Hou Yifan and Nepomniachtchi Basque in glory Hou Yifan added gold to her gold and silver so far, while Nepomniachtchi claimed his first medal of the event! Ian Nepomniachtchi and Hou Yifan have won gold medals in Basque chess, the third and final chess event of the 2014 SportAccord World Mind Games tournament in Beijing. Both players cruised home 1.5 points clear of their nearest rival, with Teimour Radjabov and Maxime Vachier-Lagrave taking silver and bronze in the men’s event, while Alexandra Kosteniuk and Zhao Xue took those laurels among the women. Basque chess? Harika Dronavalli and Anna Muzychuk are actually playing each other! | photo: Alina lAmi, FIDE The third event in China after the familiar rapid and blitz was Basque chess, a term christened when the game was used for a chess tournament in Donostia (San Sebastián) in the Basque area of Spain. Based on an idea advocated by David Bronstein, two players compete against each other on two boards simultaneously, playing White on one and Black on the other. The idea is to eliminate the advantage of giving one side the white pieces in a game, or even to eliminate the advantage of one side having White first in a two-game match. In Beijing the players were using the rapid time control of 20 minutes plus a 10 second increment each move, with a separate clock for each board. Mariya Muzychuk may have regretted her footware choice as she tried to switch between the two games | photo: Alina lAmi, FIDE Although a simple change to understand, playing on multiple boards of course introduces all kinds of new strategies. How much time do you devote to each game? Should you resign a lost position or try to keep it going to distract your opponent? Or will that distract you more? The obvious solution, you might think, would be to rapidly agree a draw on one of the boards and end the madness But judging from the games in Beijing, Sofia rules hindered that particular approach. Apart from strategy there are also pure physical challenges, such as keeping an eye on pieces and clocks on two boards at the same time, or moving your chair between the boards (the swivel chairs apparently squeaked too much on the first day!). The challenge is perhaps even greater for the spectators. Although you could follow some games on an excellent video broadcast with Erwin and Alina l’Ami commentating, the chess world isn’t currently set up to handle two games that need to be watched simultaneously. Ideally you’d not only be able to watch them side-by-side live but would also be able to replay the game afterwards so you had an idea what the position was on both boards at any particular moment in time.
Posted on: Thu, 18 Dec 2014 06:08:20 +0000
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