Status quo in Dortmund

Vladimir Kramnik (Georgios Souleidis, official site)
Three fighting draws have left the standings as they were, after the sixth round of the 'Sparkassan Dortmund Chess Meeting'. Vladimir Kramnik still has a 1½ point lead, but now there are only four rounds to go.

In the crunch game, Ruslan Ponomariov and Vladimir Kramnik indulged in a sharp struggle. Ponomariov refused to enter the main lines of the Berlin and, after provoking Kramnik to advance on the kingside, the game sharpened up. Ponomariov managed to steal a pawn on the queenside while Kramnik continued to push on the other wing. The Russian won back his pawn, but this led to a drawn endgame.

In Hikaru Nakamura-Anish Giri,a classical line of the Nimzoindian led to White having 'hanging pawns' in the centre, a structure that is often difficult to judge. Giri broke these up but in the blood-letting that followed Nakamura managed to win a pawn. However, he was unable to win the three versus two on the same wing with bishop against Giri's excellent defensive knight.

In Le Quang Liem versus Georg Meier the centre opened with a tactical flourish and Meier declined to exchange queens, as he had the safer king. The Vietnamese No.1 was able to consolidate and drawish simplification ensued.

Round 6 summary:

White Rating Result Black Rating Moves Openings details
Le Quang Liem 2715 ½-½  Georg Meier  2656 38 Slav (by transposition)
Ruslan Ponomariov 2764 ½-½  Vladimir Kramnik 2781 50 Spanish 4.d3
Hikaru Nakamura 2770 ½-½ Anish Giri 2701 72 Nimzoindian 4.e3

The standings after the sixth round:

Rank Name Country Rating Kw Kb Lw Lb Pw Pb Gw Gb Nw Nb Mw Mb Points
1 Vladimir Kramnik RUS 2781 * * ½ . 1 ½ 1 . . 1 . 1 5
2 Le Quang Liem VIE 2715  . ½ * 1 . . ½ ½  . ½  ½ 
3 Ruslan Ponomariov UKR 2764 ½  0 . 0 * 1 . . 1 ½ .
4 Anish Giri NED 2701 . 0 ½ . . 0 * * ½ ½  1 . 2½ 
5 Hikaru Nakamura   USA 2770 0 . . ½  0 ½  ½  * * . ½ 
6 Georg Meier GER 2656 0 . ½  ½  . ½ . 0 ½ . * * 2

Schedule:

July 21st to 25th:  Rounds 1 to 5

July 26th: Rest day

July 27th to 30th: Rounds 6 to 9

July 31st: Round 10

The first nine rounds begin at 3pm local time (3pm Paris, 2pm London, 9am New York).

The final round will be two hours earlier.

The time limit is 100 minutes for 40 moves, then 50 in 20, and finally 15 minutes for the remainder of the game. The players also receive an increment of 30 seconds per move.

Official site:  http://www.sparkassen-chess-meeting.de/2011 

Live games: http://schachtage.dokomserver.de/toma/live.htm 

The transmission is with a 30 minute delay in order to avoid any possibility of 'external influences affecting the players decisions'.


Published on , Updated on

React to this article

Top of page ▲
All the members having a valid membership (out of trying period) can comment the articles. Let's subscribe !

Reactions (0)

  • No reaction for the moment