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The 2023 FIDE Womens Candidates Final beginning in Chongqing, China, will decide Ju Wenjuns opponent in the final.

Chongqing, Chinas largest inland city, about 103 times bigger than New York, is hosting one of the biggest chess matches the 2023 FIDE Womens Candidates Final.

In an all-Chinese affair, the six-game classical chess match will take place between Grandmasters Lei Tingjie and Tan Zhongyi in the city endowed with rich cultural and tourism resources such as mountains, rivers, forests, waterfalls and gorges.

At stake is prize money of 60,000 Euros and more importantly, the right to challenge current Womens World Champion Ju Wenjun for the title in July.

Lets look at the two players vying for a spot in the title clash.

Tan Zhongyi

She is someone who has been there, done that. Having won the Womens World Chess Championship in 2017, Tan is considered the favourite in the contest.

Born in Chongqing in 1991, she started to learn chess from her father even before she turned six. My father taught me all types of chess games and I fell in love with chess, she said in an earlier interview.

Her father revealed that she was so obsessed with chess that she would train for 10 hours a day and participate in about 80 matches a year.

Soon she was seen as a child prodigy, winning the World Youth U-10 Girls Chess Championship in 2000 and 2001, followed by the World Youth U-12 Girls Chess Championship in 2002.

A lover of fantasy fiction novels, Tan currently has an Elo rating of 2526 and stands in fifth place in the Chinese rankings and number 12 in the world. The winner of the Womens World University Chess Championship in 2012 and the 2014 Asian Womens Blitz Championship, she broke through in 2015, becoming the Chinese Womens Champion, amongst several other impressive results.

She won the biggest title in womens chess by defeating GM Anna Muzychuk in rapid tiebreaks but lost it in her 2018 match against current womens world champion GM Ju Wenjun.

Having qualified for the Candidates thanks to her third-place finish in the 2021 Sochi Womens World Cup, Tan won her place in the final with great results at the 2022 Khiva Pool B Womens Candidates tournament: defeating Kateryna Lagno and Aleksandra Goryachkina.

Lei Tingjie

Grandmaster Lei Tingjie, rated 2545, overcame the dual threats of sisters Mariya and Anna Mazychuk in the quarter-final and semi-final respectively at the 2022 Monaco Pool A Womens Candidates tournament to make it to the final of the tournament.

Currently ranked fourth and ninth on the Chinese and World rating lists respectively, Lei had qualified for the Candidates in some style, clinching the 2021 FIDE Grand Swiss in Riga with a round to spare.

The 26-year-old has a long list of laurels to her name, having represented China on a myriad of occasions with some stellar performances. She won the 2015 Moscow Open and was a silver medallist in the 2016 Womens World Rapid Championship.

Among some of her biggest achievements is winning the gold medal at the 2016 Asian Nations Cup in Dubai and the 2018 Batumi Olympiad.

She became a Grandmaster in March 2017 and in June that year, Lei won the 6th Chinese Womens Masters Tournament in Wuxi, ahead of Womens World Champion Tan.

One may recall that in 2019, Indian Grandmaster Koneru Humpy claimed the World Womens Rapid Chess Championship after drawing her Armageddon game against Lei in Moscow.

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Know your Candidates: Lei Tingjie and Tan Zhongyi to face off in Womens Chess Candidates Final - The Indian Express

Leonard Barden on chess

Kasparov says the world championship match should include the strongest player on the planet, and this match [Ian Nepomniachtchi v Ding Liren] doesnt

Fri 24 Mar 2023 04.00 EDT

Garry Kasparov, who held the world title from 1985 to 2000 and is regarded as Magnus Carlsens rival as the greatest player of all time, said next months Ian Nepomniachtchi v Ding Liren world title match should include the strongest player on the planet, and this match doesnt Its a kind of amputated event The match between Nepo and Ding is a great show, but its not a world championship match.

Comments on Kasparovs assertion have been mostly negative, pointing out that the match is actually between the two highest rated players who are ready to participate, which Carlsen is not. There is also a direct recent precedent in the Vishy Anand v Boris Gelfand 2012 world title series, which took place at a time when Carlsen was already the world No 1, but had declined to take part in the qualifiers because he objected to the candidates being played as a knockout rather than an all-play-all.

Realistically, the degree of public acceptance for Nepomniachtchi or Ding as world champion will depend significantly on whether the new title holder can demonstrate achievements in the match itself and in following tournaments. Long ago in the late 1960s, Tigran Petrosian was world champion, but his achievements were continually disparaged in chess media due to his inferior tournament performances compared to Bobby Fischer and Boris Spassky.

Kasparov also said: We will have the world champion and the strongest player on the planet in the same tournament in a months time. This is a reference to the Superbet Classic, starting in Bucharest on 4 May, the opening event in the St Louis-organised Grand Tour. Kasparov is a leading member of the organising team.

Bucharests announced entries so far are headed by Nepomniachtchi, Ding, and the world No 4, Alireza Firouzja, 19. Also in the field are the world Nos 6, 7 and 8 Anish Giri, Fabiano Caruana and Wesley So. There is a wildcard yet to be announced, and Kasparov is implying that this will be Carlsen.

It looks as if the No 1, immediately after renouncing his official crown, is ready to dice with destiny in May 2023. The bold plan seems to be to demonstrate his continuing superiority to Nepomniachtchi, Ding and Firouzja in Bucharest at the start of the month, and then to similarly outperform the world No 5, Hikaru Nakamura, plus the cream of the teenage generation in Stavanger at Mays end.

Nakamura is a player in form. After a break of several years from classical tournaments to develop his career as a popular streamer, the five-time US champion returned with impressive performances in the Fide Grand Prix and Candidates. This week the 35-year-old has reached the final of the $ 300,000 American Cup in St Louis, where he will meet Levon Aronian or So on Friday and Saturday. Games are live and free to watch online.

An eight-game solidarity match this week between the England No 1, Michael Adams, and the two-time Ukraine champion Andrei Volokitin had its opening ceremony at Westminster hosted by the speaker of the House of Commons, and coincides with the renewal of the Lords v Commons series last played in 2016. After a draw in game one, Volokitin beat Adams in Thursdays game two in 54 moves. Fridays game three was drawn.

A prime mover in the revival has been the Shadow Chancellor, Rachel Reeves, who in a Sky News interview on Wednesday showed herself very well informed about the Adams match, Volokitin now being a refugee in Poland, the match arbiter Shohreh Bayats experiences with Iran, and her own background as a former junior champion.

Online chess in Britain is booming as never before, if chess.com is correct. The largest chess website recorded around three million active UK users, 4.4% of the population, in January. Even this elevated figure is not among the top 10 countries, which are headed by Iceland with over 10%, while Ireland ranks fifth with over 5%.

Comparable over-the-board numbers are much lower. At the last English Chess Federation board meeting, it was estimated that there are about 130,000 active players, many of whom are juniors. The number of paying ECF members is around 10,000, while some local clubs and leagues are in decline, principally due to venue costs and availability.

A new campaign for more official support for chess is under way. Backing of 60,000 a year, which started more than half a century ago, was withdrawn in 2010 and has never been renewed, despite the surge in player numbers in recent years.

In most European countries, chess is recognised as a sport. Its educational significance in Britain has been boosted by the success of the charity Chess in Schools and Communities, which has introduced chess teaching to many inner-city schools and even prisons.

It would be interesting to start an online petition asking for more official support for chess, and to publicise that petition on chess.com with its huge UK numbers. If it reached 100,000 signatures, the petition would probably trigger a parliamentary debate.

3860: 1 Ba7! e4 2 Kd8! Kf8 3 Nd7 mate. The subtle 1 Ba7! creates a flight square for the black king at move two, thus avoiding stalemate.

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Chess: Garry Kasparov calls Aprils world title match amputated event - The Guardian

The chess world will have a new world champion soon, but for many fans the legitimacy of the title will be questionable.

Magnus Carlsen of Norway, who has been the world champion for a decade, decided not to defend his title. He remains the top-ranked player in the world, and is considered one of the best champions in the history of the game.

That means the worlds second and third-best players, Ding Liren of China and Ian Nepomniatchtchi of Russia, will battle for the championship in a match scheduled for Astana, Kazakhstan between April 7 and May 1.

Nepomniatchtchi won the right to be Carlsens official challenger before the world champion decided to abdicate the throne. Carlsen defeated him soundly in the last championship match in 2021, and clearly lacked the motivation for a repeat encounter.

If the contestants for next months title match feel sheepish about becoming world champion in Carlsens shadow, they have something else to consider. The matchs main sponsor, Freedom Holding Group, has funded a 2 million prize, with 60 per cent going to the winner.

The match will be broadcast on chess.com

White played 38.Ne7+ Rxe7 39.Rf8+ Kh7 40.Rh8+ and Black resigned.

Read more here:
There will soon be a new world chess champion, but it won't be the ... - The Globe and Mail

In week four of the 2023 Pro Chess League, the Levitov Chess Wizards and the Garden State Passers won their matches against the Canada Chessbrahs and California Unicorns, respectively. The Chess Wizards qualify for the Playoffs, while the Passers move on to week five.

GM Aleksandr Shimanov was unquestionably the MVP for the Chess Wizards as he handed World Champion GM Magnus Carlsen his second loss of the season. In the second match, GM Oleksandr Bortnyk scored a 3.5/4 and defeated the opposing board one, GM Gukesh D.

On Friday, March 10, 2023, beginningat 7:30 a.m. PT/16:30 CET, Team MGD1 faces the Norway Gnomes in the first match, while the Spanish Maniac Shrimps will play the Saint Louis Arch Bishops in the second.

It's impossible not to notice the gargantuan rating of the Chessbrahs' board one, as well as their board two, but the Chess Wizards had a more evenly rounded lineup. Having the strongest board four in the PCL in GM Alexandra Kosteniuk, for example, was a critical part of winning.

The higher-rated players won on all boards in both rounds one and two. All eight games were decisive, but this nevertheless resulted in an even score.

World Champion Carlsen was on fire. In round two, he shocked the commentators as he had a winning position hardly 10 minutes into the round against GM Denis Lazavik.

Repeating a line he played against Aronian in 2020, Carlsen broke through with the old "h4, h5, sac, sac, mate," an attacking plan GM Bobby Fischer once described. The world champion's bishop sacrifice on move 20 seemed to come out of the blue.

Speaking of Fischer, the American world champion enjoyed playing the white side of the King's Indian Attack (even from a young age). Maybe it's just a coincidence, but the Chess Wizards' board one, GM Rauf Mamedov, played this same opening in round two. It just happened to also be Fischer's birthday (he would have turned 80.) The Azerbaijani GM won a nice attacking game:

Chessbrahs' board four, WGM Maili-Jade Ouellet, nearly upset Shimanov in round two in a topsy-turvy gameheartbreakingly, she lost on time in a winning position.

After two rounds, the score was even: 4-4.

The breakaway happened in round three as the Chess Wizards mounted a 3.5-0.5 score. Kosteniuk defeated GM Razvan Preotu while Lazavik scored his first victory in the match against Ouellet, but the crowning achievement was certainly Shimanov's upset victory over Carlsen.

In a Sicilian Dragon, the Russian grandmaster sacrificed the exchange for an attack with which the computer wasn't particularly impressed. In rapid chess, momentum matters, and Carlsen wasn't able to stave off the problems he faced and resigned one move before a forced checkmate.

This, of course, is our Game of the Day, annotated by GM Dejan Bojkovbelow.

GM Hikaru Nakamura also covered this game in the video below:

A Chessbrahs comeback was unlikely. Although we've seen such miracles happen this season, "ChessQueen" Kosteniuk snuffed those dreams as she achieved a winning position as early as move 12 against Ouellet on board four. With this win, the match was over, regardless of the other boards.

The Chess Wizards earn their third victory and qualify for the Playoffs. The Chessbrahs go into week five; a win will qualify for the Playoffs while a loss will result in elimination.

What more to say? The Passers came to play. Even with a tough day at the office for IM Carissa Yip, the winning team sailed to victory on the backs of the top three boards who each scored three points or higher.

The Passers nearly won on every board in the first round. The highlight was the one game that didn't go in their favor, IM Carissa Yip vs. Gukesh. The former U.S. women's champion had a winning advantage out of the opening in a version of the razor-sharp Sicilian Najdorf Poisoned Pawn Variation, but the Indian prodigy survived and won the game.

The Unicorns won round two 2.5-1.5 and reduced the Passers' lead to just one point, but round three essentially sealed the deal as the New Jersey team won 3-1 once again.

The most significant victory, of the three for the Passers, was that of Bortnyk over Gukesh, the Unicorns' board one. In a back-and-forth game, the Indian grandmaster lost control in a position where he was better-to-winning. Given a tactical chance, Bortnyk snapped up the win.

Can you find the winning moves? White to move and win material.

GMJohan-Sebastian Christiansenkept the Unicorns alive another round with a win over Yip in round three.

However, just like the first match, this one too was decided in the first game to end. GM Aleksandr Lenderman, a former 2600-rated player who's proving to be a monstrous board-three, defeated Christiansen to bring the Unicorns' season to a close.

After the match, Bortnyk spoke about beating Gukesh in the possibly match-determining game: "I just didn't have time to think about nerves."

The Passers win their second match of the season. Next week, they need to win another one to qualify for the Playoffs, while a loss would eliminate them.

The Unicorns exit the season earning $4,000 for reaching this stage.

Standings | Week 4

The Pro Chess League (PCL) is the number-one online global chess league for teams from all over the world. The event features 16 teams playing rapid games for their piece of the $150,000 prize fund.

The main event will continue throughout March and features top players like GMs Magnus Carlsen, Daniel Naroditsky, and Hikaru Nakamura.

Previous coverage:

Go here to see the original:
Chess Wizards Stun World Champion, Advance To Playoffs; Bortnyk ... - Chess.com

Rob Mitchell| Guest columnist

Smart students dont always play chess, but students who play chess always become smart. Chess teaches patience, critical thinking, problem solving and reasoning. It teaches students to not only see the turn but to see around the turn, because in chess you have to think five moves ahead.

Building resilient students is not about teaching them how to become successful. Its about teaching them how to respond when theyre not successful. It's not about teaching them what to think but how to think. It teaches them that inordertogrow intellectually andemotionally they must recover and learnfrom losses.

Failure is motivating. Success can be paralyzing. We have to be OK with sort of getting out of that comfort zone and moving into the learning zone, which is close to the frustration zone.

Being an equity-focused teacher or leader is about finding out the needs of our students and giving them what they need to be successful. Chess is that tool. For many children who live in poverty or in struggling communities, their parents wont be able to afford to send them to Johns Hopkins for science camp or to Notre Dame for exchange programs. In communities where most students live at or below the poverty level, to have access to a program that will challenge their mind at a high level is rare.

Chess provides competitivegender equity. Susan Polgar, one of the first women grandmasters in the world, was running all-girls chess tournaments because she saw, even at her level, the need for attracting girls to the game. Now, that need for separategender based programs is not necessary Just to give them an environment where they can be comfortable exhibiting their greatness.

You can sit across from someone who may come from a family with access, power, privilege, and destroy them in this game. Chess eliminates the preconceived notions, all the biases, the judgment. Chess pits one's mental ability and skill against another's. Money, power and popularity don't matter in chess.

The best thing for students to do is learn through books and online platforms. But playing face to face provides opportunities for socialization which is so necessary today.

Thegoal of thechess enriched, critical thinking curriculum that we propose to bring to our schools doesnot have a goal to create a competitive chess player. We will give them the opportunity to develop that perseverance, that stamina, that self-esteem, that self-efficacy whichwillequip them for a successful life.

It isn't an entirely new and novel concept. Alabama is using the chess enriched curriculum approach and so is the state of New Hampshire. The European Union has pressed forward with initiatives stating that chess should be taught in schools as part of every educational curriculum.

Results from other countries empirically prove that students' literacy improves, scores in STEM subjects improve as well as behavior and emotional maturity. One would question why the reluctance to invest in such a program? Especially when the cost to develop a statewide program is less than the cost to fully equip a high school football team!

We are attempting to raise awareness with the public through a seriesof charity chess matches between the elected officials from local communities. One such match being pursued (challenges have been issued as of March 7) are between Hamilton officials and Rutherford County officials. If the challenge is accepted, Rutherford County may have a decided advantage as Mayor Joe Carr is an avid and excellent chess player!

I have alreadyreceiveda pledge from Marcus Lemonis, chairman of Camping World and television star of the show" TheProfit," of $5,000 for our program for children in thejuvenile detention center. This is a great start. We also have the attention of the executive producer of the movie "Critical Thinking" regarding our efforts. We are off to a promising start.

Our first moves have been solid. We nowmust plan and executea successful strategy. Now is the time to make sure our elected leaders hear from you that you desire programs that help develop good people whoarewell prepared for whatever comes their way. It is now up to the citizens to hold us accountable.

Rob Mitchell is a 30-plus-year resident of Rutherford County and avid chess player for more than 60 years.He has been involved as a parent volunteer for chess clubs for his children at Walter Hill Elementary and Siegel Middle. Mitchell is actively pursuing a chess program for at-risk children at the Rutherford County Juvenile Detention Center and has received a $5,000 pledge from Marcus Lemonis, chairman of Camping World. Mitchell has served as the elected property assessor for Rutherford County since 2012.

Read more from the original source:
Chess: Bringing a 'critical thinking' curriculum to students - Daily News Journal