Chess Weekly

The ‘advanced chess’ has been attracting attention to Leon and yet the organizers decided to try something completely new. This year they organized a knock-out tournament between four grandmasters in the ‘usual’ rapid chess with a time control 20 minutes per game plus additional 10 seconds per move. Veselin Topalov and Sergei Kariakin composed the first semi-final pair, Ruslan Ponomariov and Farancisco Vallejo composed the second one. The result of the first match was mainly defined by Kariakin’s severe blunder in the starting game. The young Ukrainian also lost game 2 but recouped in game 3. Afterwards he tried hardly to win the last game for 85 moves playing an absolutely equal bishops ending. However all he obtained was an extra pawn and the match ended 2.5-1.5. Topalov qualified for the final.
For the FIDE world champion, the tournament in Leon should have been a general rehearsal for his match against Kasparov which is delayed until September. Ruslan was in the best sporting form in June as he stated in the press conference in Kiev. His victory over Vallejo with a score 3.5-0.5 confirms his words. However, Ponomariov himself considered the final position from game 1, where his opponent decided to fix the draw by the move repetition, to be rather suspicious.