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Monday, 05 October 2009 |
So, back from a delightful trip on the free day where the Nanjing organisers took the partiicpants to see Dr. Sun Yat-sen's Mausoleum in Nanjing, the Presidential Palace, a ride along the river canals running through parts of Nanjing, and the City Gates.
The above picture is of Dr Sun Yat-Sen's Mausoleum. We visited this on the free day which also happened to be a "double" holiday for the Chinese for the celebrations of the 60th Anniversary and Mid Autmun celebrations. The place was absolutely packed with people as can be seen on the photos of the Free Day in the Gallery.
This tour must have inspired GM Nana Dzagnidze, since she bounced back to form despite not feeling very well before the game due to some stomach bug. Her opponent, GM Xu Yuhua chose to take the game out of book very earlyon and a Sicilian slugfest got underway. At one point Dzagnidze overpressed and in her opponent's time trouble (for once!) played 23...Nb7? after which white could have immediately won the game with 24.Nh4!.
Unfortunately, with limited time, white chose 24.Rd1 and after d5 black took the initiative and eventually won the game.
GM Marie Sebag kept a nagging pressure against the Sicilian Poisoned Pawn variation which Ju Wenjun played. The Chinese player is highly talented and is currently the highest rated untitled women player in the FIDE rating list. Ju introduced a novelty on the 17th move and improved on a previous game between Mamedov and former world Junior Champion Andriasian.
GM Sebag converted the slight advatage to a point after Ju Wenjun erred with 31...d5 as the position quickly became untenable.
Another top slugfest was seen in GM Zhao Xue against GM Zhu Chen. A very complex Meran Stonewall was played and black had a reaosnable position in the middlegame. Zhu Chen's play has been very enterprising but sometimes risky. She played 16...Ng4 here and could have equalised with 19...e5. A serious oversight at move 27 however, cost her the point.
IM Lilit Mkrtchian moved into joint third place with a win over Martha Fierro. Out of a King's Indian, Black got a bad position out of the opening and Mkrtchian did not allow any reasonable counter-play taking the point in the shortest win of the tournament so far.
Shen Yang played another solid game against Munuguttul Batkhuyag but could never claim any significant advantage.A draw was a fair result.
WGM Baira Kovanova kept the Elista and Russian flag high with a win over the luckless Betul Yildiz. White took some risks in the game and black could have equalised at one point. Unfortunately, as a result of time trouble, black could not find the saving continuation and subsequently lost.
The rating performance table is now as follows :
| Rank |
|
Name |
Rtg |
FED |
Pts |
Rtg+/- |
Ra |
Rp |
| 1 |
GM |
Dzagnidze Nana |
2535 |
GEO |
5 |
11.8 |
2428 |
2701 |
| 2 |
GM |
Sebag Marie |
2519 |
FRA |
4 |
4.4 |
2451 |
2576 |
| 3 |
IM |
Mkrtchian Lilit |
2469 |
ARM |
3½ |
4.8 |
2466 |
2523 |
| 4 |
GM |
Xu Yuhua |
2485 |
CHN |
3½ |
3.6 |
2467 |
2524 |
| 5 |
GM |
Zhao Xue |
2542 |
CHN |
3½ |
-3.9 |
2427 |
2484 |
| 6 |
|
Ju Wenjun |
2443 |
CHN |
3 |
1.0 |
2453 |
2453 |
| 7 |
WGM |
Munguntuul Batkhuyag |
2418 |
MGL |
3 |
1.2 |
2430 |
2430 |
| 8 |
WGM |
Kovanova Baira |
2408 |
RUS |
3 |
0.4 |
2413 |
2413 |
| 9 |
GM |
Zhu Chen |
2488 |
QTR |
3 |
-4.7 |
2425 |
2425 |
| 10 |
WGM |
Shen Yang |
2453 |
CHN |
2½ |
-3.7 |
2470 |
2413 |
| 11 |
IM |
Fierro Baquero Martha |
2386 |
ECU |
2 |
-3.2 |
2470 |
2345 |
| 12 |
WIM |
Yildiz Betul Cemre |
2224 |
TUR |
0 |
-16.3 |
2472 |
1672 |
The GM norm at 8 points is looking a bit tough right now but the IM norm (6 pts) is within grasp of Ju Wenjun, Munguntuul Batkhuyag and Baira Kovanova.
All games and analysis can be found here.
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