16 July 2016

Armageddon is just the Beginning

Opening of the Gelfand–Inarkiev match in the review of Vladimir Barsky.

On Tuesday, July 12, the capital of Ingushetia, the town of Magas, gave a ceremonial start to the exhibition match between Boris Gelfand and Ernesto Inarkiev. Even though the red carpet was rolled out in front of the Cultural Center in wait for the grandmasters, the latter decided to take a shortcut and crossed the Center square along the big diagonal. Same was repeated by the Republic Head Yunus-Bek Yevkurov, who is taking personal responsibility for organization of the Russian Chess Festival "The Concord Tower." The festival is not only a duel between two outstanding players, but also a stage of the Russian Junior Chess Cup "Promising Players of the North Caucasus", as well as seminars for arbiters, coaches and teachers, chess simuls and blitz tournaments for everyone willing to take part.

The red carpet is still out there in wait for more guests... 

A cozy conference hall of the Cultural Center was filled to capacity. Yunus-Bek Yevkurov reminded about his decree that chess classes be opened at each school of the republic and urged that parents actively introduce their children to this wise game, which is very beneficial for development of many qualities important for a human-being. RCF Executive Director Mark Glukhovsky told the audience about the match opponents, pointing out their having much in common, such as devotion to chess, uncompromising attitude and excellent human qualities. The festival director, President of the International School Chess Union Alexander Kostyev, thanked organizers for warm hospitality and voiced his assuredness in that a few years afterwards the development of chess in the Ingushetia schools would yield a lot of young talented players. Alexander Nikolayevich followed it by delivering the welcome message from the President of FIDE Kirsan Ilyumzhinov. 

Then the grandmasters ascended the stage to play the"Armageddon" game (with 5 minutes for White and 4 minutes to Black and a draw favoring the second player) so as to determine the colors in the first classical game. Chief referee of the festival, international arbiter Artem Akhmetov, took two pawns hid them behind his back; Boris Gelfand's choice fell onto the black one. 

Artem Akhmetov, Ernesto Inarkiev and Boris Gelfand
 

The reigning European Champion won the game (which does not count into the individual score) and the white color in the first and all subsequent odd games of the match. 


Let us refresh our memories that grandmasters are to play 6 games with 90 minutes time control per 40 moves + 30 minutes until the end of the game + 30 second increment per move, starting with move one (a victory is awarded with 2 points while a draw with 1 point only). After that there will be played another 6 games with time control of 15 minutes + 10 seconds (a win is awarded with 1 point and a draw with 0.5 points). A winner is determined based on the summary result of all 12 games. There will be played all games, even if the winner happens to be determined in advance. In case of an equal score there will be played an extra "Armageddon" game with time control of 5 minutes for White and 4 minutes for Black, with a draw affording the victory to the second player.

Game one will start on Wednesday, July 13, at 15.00 p.m. Moscow time. Please watch games online on our website.

Ernesto Inarkiev
 

Ernesto Inarkiev answered the questions of your correspondent after the end of the ceremony.

– Ernesto, why is it the match that you have made up your mind to take part in, this form of competition being so infrequent nowadays? Why has your choice stopped on Boris Gelfand?
– One of the reasons is exactly because of it being a rare form of competition, whereas I have a limited amount of experience playing in matches. When I was a kid living in Kyrgyzstan, I had little experience of participating in competition, and my father organized matches for me - I challenged virtually every republic's top player. At present, speaking career wise, I have found myself in a similar situation: since I lack experience playing against the world's strongest chess players, the idea of holding a similar match came to the fore. No less important is that running in parallel will be a children's tournament: this will surely contribute to promoting chess in Ingushetia. 

– All in all, why did you decided to invite none else but Boris? 
– Firstly, he is an immensely powerful chess player and has until this day remained one of the world's strongest players despite some losses in rating. Besides, he is a man being fond of chess and will not fail to do everything to promote it. When you meet such a person, you get a big boost yourself. One of our most important tasks here is getting in touch with chess fans. I'm sure in that once they see Boris's commitment to chess, they will be influenced significantly. 

 Nowadays they play matches only for the World Champion title. Does one of this fight's aim is to keep an eye to the future as well?
– (Laughing). I think of it as an important and interesting type of experience. In official competitions I have only played short matches as part of World Cup cycles. It also appeals to me that in playing against same opponent your are always getting a great deal of his scrutiny to your soft points. A single tournament game could allow your somehow retouching your weaknesses, while in the match you will never be able to get away with it. Therefore,  a challenging and a lengthy match is a very interesting format for me.

– Could you please tell us about the places which will be used to host the match.
– This is, first of all, the town of Magas, the young capital of the Ingushetia Republic. We will play on the stage of the Cultural Center, whereas one game will take place at a very unusual location - on the observation site of the Concord Tower. Being up there, at a height of 87 meters, offers you a view of not only the entire of Ingushetia, but also of North Ossetia, whereas in clear weather you are also able to overview Dagestan as well. In my opinion, this is one of the most beautiful spots of our country, with the Concord Tower being a symbol of Magas at that. 

There is yet another viewing site in Dzheirakh - a village in the mountains. Ingushetia has really beautiful places with ancient tower. It is worth noting that in their own language the Ingush call themselves "Galgai", which stands for "the towers' inhabitants." In earlier times the Ingush used to reside in towers, which was convenient not only from the defensive point of view, but also because alternative types of housebuilding in the mountains is anything but easy. The Dzheyrakh District has ancient towers, which grow right out of the mountains. They are very nice-looking and solid and have successfully survived up to this day, being in a perfect shape. 

Some games will be also played in Nazran -- the largest town of Ingushetia and the former capital of the republic -- as well as in Malgobek, the City of Military Glory, where fierce fights took place during the World War II. It thus adds up to a total of four locations: Magas, Nazran, Malgobek and Dzheirakh. 

The match billboards are posted all over the town
 

We wrap up the report with a small bonus for our readers. Shortly after winning the European Chess Championship, Ernesto Inarkiev filled out the questionnaire of the German "Schach" magazine. With the kind permission of the Schach's editorial office, we hereby present the extracts from this questionnaire. 

– What would you switch over to should tomorrow chess suddenly disappear from your life?
– Because chess has been in my life since the age of seven, it would have been a blow, but the world is full of a lot of opportunities and I'm sure I would have found something to my liking. If I need to come up with an immediate answer, it would have been either business or aikido.

– What influences the development of modern chess positively and negatively?
– In my opinion, the latest 10-15 years have seen a perfect development of chess. The worst thing I saw was when people used chess for scandals and confrontation against one another. I am sure such developments strongly discourage those who are not yet acquainted with the world of chess. On the other hand, a positive influence is any chess event or undertaking. Even if two friends get together at home in the evening to have a cup of tea and play some games of chess, it has a positive influence on the development of chess.

– Who was unduly exalted and equally unfairly undervalued as related to the history of chess?
 It seems to me that in general both life and the world of chess gravitate towards fairness. It is just that success requires different type of qualities and that it is not always purely chess skills that end up determining the case. It sometimes happens that someone was playing seemingly better and deserved victory more than his opponent did. However, when you come to give it a more detailed consideration, it usually turns out that he either failed to cope with nerves, or lacked energy or something of the kind; in general, the decisive role was played by some other then chess-related factors. Namely, he went down by the sum of all factors, and thus the overall result was still fair.

– Which topics should be highlighted more in the chess press?
– The best that chess has to offer to the people of the world is developing their thinking capabilities. This topic deserves serious study and coverage in mass media.

– What other skills would you like to learn or what is it that you regret not having mastered yet?
– I have nothing to regret about. However, there is a lot of knowledge that I would like to see under my belt, such as mastering more languages (Ingush, German, Spanish, Arabic), getting to know more about history, physics, etc. At last, the most important thing for me is to come in grips with the main secrets of chess. I am sure that I will be able to catch up with yet a lot of unknown things for me.

– What is it that you do and do not like about yourself?
– There is nothing that I do not like about myself. Your shortcomings often serve as an extension of your positive sides, and one can rarely do without the other. Both my positive and negative sides belong to me and I'm ready to take responsibility for them.

– What is your country's negative aspect that you would like to see rectified, should such an opportunity be granted to you?
– Both my country and humankind as a whole has yet many things to get improved. The main thing that people stop regarding each other as antagonists, let alone as enemies. We were all born here on Earth. Playing chess enabled me to get in touch with people from various countries and I have seen that there is a lot that we have in common. If all resources that humanity has spent on wars would have been spent on the quality improvement of life on Earth, it would have been a completely different life by now. I hope that we will come to it someday.

– Which three books could you recommend for other people to read?
– I would not be able to single out any three books, even in any individual genre. Besides, what you managed to glean from reading is even more important than what you have actually finished reading. In certain cases, one sentence gives you an immediate understanding of a lot of things, whereas in other instances even as many as ten books might not be enough for that purpose. It is not with small pleasure that I currently read the book "The Entertaining Greece" by Gasparov. The history of Greece is treated in a very interesting manner and in plain language.

– Which of your games is the most interesting one?
– For me games are very much like books or movies - is it really possible to single out any one in particular? Fortunately, my games include vivid offenses, tricky endgames, and strategically complex patterns. In the near future, a book of mine will be published in which best examples from all genres will be presented.

– Which one of your achievements could you boast of in particular and why?
– Boasting is not a good thing. Everything I happen to know in this life I have come to learn through other people. I am grateful to them and I understand that my results without those people's contribution would have been quite different.

I rate the birth of my son Robert as the most important event of my life. Taking the win of the 2016 European Championship has so far been the biggest success of my career.

– Which person would you happily trade your fates with for a single day and why?
– It would be either President of USA or President of Russia. It is not that I take any particular interest in any of those two persons or the power itself. It is rather that President is bound to face a huge number of tasks at once and do so while taking a great amount of responsibility. It would be interesting to see how I handle this situation and it would also prove useful experience at that. However, it has to be for no longer than one day!