29 August 2011
Chess blog for latest chess news and chess trivia (c) Alexandra Kosteniuk, 2011
Hi everyone,
After Peter Svidler won the 2011 Russian Championship he gave a long interview to Vladimir Barsky for the Russian Chess Federation website. Barsky had been with Svidler at the World Team Championship in Ningbo, China, so had witnessed the dramatic change of fortune between the two events first-hand. Here is an excerpt from the the English translation. You can read the full interview at ChessInTranslation.
It seems you’ve already won the Russian Championship by every possible system?Yes. 1994 and 1995 (Swiss tournaments), 1997 (knockout), 1998 (Swiss[Vladimir Barsky notes Svidler was second on tiebreakers]), 2003 (Swiss), 2008 (a round robin with 12 players), and this one.
Which victory was dearest to you, the most memorable?
Probably the first and the last. Well, the first for obvious reasons, and this one – because in the last few years… I can’t say I haven’t demonstrated anything good at all, but a success like this one that you can point your finger at and say – look at that! – there haven’t been any of those. The victory in Gibraltar was good, there was a mass of good chess players and I scored quite a lot of points, but nevertheless it was an open tournament. Therefore this was a very important victory and I’m very glad about it.
You played a very interesting, fighting game against Grischuk. You’ve worked closely which each other and recently you were together at the Candidates Matches. What’s it like to play someone you know that well?
Sanya [a short form of Alexander in Russian] and I haven’t simply worked together a lot – we’ve got a very good relationship. He’s an extremely interesting chess player and one who’s very interesting to play against. Therefore if it was possible to find so Therefore if it was possible to find something to play that we hadn’t looked at together… The main problem was that there were some regions of opening theory which it would be uncomfortable for him to play against me, or me against him, as we’d built up a certain baggage of common analysis. As for simply playing against Sanya – it’s interesting and a pleasure because you’ve got a strong and unconventional chess player sitting opposite you.
Hi everyone,
After Peter Svidler won the 2011 Russian Championship he gave a long interview to Vladimir Barsky for the Russian Chess Federation website. Barsky had been with Svidler at the World Team Championship in Ningbo, China, so had witnessed the dramatic change of fortune between the two events first-hand. Here is an excerpt from the the English translation. You can read the full interview at ChessInTranslation.
It seems you’ve already won the Russian Championship by every possible system?Yes. 1994 and 1995 (Swiss tournaments), 1997 (knockout), 1998 (Swiss[Vladimir Barsky notes Svidler was second on tiebreakers]), 2003 (Swiss), 2008 (a round robin with 12 players), and this one.
Which victory was dearest to you, the most memorable?
Probably the first and the last. Well, the first for obvious reasons, and this one – because in the last few years… I can’t say I haven’t demonstrated anything good at all, but a success like this one that you can point your finger at and say – look at that! – there haven’t been any of those. The victory in Gibraltar was good, there was a mass of good chess players and I scored quite a lot of points, but nevertheless it was an open tournament. Therefore this was a very important victory and I’m very glad about it.
You played a very interesting, fighting game against Grischuk. You’ve worked closely which each other and recently you were together at the Candidates Matches. What’s it like to play someone you know that well?
Sanya [a short form of Alexander in Russian] and I haven’t simply worked together a lot – we’ve got a very good relationship. He’s an extremely interesting chess player and one who’s very interesting to play against. Therefore if it was possible to find so Therefore if it was possible to find something to play that we hadn’t looked at together… The main problem was that there were some regions of opening theory which it would be uncomfortable for him to play against me, or me against him, as we’d built up a certain baggage of common analysis. As for simply playing against Sanya – it’s interesting and a pleasure because you’ve got a strong and unconventional chess player sitting opposite you.
If you’re talking about the goals I set myself before the tournament then I wanted to stretch myself as much as possible, to play every game at some sort of limit. From that point of view any game against Grischuk is interesting for me as I rate him very, very highly as a chess player. When I’m in a normal condition and not getting beaten around in every game then I relish the chance to play against strong players.
Go on read further here.
Go on read further here.
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