Anand has visited Moscow not vainly! His training there enabled the Indian grandmaster to show his best sporting form in the world championship in rapid chess.
Anand is distinguished by his ability to obtain a necessary result. He behaved rather modestly in the preliminary tournament. Svidler and Grischuk set the mood in B group, while Polgar and Anand finished only half a point ahead of Shirov and Leko, which inevitably gave a ground for useless contemplation on the theme 'what if'. For example, if Leko had better defended from checks…

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Game commented by IM M. Notkin

The chess players celebrated the 300 jubilee of the Russian northern capitol twice - the first time, in spring, at the match Moscow - Saint Petersburg, and the second time at the Russian Cup tournament, Swiss 9 rounds.

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Game commented by IM N. Vlassov

It was my first time in Netherlands. Hoogeveen is rather a tiny town, few thousands inhabitants. I liked the tournament very much mainly because its organizers created domestic environment. All 66 participants were surrounded by care and attention. The composition was rather strong, with 10 grandmasters in the tournament. We played in the central hall of the town. The time control was 2 hours per 40 moves and 1 hour for the rest of the game. The main tournament was played in the same hall behind the glass fence. Its participants went out frequently to watch our games. They played interestingly behind the fence but sometimes 'strange' moves happened there. In a separated premise yet another tournament has been held, the open event.

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Games commented by GM E. Inarkiev

GM A.Khalifman' interview
Q: Were you sure of an easy victory?
A: Of course, our team was superior to other ones in its composition, and we had no other task. However, the schedule of the competition was not especially opportune and many our players were exhausted. Nevertheless, our superiority in class showed itself for yet another time - we did not have any doubts in outcome for a single moment. We had only one critical match, the one against the Israeli team in round 5, which decided it all. Generally, we won the competition thanks to our obvious superiority. The team's moral, of course, was of a great importance, resulting from perfect personal relationships between the Russian grandmasters.

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Game commented by IM N. Vlassov

From California, I went to Buenos Aires to take part in the continental championship (1st prize -$11000, 11 rounds). It was a kind of revelation for me that a flight to Argentine from New York took more time than one to Moscow (11 hours against 9).

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24.10.2003 Game commented by GM A. Shabalov
16.10.2003 Games commented by GM A. Shabalov
09.10.2003 Annotated Games

76 players participated in the main tournament. I scored 3 points in the first 3 rounds. Then was a draw in the game against GM Shchekachev and a subsequent win in round 5; those allowed me to take a lead together with the German GM Hertneck. I failed to put a decent resistance in our game and, having scored 4.5 out of 6, proceeded in my usual manner.
12-year old FIDE master Magnus Carlsen attracted everybody's attention. In round 5 Krivosheya had to play against him. In the recent time Carlen beats any non-GM he encounters! Krivosheya was not an exception - he tried to entangle complicated play, which resulted in his time trouble and lost. Then my turn came…

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Game commented by IM Y. Zimmerman

The composition of the NAO team was uniform this year. Grischuk played on board 1 and I played on board 2, like we did the last year. The French players Lautier, Bacrot and Fressinet also participated this year. Nataf and Hauchard, however, were replaced - the former by Adams on board 3 and the latter by Vallejo on board 5.

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Games commented by IM N. Vlassov

Gary Kasparov's participation has arisen especial interest. After a prolonged break, the XIII world champion played with a great enthusiasm. His opponents seemed to be doomed to Zurab Azmaiparashvili's fate in a demonstration match, which took place few days before the Cup.
Top seeds NAO Chess Club eventually emerged as the winners (Grischuk, Svidler, Adams, Lautier, Vallejo, Bacrot and Fressinet)

Games commented by IM N. Vlassov

Annotated Game

1-2. Svidler, Morozevich - 7(9);
3-10. Malakhov, Dvoirys, Zviagintsev, Motylev, Grischuk, Khalifman, Volkov, Naer - 6;
11-19. Jakovenko, Yakovich, Kharlov, Tseshkovsky, Alekseev, Sakaev, Bocharov, Glek, Sorokin - 5.5;
20-37. Shipov, Belozerov, Timofeev, Korneev, Innarkiev, Ulibin, Bezgodov, Popov, Scherbakov, Rublevsky, Tregubov, Gleizerov, Epishin, Evseev, Tiviakov, Kiriakov, Lastin, Dolmatov - 5.

New Russia Champion - Petr Svidler

Games commented by IM M. Notkin

We are glad to inform you of the New Products release:

Europe: Eur 14,95 Worldwide: $14,95

"Manual of Chess Endings", GM Sarhan Guliev The novelty of the present book is that it only examines exact position. Such positions form the skeleton of all works on the endgame already published, but not one of these authors is able to resist the temptation to proceed further, from the simple to the complicated. And they deal with problematic positions, where what is required of a player is not only exact knowledge, but also stamina, fighting, spirit, will–to–win and so on. Thus you have here a collection of the 600 most standart (exact) endgame positions. more

Europe: Eur 39,95 Worldwide: $39,95

Canvas Chess Posters. Canvas in frame. 18 X 24 cm. Perfect modern design by Veronica Kasatkina. Framed works on canvas fit one's house or an office excellently. 12 pictures are available to suffice any possible taste. more

About 100 000 new games played in the period January - October to be downloaded for free.

We are glad to inform you of the other two programs release: Comprehensive Chess Endings (a packet includes a CD, a printed manual and a box) and Nalimov on DVD, Complete Tablebases, all 3-4-5 pieces (a packet includes a double DVD of 9Gb).