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Natalia Pogonina's Blog Ranked Top-5 by Soviet Sport Magazine
Written by Administrator
Friday, 24 December 2010
Soviet Sport, a leading Russian sports magazine, has published a top-5 list of blogs authored by famous Russian athletes. Among the winners were Ekaterina Gamova (volleyball), Alexander Legkov (cross country skiing), Evgeny Dementiev (cross country skiing), Natalia Pogonina (chess), Ekaterina Bychkova (tennis).
Natalia Pogonina's Blog
Sport type: chess
Publication frequency: once a month
Self-written: yes
Replies to comments: yes
Grandmaster Natalia Pogonina (ELO rating 2501) is one of the most active Internet users among professional athletes. She is not only a frequenter of social networks, but also founder of the website pogonina.com and a blog with an intriguing title "Chess Kama Sutra". In this blog Natalia is actively responding to questions of the Internet public, compiles family ratings (by adding up points of male grandmasters and their wifes), and also publishes interviews with well-known colleagues, e.g. with ex-FIDE World Chess Champion Alexander Khalifman. Via the Internet Natalia has also played chess with her fans and won in 54 moves.
Quote: People often say I should try a career in modelling, although I have never dreamed of getting involved into such an activity. As to "Chess Kama Sutra", that is the title of the book we are working on.
URL: www.sports.ru/tribuna/ blogs/pogonina/
P.S. Another recent award for Pogonina.com, as one of the best blogs in 2010 in the "Computer Chess" category.
Congrats to GM Hou Yifan (aged 16), runner-up at the World Women's Chess Championship-2008, for beating Ruan Lufei in rapid chess 3-1 and thus setting a record as the youngest Women's World Chess Champion ever! She has also become the 3rd woman in history to cross the 2600 threshold on FIDE rating (after Judit Polgar and Koneru Humpy).
The rules are simple - send us your questions and see them featured in the weekly Q&A column!
Q1: Are Hou Yifan and Ruan Lufei strong players? Did you get a chance to play them? A1: By definition, participants of the final match for the Women's World Chess Champion title are strong players. I have an even score against Hou Yifan (+1 -1 in standard chess, a draw in rapid) and a positive vs Ruan Lufei (one win in standard chess).
Q2: How do I calculate a long variation? A2: This is a very serious and general question. First of all, if you have trouble visualizing the position at the end of a variation (or forget where the pieces are, etc.), you should solve special exercises and probably use software that helps improve visual memory (often connected with playing chess blindfolded). Secondly, it is important to know what to calculate, and what not to calculate. As humans can't simply review all the moves, a lot depends on intuition. The stronger the player, the better usually his/her intuition is. Thirdly, often people calculate a variation correctly, but end up in an inferior position. This has to do with weaknesses of positional understanding, i.e. evaluting the resulting position in a wrong way.
Q3: Well apart from being a chess grandmaster I have been working in a regular job for
more than 20 years now, and I made enough money to have a good living. But what I
don't understand and what I will never understand is how pure chess professionals
are making enough money in chess to survive or to have at least an average life
standard. Maybe you can explain to me that phenomen, because you claim you are a
pure chess pro and you obviously like it. Also you have to co-support a family. (sent by a GM rated about 2550, at one point #32 in the world - Pogonina.com)
A3: First of all, I admire your example in the sense of being able to play chess that well while having a regular job. You may serve as a role model for millions of amateur or semi-pro players out there. As to your questions: there are many intricacies. For the last few years I have been ranked 13-29 in the world among female players (that's a 2742-2715 range for men). Of course, my tournament earnings are lower than top male grandmasters', but, for obvious reasons, they are definitely higher than what male grandmasters of my FIDE rating earn. Also, as you may have noticed, I am a rather active person. That leads to additional business and sponsorship offers, endorsement requests and so on. Another thing is that I am an optimist who enjoys life and tries to help other people enjoy it. Of course, I could start moaning here and there that "an athlete of my level deserves better conditions" and so on, but would it make much sense? I believe each of us has what it takes to improve his/her own life, and there is no need for complaining or begging for help from others. Instead, for instance, one can either get a regular job (like you did), or create more chess-related projects (like I did).
Q4: IM Martin wrote at chesscom some time ago that just 15 minutes of serious chess
studies per day was enough for improving your rating by one point per week.
Do you think that is realistic for a player in the 1200-1400 region? Would it be
realistic for a player in the 1400-1600 region?
What training would you suggest to a DIY Chess Improver limited to 15-30 minutes per
day? A4: IM Andrew Martin, right? There are no formulas of progress that work for everyone. A lot depends on the quality of the training, talent and other ingredients. However, let's do some quick calculations. One rating point a week is 52 points per year. As we have written at Pogonina.com, some people managed to increase their rating by more than that while being in the 2700 range. Of course, they spend way more than 15-30 minutes/day on chess, but still. For beginners (1200-1600) it is very easy to progress to the next step, so even minor efforts should pay off.
On the other hand, 15-30 minutes per day won't take you a long way. Once you get to club level, you will either have to spend more time on chess (don't forget to count the time one spends on tournaments - that's a LOT), or admit that your activity has nothing to do with training or improving. Another estimate: 15-30 minutes per day is about 91-182 hours per year. If a game (including preparation, relaxation, trip to the venue, analysis) takes at least 6 hours, that is 15-30 rated games per year WITHOUT any training at all. If you cut the number in half (50% training, 50% playing), that's 7-15 games per year with a tiny bit of chess work in between. This won't allow you to improve. At best, it will allow you to remain the, let's say, 1700 you will be by that time. Is it worth half an hour of your time per day? I am not sure, but it's your time, so only you can decide. Having said that, I can suggest two options that seem reasonable to me:
1) (Typical for most disciplined amateurs) - try to allocate a certain amount of time on chess studies during holidays, etc., when you can play in a tournament and study without being distracted by daily chores. This will allow you to concentrate on chess and boost your results. You may also want to check out my article on tournament planning.
2) (For pros, freelancers, retired people, etc.) - if you have a lot of spare time, you may train in a more rigorous fashion, like pros do.
Q5: I was asked to think about how to form or
start up a chess tournament with a high learning momentum for players who want to
learn (more) off the game. So talk, why you did this or that move, comment position,
points of attention etc. Q: do you have experience with such a tournament?
All advise would be very welcome.
A5: You are probably referring to vote chess. I have played vote chess vs the World at Chess.com & am involved in another match of that sort at ChessGames. Vote chess allows team members discuss moves, share ideas, lets the stronger players mentor the less experienced, etc. You can check out the corresponding section at Chess.com. Good luck!
Q6: What are your views on the amount of press coverage and exposure given to the
Women's World Chess Championships?
A6: You probably know the answer yourself. Chess deserves much more coverage in the media than it has now. How can we expect the general public to follow a match for the women's crown when most of them think that Kasparov is the reigning world champion?
Q7: How will you be celebrating Christmas? A7: In Russia the main holiday of the year is NY, we don't celebrate Christmas that much. Anyway, I will be spending the winter holidays with my family, as we don't get together that often. Btw, Merry Christmas to you and you loved ones!
Karjakin and Nepomniatchi tie for 1st at the Russian Superfinal
Written by Administrator
Wednesday, 22 December 2010
Sergey Karjakin (left) and Ian Nepomniatchi (right) fighting against the Chess Terminator (at the Opening Ceremony)
Photo courtesy of Maria Fominykh, ChessPro
Russia is the only country in the world that can easily hold a 12-player national round robin of the XIX category, i.e. with an average rating of participants above 2700. Except for the absence of Kramnik (who was playing in London), most of the other top grandmasters have taken part.
Peter Svidler has been leading the tournament rather convincingly, and it looked like he has a good chance to become the Russian Champion for the 6th time in his career. However, after Nepomniatchi managed to upset him with White in round 9, it became obvious that the younger generation is taking over. This has been proved once again during the last round, when Peter Svidler and Alexander Grischuk quickly ended their game in a draw (in the case of a win one of them would have been tied for gold).
Both Ian Nepomniatchi and and Sergei Karjakin have had a great year in chess. Ian won the Russian Top League and the European Championship. Sergei was victorious at Poikovsky and tied for 1st at the Tal Memorial. In terms of rating progress: Ian is up 75 points (from 2658 in Jan 2010 to 2733 in Jan 2011). Sergei is up 56 points (from 2720 to 2776) and should be #5 in the world on the next rating list. The gap between them and another top talent born in 1990, Magnus Carlsen, is closing (he is up 4 points, from 2810 to 2814).
Two more interesting analogies: in both the women's and men's section 7 points out of 11 was enough for tying for 1st. Also, both leaders of the 2nd Russian teams at the Olympiad (Nepomniatchi and Pogonina) ended up sharing the 1st place at the corresponding Superfinals. Feel free to make your own conclusions.
P.S. The winner of the Superfinal will be determined in a 2-game rapid tie-break match.
UPDATE: Both rapid games ended in a draw. In Armageddon (6 min vs 5), a draw is counted as a win for Black, Nepomniatchi drew the game with Black and became the Russian 2010 Champion. Congratulations!
Initiative in chess means activity that allows enforcing a certain style and tempo on the game, and making your opponent play reactively. This is a very dangerous weapon in the hands of chess masters who enjoy active play and know how to attack. If you have the initiative, you are free to choose the course of the game and have your opponent on the ropes. Few people enjoy being on the other side of this confrontation.
Initiative may be short-term (e.g. having more active pieces), when you should try to take advantage of it as soon as possible. Or it can be long-term (e.g. associated with a certain static pawn structure), when you can keep exploiting it, while the opponent wont be able to do much about it.
There are a few ways in which the initiative can evolve:
1) Transform into a decisive positional or material advantage
A strong initiative may lead to a serious advantage. It may eventually disappear, but in return you will be left with a decisive advantage extra material and/or an overwhelming position.
2) Lead to a decisive attack
Sometimes one can sacrifice material for the initiative and deliver checkmate.
3) Disappear
Yes, sometimes that happens. Initiative is like a bonfire you need to keep adding fuel to support its burning. To develop the initiative, one should play actively and keep making the best moves. Just a single mistake may result in losing the initiative forever. The defensive resources of most modern chess positions are very high, so, if the opponent is a skillful player, you can easily lose the initiative when facing a stubborn defense.
In many cases the initiative can be obtained by sacrificing (usually a pawn). Its aims can be different: rapid development of the pieces, attacking a king, creating more space or a nice outpost for ones pieces, putting pressure on the opponents position, etc. In other situations one may seize the initiative due to the passive play of the opponent.
A very tricky rule: when you have the initiative, dont rush to regain the sacrificed material or win something minor. First you should evaluate the consequences: in many cases keeping the initiative promises more winning chances than snatching a pawn or an exchange only to (sometimes) become the prey instead of remaining a hunter! Knowing when and how to play down material, and still win, are signs of a true chess maestro.
All the top players know how essential it is to own the initiative. Seizing and exploiting the initiative is a trait every chess player, from novice to grandmaster, should try to develop and improve. To do that, you can study games of the best tacticians in the history of chess (Alekhine, Tal, Kasparov, Shirov, etc.), and play training games where you can sacrifice material for initiative without being afraid of losing rating points.
Now let me show you a recent game of mine vs IM Alisa Galliamova from the second round of the Russian Superfinal, which served as an inspiration for this article. At some point I had a decent initiative, but then lost it due to a few mistakes.
Please pay special attention to a few moments. At move 10 White has the initiative. My opponent could either keep developing pieces, or head to a better endgame. Alisa made the wrong choice and decided to win some material. As a result, Black then seized the initiative. On move 19 it was my turn to misstep (I wanted to develop my bishop asap, but non-standard play was called for at that point), and almost lost the initiative (while after 19ed it would have been growing). After 200-0?, another dubious decision, White even got a considerable advantage.
