation is more than obvious in case of-20...Bd6 21.Be3 Ke7 22.Rhd1]

21.Rd1 [A good alternative was 21.Nxc5 Nxc5 22.Rb6]

21...Bd4 22.Ba3 c5 23.Rb3 h5



[23...Ke7 24.Rxd4! exd4 25.Nxc5 Nxc5 26.Bxc5+]

24.Rdb1 Ke7?! 25.Bd5 [25.Nc3]

25...Ra7 26.Rb6! Topalov could not stand the temptation to sacrifice further the exchange!



26...Rc7? [The decisive mistake.]

[Necessary was 26...Nxb6 27.axb6 Rd7 and White has nothing forced. After 28.Bxc5+ (28.b7 Bxb7 29.Bxb7 Rb8 30.Nxc5 Rc7!; 28.Nxc5 Rxd5! 29.exd5 Bxc5 30.Bxc5+ Kf7! Topalov) 28...Bxc5 29.Nxc5 Rxd5! 30.exd5 Bf5+ 31.Ne4 Rb8 Black retains good chances of escaping with a draw. (31...Bxe4+ 32.fxe4 Rb8! (32...Kd6 33.Kb3+–) 33.Kd3 Kd6 34.Kc4 h4 is better for White, but there is no obvious win for him (Topalov).) ]

27.Re6+ Kd8 28.Nb6+– Nxb6 [28...Ra7 29.Kd3!? (29.Rd6 Topalov) 29...Bb7 30.Kc4+–]

29.axb6 Rb7

30.Rd6+! Ke7 31.Rc6 Rd7 32.Re6+ Kf7 33.b7

1–0

I would like to thank to all the participants who took part in this event and to wish them many successful pawn sacrifices, both positional and dynamic!
Those of you who have missed the chance to take part in the seminar still have a chance to purchase it. Just go on the left side of the blog and choose the paypal button under the Chess.com seminar sign.
I will send you the link with the videos and the pgn files once that you are ready.
Best regards!

The True Value of Pieces

My new DVD was released the last week. Here is the short description by chessbase:
Queen against two rooks or three minor pieces, as well as a rook plus pawn vs two minor pieces - these are typical constellations where the material is unbalanced. In our first steps in chess we are taught about the nominal value of the pieces. The queen is equal to nine pawns; a rook to five, a minor piece is worth three pawns. This is a common sense solution aimed at teaching the beginner a system of values so that he or she does not trade a more valuable piece for a less good one. Later however, situations occur in games in which one side can trade two minor pieces (six pawns) for a rook and a pawn (also six pawns). Theoretically speaking, this should result in an equal position, but in reality one of the two sides will profit from the exchange. There are many cases of material imbalance in chess. In his new DVD GM Dejan Bojkov of Bulgaria makes an attempt to systematise the most important ones and gives valuable advice on how to handle the resulting positions. He also explains the hidden factors behind the imbalances, explanations which will guide you through the art of exchanging pieces.
And a fragment:

Chess and Poker

(Pictures Veronika Andreeva and Denitsa Kukleva)
Bulgarian team championships are always a good occasion to meet the old friends, check out how their lives go, chat, socialize, enjoy. We are also spoiled of the choice of good places for the event. These are either the mountain resorts, or, more likely- the see resorts.



Sunny Beach is one of those nice places where the championships take place and it hosted the events from 19-25 September.
For those of you who are not familiar with the system- eight teams play each other on the top A division, with the last two relegated from the group and the top two of the second B division promoted to the “masters”. The male teams consist of six players and two substitutes and the female teams have four players and one reserve.
This was my first year for the extraordinary team of “Abritus”Razgrad. It is a rare bird at the Bulgarian team competitions for many reasons. First, we have the largest fan club. In most of the cases the supporters of the team are more than the players during the event. Second and foremost, poker is supporting the team.
While Loek van Wely claims that chess sponsors his poker adventures, it is the other way up in “Abritus”. The costs for the team are equally distributes between a pharmaceutical company and three successful poker-chess players. Stelyan Georgiev (Spirit), Vladimir Velikov (Bushi) and Yanko Yankov have a lot in common. They are professional poker players but have started as chess players at first. Their trainer, the chess master Rosen Rusev is an experienced poker player as well. For a few years now they support the club not only morally, but financially too. Last year they even brought GMs P.Eljanov and K. Miton at the Bulgarian team championship.
Moreover, in order to free room for professional players Stelyan and Vladimir played in other teams, in second division. They did well there, especially the former, who scored 4/5 at his board…
At the beginning of the tournament we had a couple of problems to deal with. The first one was the team composition. Our team consists of five GMs, and two strong IMs (and one of those is the Bulgarian runner-up from the individual championship I. Enchev!) It seems as we chose wise at the end as the plan to hold on top boards and win on the back was perfectly fulfilled. Moreover, all the players finished on positive score.
The second problem was more serious. We had to decide where and when to celebrate our title…At the end of the team meeting we “voted” the wise decision to win the tournament with a spare round to have enough time to celebrate.



And since we all are very responsible people we had to stick to the plan. All the six matches were duly won and before the final round we were unreachable with 12 team points, clear four ahead of the second team…
The champion’s team was composed of GMs K.Rusev, V. Georgiev, B.Chatalbashev, M. Nikolov, D. Bojkov and IMs I. Enchev and K.Karakehajov.



The silver medals went for the last-year champions- Lokomotiv Plovdiv and the bronze- for Lokomotiv Sofia.
The female championship was more interesting as usual.



Three teams had clear chances before the final round and two of them CSKA and Shah 21 were facing each other. The third contender Lokomotiv Plovdiv won their last match with a minimal margin and had to wait to see the color of the medals. It turned out to be silver as the last game of the vent between E. Raeva (Shah 21) and A. Stojanovic (CSKA) ended in favour of the former which gave her team the victory and the gold medals.
The champion’s team was- WIM E. Raeva, WGMs M. Velcheva and S. Maksimovic and M. Stefanova.

Yuri Benderev Pernik and CSKA promoted to A group in the male section, and Etar and Krakra Pernishki to the female group.

What Rooks Want Survey

The FIDE trainer's commission site keeps on posting interesting educational articles.
The end of September saw my first survey, titled "What Rooks Want". Here is an fragment of it:

Pfleger,Michael (2270) - Tiemann,Christoph (2075)
BL2–Sued 0809 Germany (3.8), 30.11.2008
[Bojkov,Dejan]



[If in the previous example the rook went on a passive position volunateerily, in this case it was forced:]

28.a4! Rb4 [Or else- 28...Rc5 29.c3



followed by Kc1–d2–e3–d4 when all the black pawns fall.]

29.c3 Rxa4 30.Kb1! [The rook is now locked forever on a4.]

30...h6 31.Rxd5



Let's stop for a moment to analyze the situation. There are two pictures on the board. Picture one are the completely frozen pieces on the queens-flank: the black Ra4, and pawns on a5 and c4 as well as the white Kb1 and pawns on b2, c3. They are not going anywhere and we can easily neglect them and concentrate on the other side of the board, where the white R+ 3 pawns is fighting the black K and 3 pawns. The battle is uneven though and the king has no chance.]

31...Kf8 [Another possible line is- 31...Kg7 32.h4 The pawns should help the rook find targets- 32...Kf6 33.Rd6+ Ke7 34.Rb6 Kf8 35.h5! discovers the h6 pawn. 35...gxh5 36.gxh5 Kg7 37.f5 f6 38.Rb7+ Kg8 39.Rc7



and it is zugzwang- Black will have to give up one of the f6 or h6 pawns.]

32.h4 [Not the only winning plan, but a very convincing one.]

32...Ke7 33.h5 Kf6 34.Rd6+ [34.g5+ Kg7 35.hxg6 fxg6 36.Rd7+ would also win.]

34...Kg7 35.Rc6 [White is no hurry as he knows his opponent has nowhere to go. ]

[The immediate- 35.f5 would soon lead to zugzwang as well.]

35...Kh7 36.hxg6+ fxg6 37.Rc7+ Kg8 38.f5

The rook got support and the end is close.]

38...gxf5 39.gxf5 h5 40.f6 h4 41.Rg7+ [41.Rg7+ a possible end would be- 41...Kf8 (41...Kh8 42.Rg4 h3 43.f7) 42.Rh7 h3 43.Rxh3 Kf7 44.Rf3 and Black will have sooner or later to give up the rook on a4...]

1–0
You can check the complete article here.

Panamercian Youth Championships

Pocos de Caldas is small town in Brazil, situated approximately 250 km away from Sao Paolo. The place is famous for its thermal waters and is one of Brazilian beloved resorts. This year it hosted the Panamerican Individual Championships for girls and boys aged up to eighteen.



From 25-th of July to 1-st of August the best players of South and North America competed in the event. By character the tournament is equivalent to the European Championship. By scale it should be bigger than that as there are two continents involved in the competitions.
North America was represented mainly by USA, Jamaica and Mexico, while South by almost all the countries. The most impressive was the group from Peru with approximately a hundred of competitors.



It is winter on the south part of the hemisphere and during the first couple of days it was rainy and gloomy. Not the kind of weather one should expect from Brazil. It was the people that made the days fine though. No matter if they speak your language or not, with a smile on their faces Brazilians will try to help you in every aspect they can in a most patient and polite way. And once that the rains were over none could guess what the actual season was. Warm and pleasant weather, plus 25 degrees Celsius all day long- just the perfect conditions to enjoy your stay. The majority of the players were accommodated in the nice Golden Park hotel, which was equipped with swimming pool, sauna, and tennis court and situated five minutes away from the venue. Food was perfect, exuberant and tasty, and…
The kids had only six days to take advantage of these wonderful characteristics of Brazil. Throughout those days they had also to play nine games of chess. A tough program which included three double rounds, an opening round at 7 p.m and a last round at 9 a.m. On the top of that the blitz tournament took place soon after the classical tournaments were over. Indeed, chess is getting more and more competitive in any sense.
I flew to South America as a coach of three of my American students. All of them are members of NorCal House of Chess in Bay Area, California. This remarkable club is run by the Pilipino-born coach Ted Castro who cooperates with a bunch of Grandmasters and experienced coaches all over the world to provide the best education for his students. Many of the club members belong to the list of Top Kids in the country.
My students did well in Pocos de Caldes. Ashritha Eswaran ended sixth in the group under fourteen, Chenyi Zhao-fourth under ten while Aksithi Eswaran took home the trophy of the youngest girls (under eight). Aksithi owes her success not only to coach Ted, but to coaches Mathew Benson, Ronald Cusi and Ricardo de Guzman.

Two more American kids deserve special attention in this report as both Kevin Chor (under 8) and David Peng (under 10) left no chance to their opponents and won all their games!
Overall the seventeen Americans took eight medals and the cup of the second best team. First place came naturally for the Peruvians. In some categories they swept all the medals! My personal award for most supportive team went to the Chile fellows. They were most expressive during the closing ceremony! Which was a feast of colours and sounds.
Results in each group and games here.
On the way back I enjoyed the hospitality of a friend of mine. IM Herman Claudius van Riemsdijk is a living legend of the Brazilian chess. Born in Netherlands, he was raised in Brazil and won the national title three times. Many of the country records are owned by him, including the number of finals that he played-30! Herman is a walking encyclopedia who met all the world champions starting with Euwe and was one of the arbiters at the WCC in San Luis.
He showed me in a fast mode the sights of Sao Paolo, all the famous chess spots including the place where Najdorf game his famous simul.
Thank you for the hospitality, Brazil!

Material Unbalance

In our chess games often situations occur in which one side can trade two light pieces (six pawns) for a rook and a pawn (also six pawns). Nominally speaking, this should be equal, but in reality it is one of the sides who profits from the exchange.
The general rule states that the pieces are stronger, especially at the beginning and in the middle game, but this is not always the case.
If the rooks have open files and can create direct attack against the enemy king they might be the better pieces.
Have a look at the following example:

Short,Nigel D (2440) - Tempone,Marcelo (2335)
Wch U20 Mexico, 1981



White's activity is overwhelming and it is no wonder that he can start decisive attack.

16.Bxf7+! Rxf7 17.Nxf7 Kxf7 18.Rae1!



The last reserves are coming in the action and Black cannot hold the king's flank.

18...Bf8 [Or: 18...Bd6 19.Bxf6 gxf6 (There is an in-between check in the line- 19...Qxf6 20.Ne4 Qxf3 21.Nxd6+) 20.Qh5+ Kg7 21.Ne4 where Black is helpless. Just have a look at his flanks and you will know why.]

19.Ne4 Ra5 [The rooks are ruling in the line- 19...Nbd5 20.Nxf6 Nxf6 21.Bxf6 Qxf6 (21...gxf6 22.Qh5+ Kg8 23.Rg3+) 22.Qh5+ Kg8 23.Rf3



While 19...Bg4 loses material- 20.Bxf6 Bxf3 21.Bxd8]

20.Nxf6 gxf6 21.Re8 Qd6 22.Qh5+ Kg8

23.R1e7! Qxe7 24.Rxe7 Bxe7 25.Qe8+ [Black resigned because of the line-]

[25.Qe8+ Bf8 26.Bh6 Nd7 27.Qxc8]

1–0

A Camp with the Champ

The third edition of the Metropolitan Chess Camp took place in Los Angeles from 10 to 14 July. More than one hundred players took part in it. The age of the participants varied from young kids aged five or six to experienced masters aged above sixty.
The trainer’s team was a mixture of experienced local coaches (GM Melik Khachiyan, IMs Armen Ambartsoumian, Andranik Matikozian and Zhanibek Amanov) plus two non-US residing GMs- Vadim Milov and yours truly.


However, the pearl in the crown was the presence of the reigning World Champion Vishy Anand. For a second consecutive year the Metropolitan Chess founder and national master Ankit Gupta managed to treat the lucky campers with the knowledge of a world class player.
The lectures were conducted in the comfortable Radisson hotel situated within a walking distance from the Los Angeles International airport.
The schedule was tough, especially for the lower-rated participants and included after-class activities like simuls, blitz tournament and even a bughouse one! After all, chess should be fun, should not it?


Anand showed some of the recent top GM games, including his own victory against Jon Ludvig Hammer from the Sandes Masters tournament in Norway in May as well as games of his colleagues from the recent top-GM events.
The last day of the event saw a simul by the World Champion against twenty selected players from the camp and a game against the chess.com members. More than ten thousand players took part in the latter, but it had to end prematurely as the servers went down. From Anand’s over-the-board opponents two were luckier than the others. Michael Brown drew his game (and he did so in the previous year as well!) while the ten year old Marcus Miyasaka won his one!

The sessions of the World Champion were recorded and will be released on a DVD soon. So were mine in one of the training day :)