Chess Club Black & White (CCBW)

Tuesday, June 5, 2012

Trailer of Chess Documentary on Magnus Carlsen - 'The Prince of Chess'

Tal Chess Memorial - the super-strong tournament - with world's No. 1 chess player Magnus Carlsen of Norway begins on June 7 in Moscow. We are reminded of a documentary made in 2005 titled 'Prince of Chess' by Norwegian director Oyvind Asbjornsen. Carlsen was, at that time, 13 years old and the world's youngest grandmaster. The Carlsen family had rented out their house to travel with Carlsen around the world to chess tournaments. The documentary also take up the chess motif in culture and politics. Magnus had said, in the documentary, that his dream was to be world chess champion and before 2020!

This trailer of the documentary on the chess wizard was uploaded to YouTube by razantra.

Valentina Gunina

Russian chess player Valentina Gunina has won the Women's World Blitz Chess Championship in Batumi, Georgia. On the second day of play, on Wednesday, she amassed a total of 13 points out of 15 rounds. Earlier, this year, Gunina had also won the European Women's Women's Blitz Chess Championship and the European Women's Championship in classical chess.

Second place went to Natalia Zhukova of Ukraine and third place went to Anna Muzychuk of Slovakia. Both tied for the second place with 10.5 points. Russia's Alexandra Kosteniuk was a trifle unlucky to miss out on the medals with her fourth place at 10 points. Kosteniuk had won the silver medal in the women's world rapid chess a day earlier. Bulgaria's Antoaneta Stefanova had to settle for the fifth place with 9.5 points. Stefanova had won the gold medal a day earlier in the rapid section.

Click here to read the complete post

Super Chess Radio Show The Full English Breakfast Episode 22

Give it to the British for fine humour and surreal chess... Now, you can add a must-listen chess radio show as well to the list.

Folks, if you are not listening to the Full English Breakfast, there's something seriously wrong with your chess diet! Episode number 22 speaks about how to check draws in world chess championship matches, Hikaru Nakamura interview soundbites from the US Chess Championship, and Viswanathan Anand press conference from the World Chess Championship 2012! Use the flash player below to hear the show, or head to The Full English Breakfast website. You can watch a previous B&W post for the full video interview with Hikaru Nakamura conducted by Jennifer Shahade.

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Don't go to sleep tonight without listening to The Full English Breakfast Chess Radio Show number 22.

Misha - Mikhai Tal

It's time to play strong chess in Moscow all over again from June 7 at the Mikhail Tal Chess Memorial beginning with - hold your breath - Magnus Carlsen, Hikaru Nakamura, Vladimir Kramnik, Levon Aronian, Teimour Radjabov, Alexander Morozevich, Fabiano Caruana, Alexander Grischuk, Evgeny Tomashevsky and Luke McShane.

The opening ceremony will be held on 7th June, at 18.00, in the playing venue at Pashkov House, st. Vozdvizhenka 3/5.

The Tal Chess Memorial is the first super chess event of the year after the recently concluded Anand-Gelfand World Chess Championship. It is also a major tournament before the upcoming Candidates Chess Tournament that would decide the next challenger for the reigning World Chess Champion Vishy Anand.

The organisers are going to try a unique plan to decide the drawing of lots. All the players will take part in a blitz chess tournament - with a separate prize fund - for deciding the starting seeding for the main tournament based on the blitz chess results.

Magnus Carlsen and Levon Aronian were the joint winners of the 2011 Tal Chess Memorial. Both had earned 5.5/9 points, but Magnus Carlsen had won the chess trophy on better tiebreak.

Mikhail Tal was a Russian-Latvian chess grandmaster and the Mikhail Tal playing style was all about creativity, attacking, and daring combination play. Mikhail Tal - often known as Misha - was the eighth world chess champion.

World Chess Rapid Winners Stefanova, Kosteniuk, Koneru Press Conference Video

Former women's world chess champion Antoaneta Stefanova has just won the Women's World Rapid Chess Championship in Batumi, Georgia. Another former women's world chess champion Alexandra Kosteniuk won the silver medal. India's best woman chess player ever Koneru Humpy won the bronze. Here is the press conference video of the three super women chess players.

The women's world chess championship in blitz has also begun at Batumi. You can watch the second day's play live at the official website from India time 4.30 pm.

Efim Geller - Chess before
computer prep!

Legendary World Chess Champion Gary Kasparov has been following chess keenly even after his retirement from the sport. In an interesting comment on the recently-concluded Anand-Gelfand World Chess Championship 2012, Kasparov referred to his own game played in 1979 against Efim Geller in the Russian National Chess Championship. You can read about Gary Kasparov's comments on the recently-concluded World Chess Match at Crestbook. But, before you surf away, here are both the games: the second Anand-Gelfand tiebreak and the Geller-Kasparov chess game from 1979. You can replay the games in our flash chess game player. (Note by blog admin: Post-mortem of chess games played is a done thing in the chess world and not a criticism of the players themselves.)

Efim Geller-Gary Kasparov, 1979, 1/2-1/2

Viswanathan Anand-Boris Gelfand,
World Chess Match Tiebreak Game 2, 1-0

Isn't chess amazing... like bridging time and universes, like navigating through dimensions... and returning to oneself over and over again, to the same moments mirroring back to us, on the chess board and in life?