2009 U.S. Women's Chess Championship

Internet coverage and articles - obviously some of these folks are not UP on things! LOL! Los Angeles Chronicle: NO. 1 BEATS NO. 2 IN U.S. WOMEN'S CHESS CHAMPIONSHIP Newswire Services October 08, 2009 U.S. Women's Chess Championship Underway October 6, 9:18 AM The Examiner Steve Goldberg I could go on, but I don't want to bore you all to death. You can find more current news at the USCF website, presented in original articles like this one (instead of copies of press releases from USCF that a lot of general circulation newspapers use). Jen Shahade has been doing yeoman's work giving live commentary at chess fm as well as writing coverage articles for the USCF website, although they are a day behind, they are good reads. For the most current news, check at Susan Polgar's blog (I do not believe they EVER sleep), and of course, at this blog, where I try my best to give you the results and games updated as the games finish. Current standings after R4: # Name USCF FIDE Score 1 Anna Zatonskih 2492 2462 3½ 2 Alisa Melekhina 2253 2220 3 3 Sabina Foisor 2379 2320 2½ 4 Camilla Baginskaite 2356 2317 2½ 5 Irina Krush 2490 2458 2 6 Rusudan Goletiani 2437 2391 2 7 Iryna Zenyuk 2271 2285 1½ 8 Battsetseg Tsagaan 2265 2258 1½ 9 Tatev Abrahamyan 2342 2275 1 10 Yun Fan 2134 1935 ½ Today's results: Results R4: Foisor vs Melekhina: 0-1! Goletiani vs Abrahamyan: 1/2 Zatonskih vs Baginskaite: 1/2 Fan vs Krush: 1/2! Zenyuk vs Tsagaan: 1/2 Do I for a single instant believe that Irina Krush will remain in 5th place? Nope. I think she'll move up in the rankings. Where she will finish - I won't hazard a guess. I think there are just too many wild cards floating about this championshp right now. Consider, for instance, Yun Fan. I think Yun Fan came into the game today really pissed off and she was determined to show that she belongs in the USWCC. And so, she did. And I think she's going to continue to be pissed off. Take a look at her games:

• In game one, she was white against Foisor, who outranks her by some 400 points. Still, Fan fought for game 1 for 74 moves before resigning.
• What did Yun Fan do in Game 2? She was white once again, and she lost to Zenyuk, who outranks her by some 350 points. It took Zenyuk 60 moves to win.
• In Game 3, Fan had the black pieces, playing against Tsaagan. It took Tsaagan 101 moves to defeat Fan, despite outranking her by a little over 200 points.
• And now today, in Game 4, Fan with white manages a draw against Krush, who outranks her by over 500 points, in 39 moves.

I'm sure no expert, but my overall impression from today's games was that the chess femmes who hadn't played up to their potential struck back today, and they struck back with a vengence, forcing draws against all odds.

Tomorrow is R 5, and Friday is a rest day, before the final 4 games start. Who's the dark horse? My gut tells me there is one here, and I don't know that we've seen her make her moves yet. But, darlings - don't take my skills as a Sybyl to the bank :)