2012 U.S. Championships News
By FM Mike Klein
Dramatic finishes punctuated an unpredictable day at the 2012 U.S. Championship and U.S. Women's Championship. When the final pawn was captured, a 101-move game ended in king versus king. In both events a pair of trailing players caught up to the leaders.
IM Anna Zatonskih got the better of WIM Iryna Zenyuk in a bishop-and-pawn endgame. With weaknesses on both sides of the board, Zatonskih had no trouble infiltrating and clearing a path for her pawns.
Entering the day behind by one-half point, the win nearly gave Zatonskih sole possession of the lead, as tournament leader IM Irina Krush got all she could handle from IM Rusudan Goletiani. In an atypical affair where Krush's king voluntarily moved to f1 and Goletiani's knights occupied f8 and h8, both players thought they were better. “Once the knights come out, my advantage is not permanent,” Krush said. Krush was caught off guard by the sacrifice 35...Nxf3. Afterward, she expected the immediate material equalization 36...e4, but instead the initiative-minded Goletiani preferred to step up the pressure by making a battery on the f-file. Krush survived the onslaught largely by ignoring it. Her counterattack was just enough to force a repetition of position.
The top two rated women will face off tomorrow. In what has become their usual yearly battle, they enter the game tied for first with 4.5/6. Neither woman has lost a game. “Good thing I didn't ruin everything today,” Krush said. “It was sharp; anything could have happened.”
The story repeated in the U.S. Championship, where tournament front-runner GM Hikaru Nakamura tried everything he could but could only draw against GM Yury Shulman. This allowed defending champion GM Gata Kamsky to catch up, as he was able to overcome the blockade of GM Alex Stripunsky.
Nakamura and Shulman played the longest game of the tournament. After five and a half hours and 101 moves, they were down to just their kings. After fruitlessly trying for more than 60 moves to win with an extra kingside pawn, Nakamura looked across the room for much of the final moves, seemingly chastising himself for missed opportunities. Shulman guessed that he was unhappy the minor pieces were allowed to be traded after 77...Be6+. Thanks to the zwischenzug 78...Re5+, Shulman entered an easily drawing rook-and-pawn endgame. Still, he insisted that the ending is drawn even without the “petite combinaison.” Nakamura has still never defeated Shulman in a tournament game.
Shulman's staunch defense, coupled with the tenacity of Kamsky to find a way to clear the path for his hanging pawns, means Nakamura and Kamsky are now equal first with 5/7. They will not meet until Friday's penultimate round ten.
Stripunsky and Kamsky had drawn many previous games, but today Kamsky won for the first time ever in classical chess, though he had won a rapid game in 2006. After a lot of circular movement, Kamsky made the time control and got his c- and d-pawns moving. In the final position, he had promoted a second queen, with one more on the way.
The most entertaining game of the day was unequivocally GM Alejandro Ramirez against GM Gregory Kaidanov. After a stunning victory, Ramirez was still trying to collect himself and figure out what happened. “This game was crazy,” he said. With arrows and variations strewn haphazardly all over the computer screen in the commentary room, Ramirez offered what he knew about the game, and what he was still sorting out. “I was just trying to get to the time control alive,” he said. “This was psychologically very difficult for me because I went from winning to really struggling. We had like two minutes left. We didn't know what we were doing.”
With both kings in danger, the underdeveloped Kaidanov found the subtle defense of retreating his one developed piece on move 32. “...Rg8! Wow! That was quite a move,” Ramirez said. The point was that the rook on a8 cannot be captured due to 33...Qe3+ 34. Kh1 (34. Rf2 Rf8) 34...Qg3 35. Rg1 (35. Bh3 Rxa8) 35...Qxh4#. In all variations, the wandering white queen is suddenly out of bounds. But after the time scramble resourcefulness, Kaidanov placed his king on the light square e4 and fell victim to an advancing a-pawn. Scrambling to get his rook back again, this time he was met with a skewer on the long diagonal. Ramirez was shocked at the turn of events, which saw him go from groveling for a draw to simply winning. After starting with two wins and two draws and sharing the early lead, Kaidanov has lost his last three.
Chasing Kamsky and Nakamura with 4/7 are Shulman and GMs Alex Lenderman and Alex Onischuk, who also drew today. Onischuk received one of the biggest surprises of the tournament when his former student, GM Ray Robson, uncorked the implausible Belgrade Gambit. Onischuk played the only move he knew against it, 5...Be7. He admitted that his theoretical knowledge ended there, as his position was super solid. “The position was equal all the time, but he still tried to torture me,” Onischuk said. Asked if he would now learn more about the opening, he continued, “If I play against some 2300-player, I'll have to come up with something else.”
Lenderman kept his unbeaten streak alive by holding the draw in mixed battle against GM Yasser Seirawan. “It was one of the strangest games I ever played,” Lenderman said. “It was unclear all the time. I thought I was better with initiative or attack, but after a turn of events, I was in a precarious endgame. But then without an obvious mistake from him, I was playing for a win.” Seirawan guessed that he should have made better use of his kingside pawn phalanx. After losing his first three games, Seirawan, a four-time champion, has now won 2.5 out of his last four.
GM Varuzhan Akobian again jettisoned his favorite French Defense but used the Caro-Kann to eventually win a knight-and-pawn ending against GM Robert Hess.
FM Alisa Melekhina won her second game in a row to earn a plus score. She sits on 3.5/6 after winning against the luckless WGM Camilla Baginskaite. Melekhina already has more than twice the number of points she earned in seven rounds last year. “I didn't expect Alisa to play so aggressively with such theoretical stuff,” Baginskaite said afterward. Melekhina repeated her Moscow System that she previously used against Krush, but this time she offered her two center pawns to open the game quickly. “I'm not sure it's objectively the best thing to do, but practically it is,” Melekhina said of her bellicosity. The fork 24. Qf3 pressured her opponent sufficiently to make a catastrophic error, dropping a knight. “I didn't want to get so hopeful because the other day against Alena Kats I was up the exchange and four pawns and she fought back so hard.”
In other women's games, WGM Tatev Abrahamyan bravely walked her king up the board in beating WGM Sabina Foisor.
WIM Viktorija Ni got back to an even score by using her extra rook to eventually overpower WFM Alena Kats's bishop.
Round eight for the U.S. Championship and round seven for the U.S. Women's Championship will begin tomorrow at 1 p.m. Central, 2 p.m. Eastern. Come visit the Chess Club and Scholastic Center of Saint Louis or tune in to www.uschesschamps.org for live commentary from WGM Jennifer Shahade and the club's GM-in-Residence Ben Finegold.
By FM Mike Klein
SAINT LOUIS, May 13, 2012 -- Round six of the U.S. Championships maintained the stasis – the top three rated players still sit one, two, three with a couple of other solid players lurking. In the U.S. Women's Championship, a familiar face grabbed sole possession of the lead.
GM Hikaru Nakamura traded his light-squared bishop early, but compensated by forming a wedge of center pawns to blunt GM Varuzhan Akobian's king's bishop. Opening the position for the bishop pair meant Akobian had to give back the bishop, and the resulting endgame had too symmetrical of a pawn structure to produce any winning chances. The draw continued Nakamura's pattern so far, as he has alternated winning and drawing through the first six games (he has won all three times as white and drawn all three as black).
Nakamura said he was satisfied with the result. He called the ailment that began last round “just a temporary thing ... I feel fine today. I'm still a little bit sick.” He felt well enough to joke, “I'm on drugs, so everything is OK.” Nakamura has tried to win all of his games, even as black, and said he should have one more point than he does now, as he was better in rounds two and four. Though his live rating is at an all-time high and cresting 2780, Nakamura dismissed the idea that those thoughts entered into his decision making. “I had to trade queens,” he said. “If I don't, it is really dangerous. The rating will come. If I was focusing on rating, I probably would've done something suicidal.”
GM Gata Kamsky began the day one-half point back, but never entertained any winning prospects against longtime U.S. Championship nemesis GM Yury Shulman. The two have played in the finals in each of the past two events. Shulman won a pawn, but as the game gradually lost its life, he did not obtain a winning rook-and-pawn endgame. “The position I reached in the game, I don't have any chances,” Shulman said. Kamsky agreed with Nakamura's estimation that the winner of the tournament would need eight points. Nakamura currently has 4.5/6 and Kamsky 4/6.
Besides Nakamura, the only other competitors that have yet to lose a game remain Shulman and GM Alex Lenderman. Along with GM Alex Onischuk, the trio sit in a tie for third with 3.5/6. Lenderman nearly equaled Kamsky's score as his Caro-Kann netted him an advantageous knight against a mostly impotent bishop, but the resurgent GM Alex Stripunsky held the balance.
Crowd-favorite GM Gregory Kaidanov fell back to an even score with his second loss in a row. “After two long games against Gata and Hikaru, I felt very tired today,” he said about his loss against GM Robert Hess. Kaidanov was surprised by Hess's opening choice, and forced into a deviation due to a curious incident. After nine moves, his game was exactly like Onischuk's battle with GM Alejandro Ramirez. Onischuk played 10. e4, and Kaidanov felt forced to play a different line. “It would look like we are just copying each other's games,” he explained. “We try to prevent cheating in many different kinds of ways, but we can't prevent that.” He said copying another player's moves willfully is “kind of like cheating” and while not expressly prohibited, the veteran decided he needed to play a new variation. Hess found a way to trade his queen for three of Kaidanov's active minor pieces, then unearthed a nifty queen trap based on various forks and discovered attacks.
In other round six action, GM Yasser Seirawan defeated GM Ray Robson to get to 2/6.
The logjam in the U.S. Women's Championship is no longer, thanks to the efforts of IM Irina Krush, who bested WGM Tatev Abrahamyan today. Krush played the g3 system versus her opponent's King's Indian Defense. “It's hard to prepare for it if I've never played it before,” Krush said of her opening choice. Indeed, at the post-game press conference, a despondent Abrahamyan said she did not expect the treatment at all. The win moved Krush to 4/5 and sole possession of first.
The two competitors who began the day tied with her could not keep pace. IM Anna Zatonskih could only draw WIM Viktorija Ni in a melee, while overperforming WIM Iryna Zenyuk suffered her first setback at the hands of IM Rusudan Goletiani. Zatonskih is now at 3.5/5 while Zenyuk remains at 3/5, tied with Goletiani, who has five decisive results in all five games.
WGM Camilla Baginskaite got on the board with her first draw, while FM Alisa Melekhina earned her first win and an even score with the cunning simplification beginning with 51...Rxf5. Despite her overwhelming position and material advantage, IM Marc Arnold said this was the only way to convert the full point. Her opponent, WFM Alena Kats had no choice but to enter a losing king-and-pawn endgame, so she resigned.
The players from both events will enjoy a rest day on Monday. Round seven for the U.S. Championship and round six for the U.S. Women's Championship begins Tuesday, May 15, at 1 p.m. Central, 2 p.m. Eastern. Tune in to www.uschesschamps.com for live commentary from WGM Jennifer Shahade and GM Ben Finegold.
By FM Mike Klein
SAINT LOUIS, May 13, 2012 -- Round six of the U.S. Championships maintained the stasis – the top three rated players still sit one, two, three with a couple of other solid players lurking. In the U.S. Women's Championship, a familiar face grabbed sole possession of the lead.
GM Hikaru Nakamura traded his light-squared bishop early, but compensated by forming a wedge of center pawns to blunt GM Varuzhan Akobian's king's bishop. Opening the position for the bishop pair meant Akobian had to give back the bishop, and the resulting endgame had too symmetrical of a pawn structure to produce any winning chances. The draw continued Nakamura's pattern so far, as he has alternated winning and drawing through the first six games (he has won all three times as white and drawn all three as black).
Nakamura said he was satisfied with the result. He called the ailment that began last round “just a temporary thing ... I feel fine today. I'm still a little bit sick.” He felt well enough to joke, “I'm on drugs, so everything is OK.” Nakamura has tried to win all of his games, even as black, and said he should have one more point than he does now, as he was better in rounds two and four. Though his live rating is at an all-time high and cresting 2780, Nakamura dismissed the idea that those thoughts entered into his decision making. “I had to trade queens,” he said. “If I don't, it is really dangerous. The rating will come. If I was focusing on rating, I probably would've done something suicidal.”
GM Gata Kamsky began the day one-half point back, but never entertained any winning prospects against longtime U.S. Championship nemesis GM Yury Shulman. The two have played in the finals in each of the past two events. Shulman won a pawn, but as the game gradually lost its life, he did not obtain a winning rook-and-pawn endgame. “The position I reached in the game, I don't have any chances,” Shulman said. Kamsky agreed with Nakamura's estimation that the winner of the tournament would need eight points. Nakamura currently has 4.5/6 and Kamsky 4/6.
Besides Nakamura, the only other competitors that have yet to lose a game remain Shulman and GM Alex Lenderman. Along with GM Alex Onischuk, the trio sit in a tie for third with 3.5/6. Lenderman nearly equaled Kamsky's score as his Caro-Kann netted him an advantageous knight against a mostly impotent bishop, but the resurgent GM Alex Stripunsky held the balance.
Crowd-favorite GM Gregory Kaidanov fell back to an even score with his second loss in a row. “After two long games against Gata and Hikaru, I felt very tired today,” he said about his loss against GM Robert Hess. Kaidanov was surprised by Hess's opening choice, and forced into a deviation due to a curious incident. After nine moves, his game was exactly like Onischuk's battle with GM Alejandro Ramirez. Onischuk played 10. e4, and Kaidanov felt forced to play a different line. “It would look like we are just copying each other's games,” he explained. “We try to prevent cheating in many different kinds of ways, but we can't prevent that.” He said copying another player's moves willfully is “kind of like cheating” and while not expressly prohibited, the veteran decided he needed to play a new variation. Hess found a way to trade his queen for three of Kaidanov's active minor pieces, then unearthed a nifty queen trap based on various forks and discovered attacks.
In other round six action, GM Yasser Seirawan defeated GM Ray Robson to get to 2/6.
The logjam in the U.S. Women's Championship is no longer, thanks to the efforts of IM Irina Krush, who bested WGM Tatev Abrahamyan today. Krush played the g3 system versus her opponent's King's Indian Defense. “It's hard to prepare for it if I've never played it before,” Krush said of her opening choice. Indeed, at the post-game press conference, a despondent Abrahamyan said she did not expect the treatment at all. The win moved Krush to 4/5 and sole possession of first.
The two competitors who began the day tied with her could not keep pace. IM Anna Zatonskih could only draw WIM Viktorija Ni in a melee, while overperforming WIM Iryna Zenyuk suffered her first setback at the hands of IM Rusudan Goletiani. Zatonskih is now at 3.5/5 while Zenyuk remains at 3/5, tied with Goletiani, who has five decisive results in all five games.
WGM Camilla Baginskaite got on the board with her first draw, while FM Alisa Melekhina earned her first win and an even score with the cunning simplification beginning with 51...Rxf5. Despite her overwhelming position and material advantage, IM Marc Arnold said this was the only way to convert the full point. Her opponent, WFM Alena Kats had no choice but to enter a losing king-and-pawn endgame, so she resigned.
The players from both events will enjoy a rest day on Monday. Round seven for the U.S. Championship and round six for the U.S. Women's Championship begins Tuesday, May 15, at 1 p.m. Central, 2 p.m. Eastern. Tune in to www.uschesschamps.com for live commentary from WGM Jennifer Shahade and GM Ben Finegold.
By FM Mike Klein
For the first time in the 2012 U.S. Championship, one player rests atop the leaderboard. With his win today in round five over co-leader GM Gregory Kaidanov, local GM Hikaru Nakamura took control of the tournament. With three wins and two draws, his four points are one-half point ahead of defending champion GM Gata Kamsky, who bounced back by also winning today. However, since the two top seeds have yet to play, both still control their own destiny.
Nakamura reverted to his more usual 1. d4 today, reversing his trend of advancing his king's pawn, which he had done to surprise opponents in rounds one and three. Kaidanov played a Catalan system, but Nakamura offered a temporary pawn deficit to activate his pieces. After Nakamura regained the material, Kaidanov's pieces could only entrench themselves and wait for the breakthrough. That came in the form of the improbable 61. f5 and subsequent king invasion. Kaidanov's rook and bishop moved listlessly back and forth while his opponent's monarch played checkers on the dark squares, taking the scenic route from g5 to h6 to g7 to f8 to e7. Kaidanov conceded defeat and now sits in a four-way tie for third, and will need some help to win his first-ever U.S. Championship.
Kamsky, whose 51-game U.S. Championship unbeaten streak ended yesterday, began a new one today by winning in a fashion that echoed Nakamura's victory. GM Varuzhan Akobian eschewed his nearly-automatic French Defense and played the cramped-but-solid Berlin Defense, known for forming a nearly impenetrable wall. But it was only a matter of time before Akobian's defenses collapsed, as Kamsky's knights finally penetrated his position, capping off the offensive with the devastating 31. Nf6+. Getting low on time (Akobian was down to two seconds several times), Akobian could not hold off the attack.
Third-seeded GM Alex Onischuk got back into the mix by winning a topsy-turvy game against GM Robert Hess. The Yale freshman did not control his knights as well as Kamsky. Hess's initiative began to subside after 22. Nfd4, which he called the wrong knight. Onischuk rallied for an attack on the castled king, and offered two minor pieces for a rook to prise open Hess's position. Still, it would not have been enough if Hess had played 29. Kf1, since after 29...Rxe4 30. Ne7+ Kh8 31. Ng6+ seals the win for white. “With knights, you always have to be careful,” Onischuk said. Instead, Hess made the practical decision to bring his queen backward into the defense, but Onischuk's rook eventually found daylight and a route to pay dirt – the second-rank. Onischuk played Pac-Man with Hess's queenside pawns, forcing him to resign.
Joining Kaidanov and Onischuk on 3/5 and a tie for third place are GMs Alex Lenderman and Yury Shulman, who played an uneventful draw versus each other. Both have won once and drawn four times at the event.
A pair of slow starters won in round five to get back to even scores. GM Alex Stripunsky reverse-engineered his rook back to the first rank to win GM Yasser Seirawan's bishop. After losing his first two games, Stripunsky has 2.5 out of the last three.
Joining Stripunsky was GM Ray Robson, who had a very promising middlegame according to Onischuk. With a light-squared attack on GM Alejandro Ramirez's king, he allowed the pressure to dissolve, only to later win a tricky rook-and-pawn endgame.
While the U.S. Championship took on a betting favorite, the U.S. Women's Championship did not break the three-player deadlock. IM Irina Krush, IM Anna Zatonskih and WIM Iryna Zenyuk are all still tied for first place with 3/4.
Zenyuk and Krush, who are good friends, could not commiserate much during yesterday's off day since they played today. Whereas Krush said earlier in the tournament that she would be careful not to use up valuable energy by preparing too much, Zenyuk said she spent seven hours studying for Krush yesterday. Still, that would not be enough to predict everything.
“Irina (Krush) surprised me with her opening choice,” Zenyuk said. The game, a Semi-Slav Defense, ended in a draw by agreement on move 30 when Zenyuk repulsed Krush's rook invasion. “We didn't see any fireworks today,” Krush said. “At last year's championship, I was just lost out of the opening,” Zenyuk said of their past encounter. “Someone like Irina is really good at openings. I really believe that. I was really scared.” Zenyuk continues her best championship ever, currently fashioning a 2500+ performance rating, nearly 300 points above her actual rating. “I feel more pressure, definitely. But I don't think I'm going to change much.”
Zatonskih kept pace, but for the second game in a row, she entered a deep think early in the game. Facing FM Alisa Melekhina's commonplace Sicilian Alapin, the defending champ could not decide between 6...Qxc5 or 6...Qxd1+. After 30 minutes, she chose the former, explaining that she wanted to keep pieces on the board for better chances of fighting chess. But Melekhina got the queens off the board anyway, obtaining a small but stable advantage of the queenside pawn majority. “She plays [the Alapin] also; it's tough to play against your own openings,” Melekhina said. “My position was so dangerous,” Zatonskih said. Melekhina pressed but settled for a draw by repetition in a double-rook endgame, as she feared the swift advance of her opponent's passed f-pawn. She expressed frustration at not being able to convert the full point. “Every time I thought I would gain a meaningful advantage, she found a simplifying continuation,” Melekhina said. “It's not just this game. In general I need to start winning.”
All three other games in the women's championship ended with white wins. WGMs Sabina Foisor and Tatev Abrahamyan both got a point to come within a half-point of the leaders. They beat WFM Alena Kats and WGM Camilla Baginskaite, respectively. Baginskaite is still without any points.
WIM Viktorija Ni fought off infant-induced sleep deprivation to win her first-ever game at the championship, over IM Rusudan Goletiani, who has begun the tournament win-loss-win-loss.
Round six for the U.S. Championship and round five for the U.S. Women's Championship begins tomorrow at 1 p.m. Central, 2 p.m. Eastern. Come by the Chess Club and Scholastic Center of Saint Louis or tune in to www.uschesschamps.com for live commentary from WGM Jennifer Shahade and GM Ben Finegold.
By FM Mike Klein
For the first time in the 2012 U.S. Championship, one player rests atop the leaderboard. With his win today in round five over co-leader GM Gregory Kaidanov, local GM Hikaru Nakamura took control of the tournament. With three wins and two draws, his four points are one-half point ahead of defending champion GM Gata Kamsky, who bounced back by also winning today. However, since the two top seeds have yet to play, both still control their own destiny.
Nakamura reverted to his more usual 1. d4 today, reversing his trend of advancing his king's pawn, which he had done to surprise opponents in rounds one and three. Kaidanov played a Catalan system, but Nakamura offered a temporary pawn deficit to activate his pieces. After Nakamura regained the material, Kaidanov's pieces could only entrench themselves and wait for the breakthrough. That came in the form of the improbable 61. f5 and subsequent king invasion. Kaidanov's rook and bishop moved listlessly back and forth while his opponent's monarch played checkers on the dark squares, taking the scenic route from g5 to h6 to g7 to f8 to e7. Kaidanov conceded defeat and now sits in a four-way tie for third, and will need some help to win his first-ever U.S. Championship.
Kamsky, whose 51-game U.S. Championship unbeaten streak ended yesterday, began a new one today by winning in a fashion that echoed Nakamura's victory. GM Varuzhan Akobian eschewed his nearly-automatic French Defense and played the cramped-but-solid Berlin Defense, known for forming a nearly impenetrable wall. But it was only a matter of time before Akobian's defenses collapsed, as Kamsky's knights finally penetrated his position, capping off the offensive with the devastating 31. Nf6+. Getting low on time (Akobian was down to two seconds several times), Akobian could not hold off the attack.
Third-seeded GM Alex Onischuk got back into the mix by winning a topsy-turvy game against GM Robert Hess. The Yale freshman did not control his knights as well as Kamsky. Hess's initiative began to subside after 22. Nfd4, which he called the wrong knight. Onischuk rallied for an attack on the castled king, and offered two minor pieces for a rook to prise open Hess's position. Still, it would not have been enough if Hess had played 29. Kf1, since after 29...Rxe4 30. Ne7+ Kh8 31. Ng6+ seals the win for white. “With knights, you always have to be careful,” Onischuk said. Instead, Hess made the practical decision to bring his queen backward into the defense, but Onischuk's rook eventually found daylight and a route to pay dirt – the second-rank. Onischuk played Pac-Man with Hess's queenside pawns, forcing him to resign.
Joining Kaidanov and Onischuk on 3/5 and a tie for third place are GMs Alex Lenderman and Yury Shulman, who played an uneventful draw versus each other. Both have won once and drawn four times at the event.
A pair of slow starters won in round five to get back to even scores. GM Alex Stripunsky reverse-engineered his rook back to the first rank to win GM Yasser Seirawan's bishop. After losing his first two games, Stripunsky has 2.5 out of the last three.
Joining Stripunsky was GM Ray Robson, who had a very promising middlegame according to Onischuk. With a light-squared attack on GM Alejandro Ramirez's king, he allowed the pressure to dissolve, only to later win a tricky rook-and-pawn endgame.
While the U.S. Championship took on a betting favorite, the U.S. Women's Championship did not break the three-player deadlock. IM Irina Krush, IM Anna Zatonskih and WIM Iryna Zenyuk are all still tied for first place with 3/4.
Zenyuk and Krush, who are good friends, could not commiserate much during yesterday's off day since they played today. Whereas Krush said earlier in the tournament that she would be careful not to use up valuable energy by preparing too much, Zenyuk said she spent seven hours studying for Krush yesterday. Still, that would not be enough to predict everything.
“Irina (Krush) surprised me with her opening choice,” Zenyuk said. The game, a Semi-Slav Defense, ended in a draw by agreement on move 30 when Zenyuk repulsed Krush's rook invasion. “We didn't see any fireworks today,” Krush said. “At last year's championship, I was just lost out of the opening,” Zenyuk said of their past encounter. “Someone like Irina is really good at openings. I really believe that. I was really scared.” Zenyuk continues her best championship ever, currently fashioning a 2500+ performance rating, nearly 300 points above her actual rating. “I feel more pressure, definitely. But I don't think I'm going to change much.”
Zatonskih kept pace, but for the second game in a row, she entered a deep think early in the game. Facing FM Alisa Melekhina's commonplace Sicilian Alapin, the defending champ could not decide between 6...Qxc5 or 6...Qxd1+. After 30 minutes, she chose the former, explaining that she wanted to keep pieces on the board for better chances of fighting chess. But Melekhina got the queens off the board anyway, obtaining a small but stable advantage of the queenside pawn majority. “She plays [the Alapin] also; it's tough to play against your own openings,” Melekhina said. “My position was so dangerous,” Zatonskih said. Melekhina pressed but settled for a draw by repetition in a double-rook endgame, as she feared the swift advance of her opponent's passed f-pawn. She expressed frustration at not being able to convert the full point. “Every time I thought I would gain a meaningful advantage, she found a simplifying continuation,” Melekhina said. “It's not just this game. In general I need to start winning.”
All three other games in the women's championship ended with white wins. WGMs Sabina Foisor and Tatev Abrahamyan both got a point to come within a half-point of the leaders. They beat WFM Alena Kats and WGM Camilla Baginskaite, respectively. Baginskaite is still without any points.
WIM Viktorija Ni fought off infant-induced sleep deprivation to win her first-ever game at the championship, over IM Rusudan Goletiani, who has begun the tournament win-loss-win-loss.
Round six for the U.S. Championship and round five for the U.S. Women's Championship begins tomorrow at 1 p.m. Central, 2 p.m. Eastern. Come by the Chess Club and Scholastic Center of Saint Louis or tune in to www.uschesschamps.com for live commentary from WGM Jennifer Shahade and GM Ben Finegold.
By GM Ben Finegold and Mike Wilmering
SAINT LOUIS, May 12, 2012 -- After four rounds of the 2012 U.S. Championship, an upset victory by GM Gregory Kaidanov has catapulted him into a first-place tie with GM Hikaru Nakamura. Yesterday was a rest day for the players of the 2012 U.S. Women’s Championship.
Kaidanov scored the upset of the event by beating the seemingly heretofore unbeatable GM Gata Kamsky. Kamsky, with the black pieces, misplayed the move order after his pawn sacrifice with 14…b5!? Kamsky said he thought he would be about equal after the correct 15...cxd4 instead of 15…Bb7? Kaidanov took control of things with the excellent 17.dxc5! and never looked back, winning an excellent game.
"Well, I blundered," Kamsky said. "After dxc5 I was much worse."
Kamsky had lost only once with black in eight previous U.S. Championship appearances. That game took place in 1993 against none other than Kaidanov.
Kaidanov, who only received an invitation to the event because 2011 U.S. Junior Champion Gregory Young declined, is making the most of his chances.
"Over the years, Gata's saved so many lost positions, some of which were dead lost," he said. "So until the very end, I didn't believe I could win."
This marks Kaidanov’s 18th U.S. Championship appearance. He’s managed to secure two second-place finishes in past events, but the title of U.S. Champion as of yet has proved too elusive. He has a crucial matchup tomorrow against Nakamura.
Just before reluctantly acquiescing to a peaceable draw with GM Alexander Onischuk, Nakamura was visibly frustrated at the board.
"Somehow it just felt like there should be something, like it should be winning, but maybe there's just not enough to win; it's just a symbolic advantage, perhaps," Nakamura said. "I just thought that somewhere in the middlegame Alex went wrong.”
Nakamura said he was inspired by GM Jesse Kraai, who played b6 against Onischuk two times prior.
"I just felt like trying something different,” he said.
Onischuk probably should have tried to castle kingside with 16.Bf2 and 17.0-0, but instead castled queenside. Both players thought they had a good position, but Onischuk said he simply blundered with 17.Nf5? However, this move was probably not so bad after all, as white kept the balance, and a draw was agreed soon after time control.
In the post-game interview, Nakamura attributed his newfound affinity for the bishop pair to his brief training partnership with former World Champion GM Garry Kasparov. Onischuk dismissed the notion.
"Frankly, I think everyone prefers two bishops," Onischuk said.
After the post-game analysis, Nakamura discussed the game between Kaidanov and Kamsky, which was still being played at the time.
"Gregory's playing a very good game, and he's a strong player, and Gata isn't having one of his better days, but that happens,” Nakamura said.
"It's early on in the tournament," Namakura said. "And even though Gata's probably going to lose this game, I have a feeling both he and [Onischuk] are going to be my main competition towards the end.”
The game between GM Varuzhan Akobian and GM Alex Lenderman was a well-played draw.
"The opening was preparation,” Lenderman explained. “It's a new idea, but it's been played before by a Russian grandmaster, Popov, but no one else has played this idea."
Indeed, Popov has played this line with 8...g5 and 9…Ne4 before with a +1 score. 14...Qe7 was a novelty, as Popov had played 14...Qd6 in an earlier game and drew, although 14...Qf6 may be best of all.
"Alex found a very good move, Bc7," Akobian said. This allowed Lenderman to escape with his king, castling safely, and a draw was the fair result.
Round four also featured a battle of the tournament's two youngest players, GMs Ray Robson and Robert Hess. Robson played the very unusual 7.Nbd2, and Hess was on his own early. In fact, IM Marc Arnold, Hess' second, said they were up till about 4 a.m. that morning preparing a line against 3.Bb5. Robson, however, threw a wrench in the prep, unleashing Bc4 on move three.
"I wanted to surprise someone in the opening instead of being surprised all of the time," Robson said.
Robson didn't get any advantage from his unusual opening, but Hess played quite passively and couldn't find a good plan. Robson increased his advantage methodically, and won a strategically beautiful game.
"I didn't make any good moves, that's the problem," Hess joked. "But no, Ray played well today."
The next game to finish was the long battle between GMs Yury Shulman and Alex Stripunsky. Both players had the edge at different points, but neither could gain a significant advantage, and a draw was a fair result.
The best chance was for Stripunksy to play 32...f5! with the edge. A win for Shulman would have launched him into a first-place tie with Kaidanov and Nakamura.
Although he wasn’t able to convert the full point, this result represented a nice comeback for Stripunsky, who started with 0-2, and now has 1.5 out of his last two games.
GM Yasser Seirawan won the longest game of the tournament against GM Alejandro Ramirez, as it looked like an easy ending win for white. But Seirawan’s technique let him down, and he had to win the game all over again. Black was in severe time trouble the last 20 moves, getting down to less than 5 seconds on the clock several times. The last drawing chance would have been 86...Rc5!
Round four of the U.S. Women's Championship and Round five of the U.S. Championship will begin at 1 p.m Central, 2 p.m. Eastern. Turn in to www.uschesschamps.com for live commentary and to follow all of the games live.