Candidates Chess Matches Kazan 2011 R1 down to tie-breaks: Grischuk, Kramnik progress to semi-finals

Chess blog for latest chess news and chess trivia (c) Alexandra Kosteniuk, 2011

Hi everybody,


The first round of the Candidates Chess Matches 2011 in Kazan have come down to the semi-finals. It's going to be Alexander Grischuk, Vladimir Kramnik, Gata Kamsky and Boris Gelfand who will progress to the semi-finals. 

The blitz tie-break saw Aronian tied with Grischuk, but losing the fourth game. Kramnik tied Radjabov in all four rapids, and then lost the first blitz (of two). With a dead drawn position and 15 seconds left each, the clock just reset itself to zero! When the clocks were restarted somehow, 13 minutes later, (with help from the time shown on the live broadcast) Radjabov ended up losing quickly only with Kramnik following up by winning the second blitz match. 

Kramnik and Radjabov - What's up with the clock?

Scoreboard Nat. Rtg G1 G2 G3 G4 R1 R2 R3 R4 Tot. Levon Aronian ARM 2808 ½ ½ ½ ½ 0 1 ½ 0 3.5 Alexander Grischuk  RUS 2747 ½ ½ ½ ½ 1 0 ½ 1 4.5 Nat. Rtg G1 G2 G3 G4 R1 R2 R3 R4 Tot. Vladimir Kramnik RUS 2785 ½ ½ ½ ½ ½ ½ ½ ½ 7.0 Teimour Radjabov  AZE 2744 ½ ½ ½ ½ ½ ½ ½ ½ 5.0 Nat. Rtg G1 G2 G3 G4 R1 R2 R3 R4 Tot. Veselin Topalov BUL 2775 ½ 0 ½ ½ 1.5 Gata Kamsky USA 2732 ½ 1 ½ ½ 2.5 Nat. Rtg G1 G2 G3 G4 R1 R2 R3 R4 Tot. Boris Gelfand ISR 2733 ½ ½ 1 ½ 2.5 Shak. Mamedyarov  AZE 2772 ½ ½ 0 ½ 1.5

From May 3 to May 27 2011 the FIDE Candidates matches are being held in Kazan, the capital of the Republic of Tatarstan, with eight strong GMs competing to qualify as Challenger for the 2012 World Champion match. Time controls in the four regular games are 120 minutes for the first 40 moves, 60 minutes for the next 20 moves and then 15 minutes for the rest of the game, plus an additional 30 seconds per move starting from move 61. In case of a tie there will be four rapid chess games, and if the tie is still not broken then up to five two-game blitz matches 5'+3". Finally there may be a sudden-death final decider. The prize fund of the candidates is 500,000 Euros.


You can access the official website here. Semi-finals start on May 12. In the semi-finals, it would be Gata Kamsky vs Boris Gelfand and Alexander Grischuk vs Vladimir Kramnik. You're going to be tuned in? Right?!

Tweet

From Alexandra Kosteniuk's
www.chessblog.com
Also see her personal blog at
www.chessqueen.com