I simply am compelled to bring this to your attention. Even if you are not so much into chess… tua maxima culpa – you can see how totally nuts this game was between Hungarian Richard Rapport (now playing for Romania) and Magnus Carlson, who went on to win the whole event, the 2023 Fide Rapid and Blitz in Kazakhstan. Round 14.
Chess24 has it HERE
A good video recap is agadmator’s HERE
Another recap take HERE
Watch the live video of the game HERE.
At chess.com HERE
This is “Blitz”, meaning both players have 3 minutes on their clocks. They get 2 seconds back with each move.
The evalulation bar on the left…. watch it as the game goes along after especially about move 25.
In other interesting chess news, at that same tournament on the women’s side, members of the Iranian women’s team refused to wear the “hijab” in an act of defiance against their government. Sara Khadem has been warned not to return to Iran. She has defected to Spain.
And there’s this, but I can’t verify it.
Just read this, is it true?: All 6 Iranian female Chess Grandmasters have defected! Atousa Pourkashiyan and Dorsa Derakhshani will play with the ?? flag, Ghazal Hakimifard with the ?? flag, Mitra Hejazipour with the ?? flag, Sara Khadem migrated to ??. #Chess #IranRevolution pic.twitter.com/XhYMyDVHDF
— Davide Nastasio (@DavideNastasio) January 3, 2023
Meanwhile, this looks fun. HERE
Amazing game. Hikaru recently played an online game that ended in a king and pawn endgame where he was up something like 7 pawns to 1. His opponent refused to resign, so in playful spite Hikaru promoted all of his pawns to bishops and checkmated with the bishops. I was disappointed that my non-chess-playing wife could not fully appreciate how humorous but also impressive (avoiding stalemate!) such a performance was.
A few of my coworkers have begun to play chess during their lunch breaks. It reminds me of you, Father Z, every time I see them play!