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Day 5 - Woman Blitz Event |
The Women blitz event lasted 3 days and 30 games, but was only decided at the last second of play. Hou Yifan of China, and Valentina Gunina dominated the event, and it was soon clear they would take gold and silver. Like in the rapid event, where they also fought neck to neck, it again came down to the final round who would take the gold. And in a direct encounter even, as the drawing of lots have paired the to in what would turn out to be a final. Gunina needed to win the game in order to repeat her feat from the rapids and secure another gold medal, while for the World Champion, a draw would be enough for gold. Not Surprisingly Gunina choose an aggressive strategy:
Valentina Gunina Russia- Hou Yifan China
1.d4 e6 2.c4 Nf6 3.Nc3 Bb4 4.Qc2 0–0 5.Nf3 d5 6.cxd5 exd5 7.Bg5 h6 8.Bh4 c5 9.dxc5 Be6 10.e3 Bxc5 11.Be2 Nc6 12.0–0 Be7 13.Rfd1 Qa5 14.a3 Rfd8 15.b4 Qc7 16.Bg3 Qd7 17.e4!? The Russian has achieved a pleasant position, and now starts immediate complications. Maybe a quiet approach was better from an objective perspective, but going for gold, putting your opponent under maximum pressure makes alot of sense. 17...Rac8 18.Bb5 a6 19.Ne5
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Day 4 - Women Blitz Event |
Day 2 of the womens blitz event, saw the reigning world champion, Hou Yifan break away from the field of competitors, to take a dominating lead, a full 2 point ahead of her closest rivals. Despite still a teenager, she
will be 20 in February, Hou is a 3-time World Champion and today very much demonstrated why. After day 1
the tournament was lead by the gold medallist from the rapid tournament, Valentina Gunina, but in their direct encounter in round 15, the tables where turned:
Hou Yifan. China - Valentina Gunina. Russia
1.e4 c6 2.d4 d5 3.Nc3 dxe4 4.Nxe4 Bf5 5.Ng3 Bg6 6.h4 h6 7.Nf3 Nd7 8.h5 Bh7 9.Bd3 Bxd3 10.Qxd3 e6 11.Bd2 Ngf6 12.0–0–0 Be7 13.Kb1 0–0 14.Ne4 Nxe4 15.Qxe4 Nf6 16.Qe2 Qd5 17.Ne5 Rfd8 18.Rhe1 c5 19.c4 Qd6 20.g4 Quite extraordinarily the 2 players had excatly the same position in the rapid game, only 2 days before! Also there, they where fighthing for gold, and Gunina held the balance after 20...Nd7 21 Ba5 b6 22 Qf3 Bf6! With an equal position, but probably afraid of a Chinese deviation, she herself decides to deviate. 20...cxd4 21.g5 hxg5 22.Bxg5 Nd7 23.Nxf7!
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Day 2 of the mens blitz tournament, was a very dramatic day, where the lead constantly kept changing. Levon Aronian from Armenia led after day 1 with the convincing score of 8.5/10, but in round 13, fell to his closest rival Ian Nepomniachtchi of Russia:
 Aronian, playing the black pieces has sacrificed and exchange, and by frst sight it indeed looks like the then tournament leader, had created a dangerous attack, and was about to extend his lead, but the Russian uncorked the brilliant: 24Qc7!! Brilliant, yet simple. The white queen now attacks bot the knight on c5, and the bishop on f7, and the fork nets white a profit of an extra piece. Thus Aronian only chance was a desperate counterattack, but after: 24...Qa1+ 25 Kd2 Nfe4+ 26 Bxe4 Qxb2+ 27 Ke1 Nxe7 28 Qxf7 white is simply a full rook up, and Nepomniachtchi easily won the game, and thus took the lead! The Russian however could not hold onto to his newly gain lead, and Aronian managed to stage a comeback, again placing himself at the very top of the standing, beating Chinese Wang Hao in the following instructive technical fashion:
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Valentina Gunina from Russia and Levon Aronian from Armenia are leading the blitz tournament after day1.
Compare to rapid tournament it's more dynamic part of the event. Players have 3 minutes for the whole game plus increment of 2 seconds after every move.
It means that good opening preparation and intuition are really important, because there is no time to calculate very deep lines during the game. Usually better chances has who can put opponent under pressure, some positions are easy to evaluate in classical chess, but in blitz they might be still unclear. In blitz we can see more blunders which are rare in classical chess, but it's definitely more interesting for the spectators.
Playing system is also different: double round-robin, it means players are meeting each opponent twice, playing both colours.
In women section Valentina Gunina from Russia (gold in rapid tournament) is uncompromising, so far she didn't make any draw.
8 wins and only 2 lost games gives her a half point advantage on Anna Muzychuk.
Third place is held by Hou Yifan (silver in rapid).
Levon Aronian from Armenia won 8 games, lost only one and made one draw.
He is clearly leading with 1 point advantage. With 7,5 Ian Nepomiachtchi of Russia is on the second place. Third in the crosstable is Shakhriyar Mamedyarov from Azerbaijan (6,5).
It's to early to make any prognosis, there are still many rounds to go, but of course we can expect that leaders will try to keep their positions on the top.
After next two days we will know the medalists.
Lets take a look on most interesting games of today:
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WANG YUE EMERGES AS WINNER IN LAST ROUND!
After 7 rounds of the rapid chess tournament Wang Yue from China became the unexpected winner of the men section. He won his critical last game against Peter Leko who had been leading almost since the beginning of the event. Lets take a look what happened step by step:
The second day of the rapid chess event started with round 5 of the tournament. In the top game of the men's section, Peter Leko from Hungary won with black pieces against Wang Hao from China, and with this retained the 1st position in the crosstable.
After the opening black equalized in one of the well known lines in the Grunfeld Defence.
White decided to fight for a full point and sacrifice a piece in the middle game:
20.Nxe6 fxe6 21.Bxg6
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