2009 World Cup

Judit Polgar tied her R 3 match with Boris Gelfand so tomorrow they go to play-offs. Good luck JP! Meanwhile, young phenom Wesley So knocked out America's last hope by drawing with GM Gata Kamsky (winner of the 2007 World Cup) today in game 2, thus moving on to R 4 with a score of 1.5/0.5 against Kamsky. WOW! So is 16; Carlsen is 18; Ray Robson, a very promising young American player, is 14. Robson will be playing in the 2010 Corus "C" Group - a great invitation and opportunity for Robson to once again shine on the international stage. What he needs is sustained financial sponsorship so he can afford coaches and not have to worry about money for travelling to overseas tournaments. I just don't get that an American company cannot see what a marketing opportunity he represents! He's a teenager, nice looking (the teenyboppers would like him, I think), he's not geeky, and he's a chess prodigy. What's not to like marketing wise? There are a lot of products he could represent - Pepsi, Coke, how about Gatorade switching up and doing a series of commercials on the "sports of the intellect?" How about this for a commercial - screen shot of hundreds of screaming girls (like in the old days with the Beatles), panning out and the crowd expands to thousands! They all chanting something - the mike moves in - they're chanting go Ray go, go Ray go! A police motorcade pulls up before a huge stadium, also packed with screaming fans! A limo pulls out to mid-field. A hush falls upon the massive crowd. And then, the door opens and out steps Ray Robson! The crowd goes wild as Ray coolly walks to the playing platform, climbs the stairs, and takes his place. Sitting there waiting impatient, legs crossed and jiggling in his seat, is none other than [here insert current pop star icon]. Ray sits down, adjusts his cuffs and stares calmly across the chess board. "Your move" he says. Hey, maybe I missed my calling :)

World Cup

GM Judit Polgar is the only female player left. Check out this interview with JP at Chessdom. Meanwhile, GM Gata Kamsky is the only American player left in the field. In Round 3, he will be facing GM Wesley So, who knocked GM Vassily Ivanchuk out in Round 2. Ivanchuk was so upset by his play that he announced his retirement from professional chess. Let us hope he reconsiders once he calms down. Ivanchuk is 100% emotionally invested in chess, I cannot imagine him no longer playing in the top events when he still holds his own and can even dominate in the "super" tournaments. Hmmmm, I just read at Susan Polgar's blog that So, playing black, just defeated Kamsky in Game 1 of R3! Oh oh! Ah - I just checked at Chessdom - they have live coverage of the game, gameboard you can play through and written analysis.

2009 Chess World Cup

Round 1 of the World Cup has been completed. Here are the results for the players I am following: GM Alexandra Kosteniuk (RUS 2517) - didn't make it into the next round. She lost both of her games playing GM Shakriyar Mamedyarov (AZE 2719). GM Hou Yifan (CHN 2588) and GM Arkadij Naiditsch (GER 2689) are going to play-off after drawing both Round 1 games. I understand that GM Judit Polgar's match didn't take place because the player did not make it (for whatever reason - I haven't checked to see what the latest news is on that). So JP goes through automatically to Round 2. American players: Tomashevsky, Evgeny (RUS 2708) 1.5 / Ivanov, Alexander (USA 2539) 0.5 Friedel, Joshua E (USA 2551) 0.0 / Wang, Hao (CHN 2708) 2.0 Jobava, Baadur (GEO 2696) 1.5 / Robson, Ray (USA 2567) 0.5 Hess, Robert L (USA 2572) 0.5 /Motylev, Alexander (RUS 2695) 1.5 Kamsky, Gata (USA 2695) 1.5 / Antonio, Rogelio Jr (PHI 2574) 0.5 Onischuk, Alexander (USA 2672) 1.5 / Flores, Diego (ARG 2602) 0.5 - Onischuk to R2 Smirin, Ilia (ISR 2662) 1.5 / Ehlvest, Jaan (USA 2606) 0.5 Shabalov, Alexander (USA 2606) 1.0 /Baklan, Vladimir (UKR 2655) 1.0 - going to play-off Savchenko, Boris (RUS 2644) 1.0 /Shulman, Yuri (USA 2623) 1.0 - going to play-off Akobian, Varuzhan (USA 2624) 1.0 /Tregubov, Pavel V. (RUS 2642) 1.0 - going to play-off