Polgars in the News

This article was in my local newspaper this morning, an interview of 20 questions with actor Bruce Greenwood (Captain Christopher pike in the 'new' Star Trek movie) from popmatters.com: Busy Bruce Greenwood makes time for Q&A December 3, 2009 5. Your ideal brain food? Chess: 5334 Problems, Combinations and Games, by Laszlo Polgar. A restrospective article at Lubbockonline.com on the year Texas Tech's chess program and SPICE have had: Polgar: A fantastic 2009 for Susan Polgar Institute of Chess Excellence Lubbock Avalanche-Journal Sunday, December 27, 2009 And Judit Polgar reminds us - as much as we take her for granted as the World's #1 female player for seemingly forever, that she is merciless and capable of uncorking amazing moves in a game at any time. She reminded us of that in this game again GM Boris Gelfand, who went on to win the 2009 Chess World Cup: Posted on 09:45 PM, December 17, 2009 Chess Piece -- Bobby Ang Gelfand wins World Cup The FIDE World Chess Cup took place in the oil-boom town of Khanty-Mansiysk, in that general part of Russia we usually refer to as Siberia, from Nov. 20 up to Dec. 15, 2009. It was a seven-round knockout event comprising of 128 players with six rounds of matches comprising two games per round, with the winners progressing to the next round. The final seventh round consists of four games. The time control is 90 minutes for the first 40 moves followed by 30 minutes for the rest of the game with an increment of 30 seconds per move from move one. Aside from the huge cash prizes, the winner of the World Chess Cup automatically qualifies for the Candidates’ match-tournament, from which the challenger to the world championship title will come from. The Israeli GM Boris Gelfand, at 2758 the top seed among 128 players competing, lived up to his billing by defeating host player Andre Obodchuk (1.5-0.5), the tough Tajik Farrukh Amonatov (1.5-0.5), Judit Polgar (3.5-1.5), top Frenchman Vachier-Lagrave (4.5-3.5), Dmitry Jakovenko (3.5-1.5), Sergey Karjakin (2.0-0.0), and, in the finals, Ruslan Ponomariov 7.0-5.0. Gelfand showed good form and opening preparation all throughout the competition -- he lost only one game, when he forgot just how dangerous an attacker Judit Polgar is: Polgar, Judit (2680) �� Gelfand, Boris (2758) [C24]World Cup Khanty-Mansiysk RUS (3.2), 28.11.2009 1.e4 e5 2.Bc4 (this is a must-win game so Polgar avoids the Petroff) 2...Nf6 3.d3 c6 4.Qe2 Be7 5.Nf3 0��“0 6.Bb3 [Not 6.Nxe5?? Qa5+] 6...d6 7.0��“0 Nbd7 8.c3 a5 9.a4 b5 10.Bc2 Ba6 11.axb5 cxb5 12.Nbd2 Qc7 13.d4 a4 14.Bd3 Rfb8 15.Nh4 g6 16.f4 exf4 17.Ndf3 Nh5 18.Bd2 Nb6 19.g4! fxg3 20.Ng5 Bxg5 21.Bxg5 Nc4 22.Nf5 f6 23.Bh4 gxh2+ 24.Qxh2 Rf8 25.Be2 gxf5 26.Bxh5 fxe4 27.Qf4 f5? [The only move to continue fighting is 27...Qe7!?] 28.Kh1! Kh8 29.Rg1 Rf7 30.Bxf7 Qxf7 31.Qh6 Rf8 32.Rg6 (Black has no defense to Bf6+) 1��0