ChessBase Magazine Online

Exciting birthday presents and protest for Kirsan
05.04.2002 – On FIDE president Kirsan Ilyumzhinov's 40th birthday there were some very exciting games at the Grand Prix in Dubai. Karpov dropped an exchange, Azmaiparashvili a rook, while women's world champion Zhu Chen and Ivanchuk each overlooked a mate. We also learn that there was a serious protest when players discovered the prize money had been reduced to a quarter of the original sum. Read all about it and follow the action here.
 

Karpov strikes a blow for men, Anand drops out
04.04.2002 – The second round of the FIDE Grand Prix in Dubai saw Karpov defeat Zhu Chen in straight sets, avenging the humiliating defeat of his successor Ponomariov at the hands of the Chinese girl in the previous round. Shocks: Anand succumbed to Azmaiparaschvili, Ivanchuk to the young Frenchman Bacrot. You will find games, results and pictures from Dubai here.
 

Eurotel Trophy – with Vlady 'n Garry 'n Vishy 'n Mickey
04.04.2002 – "Mixing the high energy of rapid chess with the smoldering intensity of a classic final, the Eurotel Chess Trophy features the world's 32 top-players facing off for a total prize fund of 500,000 Euro," writes the organizers Bessel Kok and Serge Grimaux. The lineup is indeed sterling, with eleven of the top twelve in the world included. You will find full information on our Eurotel report page.
 

There is such a thing as a free lunch
04.04.2002 – Fritz7 allows you to join a global chess community and play chess on the Internet. You can download a ten-day trial version of the program. This can be used to run a bunch of free "engines" which are available in our download zone: Crafty, Comet, EXChess, Faile, InmiChess, BamBam, Goliath, or the latest UCI engines Pharaon and Sjeng. Don't miss the chance – it is all completely free of charge. More
 

Doctor Viktor Kortschnoi
04.04.2002 – He is unquetionably one of the great chess players of all time, twice world championship challenger, a top GM with great international successes, even today at the age of 71. Now Viktor Kortschnoi has been awarded the title of Doctor honoris causa by the Independent University of Moldova. He also inaugurated a new sports complex of the university, which bears the name of one of our favourite ChessBase contributors. More
 

World champion eliminated by – a woman!
03.04.2002 – The inaugural FIDE Grand Prix in Dubai started with a bang. The reigning FIDE world champion was eliminated by the reigning women's world champion. Zhu Chen could have easily won 2-0 (but 1.5-0-5 was enough) for the first-ever victory of a woman over a world champion in any competitive sport. You will find games, results and pictures from Dubai here.
 

Fischer moves – a cruel hoax!
02.04.2002 – Yesterday we posted a report on a new rule proposed by Bobby Fischer and under consideration by FIDE. To our horror we have discovered that this was a cruel hoax, perpetrated by an evil prankster in the ChessBase team. Apparently he was practising a pagan ritual know as "April Fool". We apologise to the visitors who for who found the spurious article distressing, and thank everyone for the many letters we we received. You will find some excerpts here
 

New pictures of the chess babe
02.04.2002 – Look who's on the title of the popular Russian youth magazine Yat. It's Alexandra Kosteniuk, chess's answer to Anna Kournikova, hitter of the yellow ball. Alexandra has just returned from Singapore and Jakarta, where she demolished the Junior team 6:0. As a special service we provide our visitors not with the games of this match but with rushes from the photoshoot in Moscow. In thumbnail and wallpaper. No pushing and shoving now. The pictures are available here.
 

Boris Gulko – the final comments
02.04.2002 – "I would compare playing against a computer to a struggle with a river with strong rapids in the fairway and calm waters outside. The art is to reach the calm waters..." After his 3:5 loss against the world's top programs Boris Gulko has drawn some interesting conclusions and provided us with a short summary of his games against the machine. You will find it on the bottom of our special coverage page...
 

New Fischer moves
01.04.2002 – Although the reclusive ex-world champion Bobby Fischer has not played much chess in the last 30 years, he has introduced a number of important innovations into the game. After the Fischer Clock and Fischer Random Chess he is now proposing a further change, the "Fischer move". It was presented to FIDE and will come up for a vote at the Executive Council meeting in Dubai. More...
 

Just one of 17,823,400,766 positions
01.04.2002 – Imagine this: a relatively simple endgame position, six pieces on the board, with a study-like win. The problem is that White must find 262 accurate moves in order to achieve his goal. In most cases the slightest inaccuracy leads to an immediate draw. We refer to the longest known six-piece ending, as calculated by the endgame databases of Ken Thompson and Eugene Nalimov. Take a deep breath before you proceed to the details here...
 

Now Ilya Smirin (2705) takes on the computers
31.03.2002 – The experienced GM Boris Gulko, Elo 2602, lost 3-5 against the world's top programs. Now the organisers of the online man vs machine challenge, ChessBase and Kasparov Chess, are upping the ante. Ilya Smirin has a hundred points more than Gulko – in fact he is the world's number 15 player. From April 14 to 28 he will attempt to show the electronic pretenders who is the master. Full information is available on our special coverage page...