Kramnik in sole lead

By Arvind Aaron

MONTE CARLO, MARCH 25. Brain Games World champion Vladimir Kramnik of Russia shot into sole lead after the rapid session of round eight in the 10th Amber chess tournament here at Le Metropole Palace Hotel on a sunny Sunday afternoon.

Overnight joint leader and World champion Viswanathan Anand made a draw with the black pieces against Loek Van Wely of the Netherlands and is in second place on 10 points. Veselin Topalov of Bulgaria who decimated former World champion Anatoly Karpov of Russia moved to join Anand in the second place with 10 points.

Kramnik and Topalov are leading the blindfold section with five points each from seven games. The rapid section is led by Anand and Kramnik jointly with 5.5 points from eight games.

Three rounds and the blindfold session of the eighth round remain to be played in this $193,250 super tournament featuring rapid chess and blindfold chess.

Monday is a rest day.

Both 25-year old Kramnik and 31-year old Anand are known for their technique. Anand's queen's Indian defence as black helped him draw in 36 moves after the players reached a major pieces ending. In the middlegame, Anand was able to dent white's pawn structure in return for white's lead in development on the queen side. In the reverse encounter Anand will have the advantage of playing with the white pieces.

This rapid session was the best in the last four rounds yielding four decisive results from the six. Also, Sunday was a short 23- hour day in this part of the world with Central Europe shifting the clock from winter to summer time.

Kramnik's 50-move victory over Ivanchuk had plenty of technique and determination as he did it with the white pieces from a queen's Indian defence game. Using a passed pawn, Kramnik jumped past all the hurdles that Ivanchuk was able to offer in the bishop versus knight ending to move into sole lead mid-way through the day.

The Shirov versus Gelfand game was a fighting draw and one of those rare insipid games by the former. Since the arrival of his girlfriend, Victoria Cmilyte, Shirov has started to do well and arrest his defeats.

Piket had an easy game winning against Ljubojevic in an ending after picking up two pawns. Piket moved to fifth place.

Almasi provided the surprise of the day by defeating his more fancied Hungarian team-mate Leko in 51 moves with the white pieces from a Caro-Kann defence. Leko unusually took more risk and paid for it. Almasi won the double pawn up rook ending with ease.

Saturday's Blindfold Games

This section started with a non-event draw by Almasi as white against Anand. Out of the opening, the 25-year old Hungarian proposed a draw and Anand took it. Strangely, Anand finished with more time than he started the game with! For each played move there is an increment of twenty seconds in blindfold and ten seconds in rapid chess.

In the other two games, Ljubojevic and Piket avenged their rapid defeats by bouncing back to upset Van Wely and Leko. Ljubojevic benefited from a tactical oversight by his opponent who failed to see a knight fork. Piket played positionally and delivered a nice punch in 58 moves by squeezing Leko in a queen and opposite colour bishop ending.

In the last set of games, Gelfand blundered his rook in a difficult position to gift Kramnik the second most easiest victory. Earlier in the tournament Shirov had blundered his queen to Kramnik. This victory took Kramnik to join Anand in the lead on the combined standings after round seven.

In the other games, Topalov's pawn sacrifice did not give him anything more than a good square for his knight. Ivanchuk initiated the repetition of moves with an extra pawn that Topalov welcomed it.

The Shirov-Karpov game was a see-saw battle. White had more chances in this Caro-Kann game but Karpov missed one winning chance to lose to a brilliant rook sacrifice. ``I thought white had his king on Kg2,'' Karpov said in the pressroom for missing what looked like a simple win for those with vision. Playing blindfold chess should be a far greater strain for thi 1951-born legend, who was world champion from 1975-85 and from 1993-99.

The results (eighth round):

Rapid: V.Topalov bt A.Karpov, V.Kramnik bt V.Ivanchuk, A.Shirov drew with B.Gelfand, J.Piket bt L.Ljubojevic, Van Wely drew with V.Anand, Z.Almasi bt P.Leko.

Seventh round:

Blindfold: J.Piket bt P.Leko, L.Van Wely lost to L.Ljubojevic, Z.Almasi drew with V.Anand, A.Shirov bt A.Karpov, V.Kramnik bt B.Gelfand, V.Topalov drew with V.Ivanchuk.

The combined standings mid-way through the eighth round: 1. V.Kramnik (Rus) 10.5/15, 2-3. V.Anand (Ind), V.Topalov (Bul) 10 each, 4. P.Leko (Hun) 8, 5-6. J.Piket (Ned), A.Shirov (ESP) 7.5 each, 7-9. Z.Almasi (Hun), B.Gelfand (Isr), L.Ljubojevic (Yug) 6.5 each, 10. A.Karpov (Rus) 6, 11-12. V.Ivanchuk (Ukr), Van Wely (Ned) 5.5 each.

The moves: GM L.Van Wely-GM V.Anand, round eight, rapid game, queen's Indian defence, E12: 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nf3 b6 4.a3 Bb7 5.Nc3 d5 6.Bg5 Be7 7.Qa4 Bc6 8.Qb3 dxc4 9.Qxc4 O-O 10.Bxf6 Bxf6 11.e4 a6 12.Rd1 b5 13.Qa2 Bb7 14.e5 Bg5 15.Bd3 Bxf3 16.gxf3 c5 17.Be4 Ra7 18.dxc5 Qc7 19.b4 Bf4 20.Qc2 h6 21.h4 Nd7 22.Ne2 Bxe5 23.Qd2 Bf6 24.f4 Rd8 25.Qe3 Be7 26.O-O Bxh4 27.Nd4 Re8 28.Nc6 Raa8 29.Rd6 Nf6 30.Bf3 Nd5 31.Bxd5 exd5 32.Qd3 Be7 33.Nxe7 Qxe7 34.Qxd5 Qe2 35.Qg2 Qc4 36.Rxh6 Draw.

GM Z.Almasi-GM V.Anand, round seven, blindfold, Caro- Kann, 1.e4 c6 2.d4 d5 3.Nc3 dxe4 4.Nxe4 Nd7 5.Nf3 Ngf6 6.Nxf6 Nxf6 7.c3 Bg4 8.h3 Bxf3 9.Qxf3 e6 10.Bc4 Be7 11.O-O O-O 12.a4 a5 13.Re1 Qb6 14.Re2 Rfd8 15.Bf4 Nd5 16.Bg3 Draw.

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