Welcome everybody to our special edition of chess cafe, Russia and China on board. I'm featuring our esteemed panel of guests. I am very excited to welcome all of you. I mentioned just a moment ago. My name is Alyssa Stone. I am the senior director of programs and community engagement here at Mechanics Institute and I'm so excited to have all of you joining us this afternoon or evening depending on where you are. Before we begin, I would like to introduce folks who are new to Mechanics Institute to our wonderful organization founded in 1854 Mechanics Institute is one of the oldest institutes institutions on the West Coast of the United States. Our mission is to provide a center for intellectual and cultural advancement. Located in the financial district of San Francisco, Mechanics Institute serves individuals and families throughout the Bay Area offering a vibrant library with full time professional staff, expert instruction and competition in chess and a full calendar of engaging cultural events programs and classes. One can join the institute for small and many of our activities and services for members are also open to check out our full offer. I would like to join us again for an upcoming event, chess tournament or class or film, we have something for everyone. For this special edition of chess cafe, a bit different than our usual chess cafe, we have an expert panel, including international master John Donaldson, feeding master Paul Whitehead, an international master and Marshall chess club vice president Salomaterra to discuss the World Chess Championship matchup between Ding Weren of China and Ian Napamiyachi of Russia. A historic matchup for many reasons which our panelists will explore shortly. We also have a very special guest joining us as well to provide welcoming remarks. The Mechanics Institute is honored to welcome Mr. Osman Adramoff, the Consul General of Kazakhstan in San Francisco to the special chess cafe. Our discussion will center on the World Chess Championship being held in Kazakhstan for the first time. As you should know, a Consul General is an individual stationed in a place of considerable importance, such as a major city like San Francisco to advance international trade and commercial activities. Since January of 2019, Mr. Adramoff has held diplomatic rank of counselor first class as the Consul General of the Republic of Kazakhstan in San Francisco. Mr. Adramoff, with the healthiest positions of charge of affairs of the Republic of Kazakhstan in Cuba, head and deputy head of the Secretary of Exho 2017 of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Kazakhstan, counselor and first secretary of the Embassy of Kazakhstan in Spain, as well as first, second, and third secretary roles in the Embassy and Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Kazakhstan. Mr. Adramoff graduated from the State Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Kazakhstan Humanitarian Law University. And if all of that wasn't impressive enough, he multilingual in Kazakh, Spanish, and English. Again, he is honored to welcome Mr. Adramoff to provide welcoming remarks during our chess cafe event. Welcome Mr. Adramoff. Thank you so much. So dear friends, good afternoon. First of all, let me express my sincere appreciation for this possibility to join you to be here today with you. So as me and my family moved here more than four years ago, we were looking for a good place for our kids to continue with their journey of playing chess. So learning from the best of competing and the best and team with the best opponents in San Francisco. So we decided that the game institute would be a little much amazing experience playing chess over there. So in my opinion, just keep our kids healthy. So it's physically demanding as well. So, demanding, they're practicing openings time. So, everything is that I can use my kids. So, I must say that chess players practice sportmanship etiquette is extremely important in chess and it's a part of education for them as well. Not only to be a sportsman, but to be an educated person to be polite to respect their opponents. And the most important thing I think I think for them, not only to win, but to lose as well and know how to lose. It's like experience as well for them. Chess is universal, you know, like people who are teachers so perhaps the peak of sport employment compete for national glories the Olympics was the World Cup chess has similarly filled people's national imagination such as when Bobby Fisher challenged Boris Spansky. So my parents told a lot of about this place as well as the World Championship in 1932. You know, it's the height of the Cold War. This competition between an American and the Soviet player was watched by millions, especially in my country as well. The former Soviet Union. Now we are independent country Kazakhstan so, but we have our own history as well. I would like to emphasize that Kazakhstan chess players are among of the best chess players around the world, especially our young chess players like Bibi Sarasso Baeva now she's showing a great results in India. Today this young Kazakh chess player gets the highest ranks in chess all over the world. For example, two time well chess champion from Kazakhstan recently got the highest place in the Grand Prix that took place in New Delhi. So, people from Kazakhstan are well chess as many other people from all over the world. Today is a beautiful sportsmanship between one of the strongest chess players and learn from them. I wish good luck to all the participants and stay strong. Once again, let me express my sincere appreciation for all you are doing for kids, especially for kids with mechanic institutes. My kids every month like strongly preparing for all these scholastic championships during I mean every month so it's I think one of the best experiences in their lives. Sooner or later we'll leave the United States because we are diplomats but I think these tournaments will be always in their hearts I mean of my kids in their hearts and they will. Remember it for whole their lives. Once again thank you so much and it's my pleasure and and honor to be with you today. Thank you so much for your attention. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much. We are so so glad that you are joining us today and we hope that you don't leave the United States too. We hope that you will get a chance to grow up playing chess here at Mechanics and wherever they go. I'm very, very excited. I am the news. I am Salma Tara, who is the vice president of Marshall chess club. Paul Whitehead, our chess room coordinator and feet a master. And I am john Donaldson, previous chess room director here Mechanics Institute and chess guru at large international at large. So, a quick introduction for our three panelist. Salma Tara was the US junior chess champion of 1967 earned his international master title in 1976 and was a chess professional from 1972 to 1983. Salma was a technology master on Wall Street from 1983. Salma is the current vice president of the Marshall chess club foundation. John is the chess room coordinator for Mechanics Institute. He is the feet a life master and former US junior chef again, and international master. I am john Donaldson. John Donaldson is the author of numerous books on chess and was the Mechanics Institute chess room director for 20 years. John in the 14 time champion and I captain of the US Olympic team leading them to gold at the end of the year in Azerbaijan. I'm very pleased to welcome our panelists now and I'm going to pass it right along to Paul. Thank you to the chess cafe.  We're going to look at the chess cafe. And pretty much that's it. Folks who best game so this is kind of along the same lines and just before I share my screen about the showing the games to sell or john you guys have anything to add to what I've said. Actually, I was thinking about this these two first two games Paul. And I was thinking historically about what's going on. Nepo just looks incredibly relaxed. And ding it just seems to be star struck to some extent and I think that people don't realize that playing in a world championship matches incredible pressure first of all, every, instead of playing in a tournament where maybe every other game you're playing somebody you should be you're basically playing the first of the best player in the world so every day you get up it's not going to be an easy game you know that right off the bat. But it also seems that historically what has happened is incredibly strong players have won the candidates which of course is required to play, play the world champion, and many of them on their first try did not succeed because I think there's something about a world championship so once I was thinking of is Smith's love one of the first two candid was the first candidate match was in 1950 which was one by Bronstyne, but Smith's love played and he won two candidates in a row there are a few people who want to candidates tournaments in a row. The first one he played by Vinik and the match was tied in those days the champion retained his title. The three years later, he again won the candidates tournament and the and then in 1916, Spassie was clear strongest player in the world in three matches in a row. Paris was an incredible player, Gellar and Tau and he qualified to play as a world championship, got on to the big stage and guess what match the protrusion. Three years later showed up again, Larson and Courtenoy. This time he figured it out. I think he was you know used to being on the stage he was used to playing protrusion and he won. And I was kind of looking at Nepo today going, you're not playing Carlson again on the other hand, you don't look like you're really worried about what's happening here and I think people don't realize that that experience is extremely important for that. So that's for that second match and and every one of those play I don't know if Nepo is going to win necessarily and I don't think this matches over by any means, but I think it's very interesting that that stage at the nerve. That's a great intro to this match to our discussion for sure. I mean, actually, in the, in the, something was saying, how come the players are never at the board. I think Ding is very nerdy and going into the rest area where he's sort of out of sight to Nepo. Like you said, maybe he's feeling the pressure. What do you think, John? I would say that how to put it, I mean, when they leave the board they're still thinking about a position so for sure, you know, and they have incredible capabilities to calculate without side of the board so I think yeah you might be just finding his way. But I think it's all right. He did play in the candidates term and he had a very strong start and so, you know, he's just trying to find his way but I would say one other thing is that we didn't mention, you know, the match has been played in. Kazakhstan, but it has a really good chess tradition. It was the host of the 2019 World Team Championship. And, you know, it's not sort of in the chess news, the way that he's back is damaged when the enemy is, but it's still, you know, very much of incoming chess nation. Well, John, do you think that Ding has in the back of his mind that he's potentially the first Chinese world champion? Nepo certainly doesn't have that problem with the many Russian and Soviet world champions. You might find although, you know, they've had plenty of Chinese world champions, they just all been women. They have like over half dozen by now and in fact they're going to have, well, they have two women Chinese women playing for the world title in later this year. You might have some pressure there, but the thing to understand is that while they're very successful and, you know, chess players in China, it's not a national sport by any stretch of the imagination. So it's not like, for example, if it was a table tennis or if it was gymnastics or swimming or track and field, you know, chess is kind of a little bit of an outlier. And it's actually quite impressive how the Chinese have performed when you consider the relatively small baseman players they have to draw from. Yeah, I know John, you know a lot about that. How did the Chinese get so good with such a small pool of players? I mean, do you have any insight into what's going on there? Yeah, I have some ideas because in 2011 they had the world championship in Ningbo, which is a city small town of five or 10 million people. This is about, they locate a lot of their talent from the Chinese chess.  And China has only competed internationally since the late 1970s, that's when the Chinese first competed in the Olympiad in Buenos Aires. So it's been relatively recent, but almost from the start, the early 90s, their women have been like, you know, among the very best. And it's been a little slower ascent for the men, but of course they've won the Olympiad in 2014 and they came back on the Olympiad again in 2018. So they definitely played a very high level. But if you ask me, I would doubt that, you know, we have 100,000 members in the US chess federation and I would suspect that the Chinese have less than that. Considering how many people live in China is, you know, what are the main cities that Chinese play chess in China? Well, see, it's a little bit skewed because if you mean just like play chess or like play at a high level because the system they had, and I don't know if it's still true because of what happened after COVID, but they would have all the strong players living in the same city, living in the same apartment block and moving together. And that's why if you look until like the last three or four years, a lot of those players are deemed being an exception, but a lot of the other ones being classic examples say they all played the slaw as black, they all played the Petrov as black, they were always, you know, very, very technically proficient, very good end game skills. But, you know, it's hard to say that system is still in place because in some ways it's not maybe we're quite the way, if you remember they had a way. He was a player, he crossed 2700 when he was maybe 16 or 17 years old, and he was expecting, you know, that he would easily get to 2800 and he'd become like, you know, a world champion, maybe more so than a ding but he was not a lot stronger than he was when he was 16 or 17, he's still a very fine player. But, you know, it could be that that system that they used where they like concentrate. I think it's a great way to work together that, you know, maybe that wasn't the best. I'm not sure really. Okay, folks, I'm going to share my screen, and we're going to look at the first two games of the world chess championship. Here we go. I did load a bunch of other game draws or something to begin with, but actually the the tournament really started out with a bang, I think, with Nipah really kind of in control of the match so far. I think we had white and I think the consensus was from this game was that he was definitely much better, not winning, but kind of maybe messed it up a little bit. At some point, but let's look at the game. And here I'm going to really heavily rely on John and Sal for commentary to. And Pamiachi is white and ding is black. And I'm not sure if there were any surprises. It's a rolo pes. But maybe right here Bishop takes. Right. I mean this is a move that's been played by Paul Whitehead. But Paul played it differently as we'll see then. Okay. I didn't have any wide into Nipah's training camp. And by the way, I found out that rapport is ding second, which kind of surprised me a little bit, but who isn't a Pamiachi second to you now. I think it's probably Russian players he's worked with the long terms like pop can and there's a couple others that do they have an official second. Yeah, yeah, they're not like super strong players or I mean they're very, very strong. They're most of the people that Nipah has worked with in the past, or, you know, maybe about 2650 2700 T days so in that sense, having reached for the great, you know, Hungarian, you know, world class player as one of Dean's assistants, you know, ding seconds would beat Nipah's seconds if they were to play, play instead of. Instead of course they did not. Right. But I should say that one thing is you might wonder why did White move his Bishop to B5 and to A4 and then capture on C6 when he could have captured on C6 and four, which would be of course the exchange very way and give us a little chess lesson. So a6 Bishop A4. Okay, so instead what happens if Bishop C6 you take you take you D takes right and then White doesn't take the pawn and E5 right but Castles Castles and now black has all sorts of events it's Bishop D6 F6, Bishop G4, Bishop D6, Bishop G4. Right. Queen D6. There's no shortage of black moves. Okay. Shanklin won a nice game against Bishop G4 recently. Yeah. So, but instead White retreated the Bishop to A4. Right. And now Black played Knight of 16 White cast and Black played Bishop C7 and White captures and Black retakes and now White played a lead rookie one to defend the E pawn. Right. So the point here is that Black has fewer choices about how to defend the E pawn. And in fact, the real main move is just to play 97 I believe is what he did in the game. Right. So, so the idea of taking on C6 they call it sometimes the dirt delayed or old. Yeah. The delayed exchange Royal of Pez. Right. Something like that. The idea is that Black has less options. And so White here is interesting White played D4 that's really the kind of, you know, less common approach. The way I've seen Paul play many of his predecessors is to play D3 and Knight D2 and Knight C4 and try to induce F6 by Black. Or try to get Black to put all the pawns in his dark sport bishop. Okay. But here D4 is something different. You know, White's, you know, opening the game up and supposedly Black has these two bishops that should become good then. Well, White's threatening to take on G7 now and very straightforward development. Right. So White has a lead in development. That's one of his compensations in the double C pawns for the Bishop there. White here avoids the Queen trade. Right. After the Queen trade, they're going to play a larger role. Right. Okay. And so White wants to play F3 and attack that Bishop and Right. Getting the Knight before there's a chance to play F3. So yeah, now Knight F5. Actually, I'm sorry, could I just jump in for a second? I was watching the commentary. Move the Knight back to D4 for a second. Yeah. It's talking about this possibility of H3 here with the idea that if Queen takes D4, Knight D5 is a shot, a serious shot. Wow. And I forget that the commentators were Anish Geary and I forget who else, but they were, they were all shocked by this. And they, once they saw it, they said, Nepo will definitely play this. And I believe it wins. So this might have been part of his home preparation. He didn't see it. He didn't play it. He played Knight F5 instead. What is H3 significantly? I mean, it's stronger, but it's not winning. What would happen on Bishop H5, would White actually play G4? No, I think it was Knight F5 now. Sure. And increases in strength. And then you have Queen G3 ideas. They really felt Geary also thought that White had a serious initiative here. Interesting. That is interesting. I'm wondering about, just because, what about the Desperado sacrifice of Bishop H3? There was something here too. Hold on. Well, can you take with a pawn and then Queen D4 play Knight D5 again? Oh, there you go. Yes. There you go, John. There's a theme there. I've never seen that theme before. Right. So what's happening here is that the Knight move, it cuts off the protection of the Queen on D4. And the Bishop will always be hanging on E7. So if the Queen takes on E3, you've got that intermezzo or... Yeah, Queen E3, Knight E7 check, yeah. And if Black captures on D5 with a rook, he's not going to probably get enough for his material. Well, there's still the problem of the Bishop on E7. So Black's just an exchange down and for one pawn it's not going to be enough. Wow. And one of the nice things also, once you get that Bishop off that diagonal is you'll be able to play rook AB1 too. Right. So, but the main thing is, I mean, if you go to Bishop E6 here, then probably just rook AB1, I would think. Yeah. Looks very nice because the Queen's going to probably have to go back to C8. And Queen G3 is coming up. Queen G3 is coming up. Yes. Yeah. Wow. Okay. Interesting. Okay. All right, but instead he played Knight F5 right away. And okay, so Black can't take twice on F5. Because of E17.  Right. Okay. And so here. So, and if Black doesn't capture, it looks like something like Bishop D6, maybe F6 or something. F6 is annoying. Right. Also the Knight on C5 looks like before my trapping at some point. Awesome. Look at that. Yeah. Interesting. Okay. A lot of tactics hidden in these simple positions. Right. And a lot of it's coming about because, well, actually, I wouldn't say White so much has a lead in development, but he has a move in a position where they're equally developed. Interesting. All right. So Black plays 96. Right. And White trades. And now the specter of Bishops of the opposite colors shows up. But White's got this nice position. Yeah. Yeah. Still much nice. And the C7 pawn is a target, maybe. Right. I mean, Black had two Bishops to compensate for the double pawns. And now White has a clear majority and the Black doesn't have a Bishop pair. And while there's also a pair of Bishops, maybe in in-game they might have Josh tendencies, but in a middle game they might work very well. All right. Okay. So this is funny because White, they're doing what he's supposed to do and put, they're doing what they're supposed to do. The pawns on the colors. But it looks funny to see him playing. But the fact of the matter is all the rooks are going to get changed up on the default sooner or later, just because it's the only open file for the rooks. And you can't just leave the other side to, to have it. So even though they're making moves, these kind of temporizing moves, it's just, you know, they're just. Right. Just kind of maneuvering around. They're playing moves that they could have played. Could Black have tried Queen B4 for ads? I don't think it's that relevant. You know, okay. So B6, A3, A5, 92. And here come the rooks. So White just wants to do it so that it's going to become an in-game with Bishop and Knight versus Bishop and Knight. And White will have a better pawn structure. And this was apparently a, not a very good move. C6. Because it opened up an in-road into the Black position. There was apparently no reason for Black to have necessarily done that. But probably if he wants to trade on D3, and then he doesn't want to have the C7 pawning, that's probably why he did it. But you're wondering if he should have just sat still and played by King F8 and try to get his King ready to come to the center of the board for the in-game. And he can't take with the Queen now anyway, because White will trade, I'm sorry, White will trade and then play Bishop C7 and win a bunch of pawns there. So he took with the Knight. And now Queen F4 was very strong. The idea of coming into the 8th. I mean, at this point, the old Russian expression, White's plan was to resolve a winner or draw. There's no chance for Black to do it. All right, here, the red is Bishop C7, so White gets out of the pen, and White plays Bishop D6. And I think Ding is just holding on by a thread here. Yeah. Queen D7. And so if Bishop takes C5, I think Black gets a ton of counterplay with Queen D2. Right, it's the old story that when you have an advantage, you positional advantage, you don't want to cash in your chips too early. You want to only win material when you still keep your positional trance or at least not give your opponent some compensation. So there's no reason for White to hurry here. I'm going to remember that for my next tournament game. I was a very good technician. All right, 93, 96, F4. And this is apparently, this is a very strange moment in the game, I think, because White starts putting his pawns on dark squares now. I mean, what did you think? Commentator. He hated that move. And he also hated H4, which comes very soon. Yeah, White did everything right by putting his pawns on white squares and then starts to do everything wrong by putting back on dark squares. It was very odd. Well, I think he's doing it because he just wants to try to win the pawn on C5 and to try to wrap some space. I think thinking of like Nf5 first is just, because the other option you have is it's hard to avoid a push edge if you don't have the Bishop on D6 defended, which is how things started to work his way out of this mess, I think. Yeah, I think it pretty much, I mean, I think Black kind of, this was a nice move, I think H5. But again, maybe this is another pawn goes on the dark score and yet another pawn goes on the square. It just looked kind of the wrong way to play. Yeah, I think that they were thinking maybe some maneuver with the knight like F1 to E3 and more of G3 thing, but H4 they just instinctively didn't like. And now Black offers a trade of queens and even if he loses a pawn here and here if queen takes D6, queen F7 and I don't think Yeah, but Nf5. Nf4, Nf5 wins for White, I guess, because there's no double check with the knight. No. Right, okay. No tactics. Okay, so instead, Dean brought the Bishop back to defend on C6. Now the knight came into F5, but now Dean is able to force the trade of the queens. And Npomiachi tries to make something here with his advanced e-pawn, but King comes back. Yeah, it seems to be right here. Yeah, I think so. And this thing put bringing the knight to D3 kind of is equal. Again, this is another attempt by, you know, knight takes E6 would be terrible here. Of course. So White takes on C6 because the Black Knight would be better than the White Bishop. And now we're getting into Bishops of opposite color territory and the players agree to withdraw. All right. That game was somewhat exciting, but the next game is absolutely much more exciting. This was today's game. And really, first of all, there was an opening surprise. This time, Dean, of course, is White. So there's alternating colors. And we get H3 here. Right. So theoretical novelty. Right. And I would say that this move, obviously, you know, the smooth suspects, there was a reporter who likes to play a lot of unusual openings that this might have been his suggestion. So this has rapport written all over us. Yes. But, you know, the thing is, why do these guys play games like this? And, you know, why, and not just in a world championship match, but now in modern chess, you see all these opening setups you wouldn't see before. And it has to do with the fact that for these very powerful chess engines, the amount of opening theories, it's just like blown by leaps and bounds. And so if they're like high level players, you know, they can be pretty certain that their opponent has looked at much of what they've looked. It's completely open. I mean, they use computers, the same engines. It's very hard to surprise. So that's why. You spoke like age three. And one, at least I thought that they kind of divide and play exchange variation. And then age three is can be very much part of a white setup. The idea is that it denies blacks pieces and use G for square. So an exchange variation, it makes sense to play age three. Of course you would never play it. So early, if you'd like a nine or 10 report, probably must follow up. The other idea is G four. You know, it's just very, very popular. You know, very aggressive way to play for now. I saw recently a game on not between, of course, these really high rank players, but I'm pretty good players for white played an early age three in the Queens gambit and black played C five playing a, like a Taroche kind of the kind of approach. I think black probably has a number of ways to play here that are probably pretty good. But that's sort of the appeal of playing age three. A non suggested a six, which is kind of a funny symmetry about it. But, but a six is, is a really important move for black. In this picture, instead of I hadn't played it, I'm in this to try to induce white to take on D five, because blacks are into capture and then support the phone with B phone. Right. I just, I saw an on that his first reaction was a six. Yeah, yeah. And, okay. So Nipah took on C four leading and I just jump in for one second. Yeah. Do you find that that thing to me is a very classical player. And I'm not just talking about openings. I mean, he's very, he's very strong. He's very positionally strategically based report has a unique style. I find that a strange combination. Right. Well, the thing to keep in mind that both these players have multiple second and others and some players will, some of the seconds will be on site, but usually just like one or two, it's a little bit too complicated to have more than that. And, and the principal seconds will be there, you know, not just for the chest side of things, but also that, you know, for emotional support and, you know, and guidance. But then there'll be a whole big team back home, you know, in China, Russia, that will be helping in preparation. And. We. Do tasks for everybody to work on and he'll get that material back from them, their homework, and then he'll synthesize the material and present it to the player, you know, or digest all bits, if you will.  And. The problem. Yeah, that could be that they have a friendly relationship. It could be that they have a rapport. Sorry. Okay. All right. Well. Yeah. Apparently to Pamiachi smiled when age three showed up on the board showing just how relaxed he is. During this, during this championship so far. So E3. C5 Bishop C4. This is kind of critical. The goal. Queens gambit to accept H3 means nothing. It's a strange man. So a good, good choice.  So it could be that what things hoping for is that theoretically this position might not be very dangerous for black, but practically Nipo wouldn't have a lot of experience with it. Maybe you wouldn't feel comfortable with that was to say, oh, perhaps, right.  So, black plays Bishop B7 A4. Now it looks like it very much resembles a Moran. And specifically Moran where white plays with E5 instead of E5 and the main theory of the position. If you look at the match that was played between Anand and Kramnik back in Bond, in the 2000s, I believe it was, that match, you're going to get this similar sort of setup where black has the double F pawns, but he has the open G file and he has the powerful Bishop on B7. And now somewhere in here that he said that white was actually had missed some promising way to play, but within like 10 moves, black just ended up with like an overwhelming position. So I'm not sure where it was. I saw a comment by Anand saying that he, there was a position like this where white's rook was on E1 and he was able to put the Bishop back on F1 instead of the pawn. That would be very significant because that would definitely give the King Moran a chance. So it resembles that position, but the white Bishop has to come back to C2.  I mean, this is, this is like Napomniacchi's kind of, well, I think it's anybody's sort of dream. Anybody, yeah. So very difficult position already for white, I think. And I'm, I'm not sure, not having done a great amount of homework on this game. Yeah. But the thing here is just, black has open minds against white's King.  And this F5 break that he played in the King, that just like broke up in a position. Yeah. Wow.  Right. This is like a Rubenstein game. It reminds me of leaving against Rubenstein as all black pieces are attacking. Yeah. And you can't break through on the C file. That's a killer. Yeah. So there's nothing happening on, against black's King. Yes. So he here, the most wanted player like D, Bob or I guess he takes F5, what that seems like, Rook takes G4 or something like that. Right. And then I have to read and capture back with that. Rook takes G2 shape. And then Rook, and then, I mean that like, okay. Let's just, yeah. Check. Right now, H2, or B2 check, H2 check. That looks like it's going to. Oh yeah. You're right. Check. Check. You have to go. I mean, King of one. H6 is coming. This is. Yes. And that's Nate. Yeah. Yeah. I'm sure there are other variations like that. Pretty scary for white. He really can't afford to open up. The, the diagonal like that. So he goes back. He's just played vision B3. Yeah. It's just, it's probably completely lost now. Knight comes back to C6. This is an attempt to plug the G file, but I saw in the Pomi actually played Rook should five. And it was like, boom. You really, you know. That's the thing about him. He just, he plays very quickly. He's a very intuitive player. He's incredible. And I always felt, I've not always felt, but we play Carlson. It's like he was trying to play. Good chess. And that was. Playing good. Good chess. Playing Carlson. Like he was trying to play. Good chess. And that was. Playing. Good chess. Playing Carlson. This. This is him. Black. White is. And. Any comments, guys? I don't know. I mean, maybe it's the same idea. Black is just going to have. You know, the two bishops and the pawns for. Yeah. Seven. Just take on C2, you think, Paul. And then take on E4 again. I don't know. I think, yeah. In case Black's getting in with that. Yeah.  Right. And particularly he's going to have his dangerous queen side pawn. This is just pretty bad. Really bad. As well as the queen side. Pass. Well, that was also maybe want to mention that little trick there. What King H1 was all about is black was threatening Bishop F3 and Bishop H2. Check. Right. Nice. Right. So this is a possibility after Bishop F3. Queen F3 Bishop H2 check and winning the Rook on T. Okay. That needs to make a queen, which she stops with Queen H6. And the Rook strap. And the Rook straps. Yeah. Yeah.  One thing we can say. About the two players is that. Dean has a chance throughout his career. I'm just looking. He got to a very first start, but then he came back very strongly. So. More so than Nipo. I think he's a player. He's a player. Who has a tradition of kind of melting down when things don't go his way. I would say that. Dean is, you know, better set up to. For a comeback, but who really have to do something because. He, he was decisively beaten in this game. And the previous game, he was just, just managed to save it, you know, barely. And that's part. Nipo has managed to get in conditions where it's not comfortable. And so that's what the world championships are about. He's, he's guys are so. You just try to find some place where he's less comfortable. And others. We've looked the games. If anybody wants to, you know, pepper us with interest. Questions or any questions at all about the match or chess or anything, please feel free. I'm not sure how it's going to work out with. Welcome. More than welcome. I think you can unmute yourself and even ask questions. Yeah. So any folks who are interested in asking questions. Welcome. Yeah, we can. Go back and take a look at. I don't know if in the game, if anybody wants to. So what I'm, what I'm in the morning was it. Games are starting for you. It's a little bit. So for us, it's. See, we're not practical. Right. What I remember is that, uh, flying through the United States to, uh, Kazakhstan was perfect because normally when you fly, uh, to Europe before important chess competition, you would want to, you know, quite a few days early to make the time difference. But it's so far away that it's Kazakhstan. It's like between Russia and China, but it's a 12 times zones different from the West coast. So, uh, flying, uh, from the U S on Lufthansa to, uh, uh, Germany to Frankfurt. You miss that overnight, you know, to sleep, if you will. Uh, and then you have to wait several hours. Connecting flight so that you end up arriving on the second day around me in Astana. So if you can manage to stay awake for that period, you'll be very, very tired when you arrive and our team did. And then we finally got to Astana, you know, checked into the hotel. We woke up the next morning at nine o'clock. It felt like normal for us. So that was, you know, not a very common occurrence. So Alexi asks who's going to win the match? Um, Uh, are we taking a poll or, uh, I mean, I think it's kind of early to call like John says, um, ding has shown a lot of comeback. Fight in his, uh, in historically. So we can't write them down. So, uh, I think it's kind of early to call like John says. Um, you know, he's just been working on it. Um, he's been working on it historically. So. We can't write them off yet. Um, Yeah, but I would say having 16 in the first two games. And keeping in mind that they play 14 games and only continue on. It's the match. Five at a faster time control. I would say that Nipo, you know, if the odds were like. People. I would say in general, I would say that the odds were not the reason that his experience, uh, you know, in a previous world championship match that Dan lacks. Uh, I'd say the odds for his success have definitely gone up, uh, uh, significantly after these first two games. So it's going to be really interesting to see what happens in this next game because, uh, you know, the big, uh, work or day will be like to be solid probably and just stop just like a good error free game. And for Nipo, you know, he's going to want to try to increase that lead. And of course, what we saw in the match between, uh, the only option Carlson is that, uh, you know, you know, you can get down one game is 14 games and that's very realistic to have a chance. You're going to get a lot of whites. You can pick your moment to try to come back, but you get down to two games. Then you're like, like right on the precipice. And if you get down three games, then, you know, it's pretty much over. Uh, so, so I would sort of, sort of ding that the order is block this next game. And then the first chance in the following game, but not trying to overreach because, uh, you know, he's, he's in there's a danger right now. If he, if he loses another game and he's going to really be in the hole that you might never be able to get himself out of. Yeah, he has to find his footing and just, you know, he's got to calm down. I think it's time to make a boring draw. Um, if he can. Yes.  And play good chess. Right.   It's very comfortable and just grinding, grinding, grinding, But of course what makes these guys really great is that, they're really good at everything. And one of the skills that, uh, almost no players in the world, except for they have, like the defense slightly unpleasant positions. They seem to do it after this thing, you know, that, all the time, but these guys like they like never seem to, you know, they can get just really, really, really takes a lot to be. I had another thought. I mean, Paniachi really wanted about him being really a serious challenge to Carlson in this in an upcoming World Championship match. What do you think his chances were? I mean, he's a, he clearly botched his first try, but would he have stood a better chance against Carlson and maybe that might have had something to do with Carlson backing out of the World Championship match? I mean, I'm not certain that the Paniachi is not really a dangerous opponent. Well, he's a dangerous opponent, but Carlson's Carlson, and if you look at, there's like 50 loveborn standing between the two. I think he would have been better than he did the last time, but he would have lost. And yes, he would definitely have lost. You know, to Carlson, the thing that there's a couple of factors in playing one is that, for example, when Kasparov defended his title, it was every three years, not every two years. Right.  And then I think the second thing is that in the case of Carlson, you know, compared to Kasparov. And Kasparov was playing these World Championship matches, the preparation time was maybe like, you know, three or four months. Now it's maybe like six months to nine months. That's what it takes to really prepare for one of these matches.   So, you know, so it's clear that there are arguments to be made both ways. I mean, there's a lot of really great players now they shouldn't have to wait three years to have a practical title, but considering that, you know, if you have to play two to nine months for a match, and you're playing one of these matches every two years, it means like you don't have many, many opportunities to play in other tournaments. And so I think that's part of it. I think also though, you saw that this move age three and four that, you know, who could have guessed that like you would see a move like that. You know, I mean, all of you know you're not supposed to move here for your king way, and you're not supposed to move those ponds in the opening either. So what are these guys doing. And I think also that, you know, who could have expected I remember when I first started playing chess in the early 1970s, we had a member of our common chess club and his name was John Ward. He was a nice guy. And he used to always play the London system. And they call it like the pensioners opening. And it's like, there was like no, no, you know, regular chess player wonder if I got the London system.  And like all these players Carlson included are playing the London. I mean, like, why. And the reason why is, is Jonathan to still setting his recent new in chess interview. If you could take one thing back in life what it would be, he said engines.  And, you know, this last week and I saw Jim Tarjan when a tournament in Reno Nevada, and I remember using chess engines. Oh, no, no, no, no, no. He would just a couple of times during the tournament is analyzing his games in between rounds. You know, at Larry Christensen, maybe 25 years ago he referred to the first people that started using chess base is the army of the iron bus. And by using these people would just like park themselves and just, you know, spend eight or 10 hours every day studying chess and using these computer engines. You know, now the greatest talent that the really good players have is they can look at computer evaluations, and they can appreciate, you know, in a very subtle fashion, not really crude one, where sometimes the computer will say equals, but it can play like, you know, really perfectly. And other times equals, it's like, you know, really easy use. And that's a kind of an exaggeration, but, but at the really high level they can find situations that are like, you know, more nuanced. Okay, it says it's equal now you show me how to draw the position. Yeah, right. Maybe it's a position where they, they turn up the tension and, you know, the guys a little bit tired and, you know, he gets a little, he spends a little bit more time in the clock and they kind of like use all those elements together to try to craft their main chances. You know, a couple of things I'm thinking as you guys are talking. Carlson didn't know who was going to win the candidates when he started hinting that he was not going to defend his title. Right. Yes. I don't think it was it was fear of napomnyachi. No, no. And I also think, I think it was a botvinic quote he once said and the two what John was just saying about defending the title every two years is very important botvinic who used to do three years and of course you always play the next year because he always said it took one year out of your life to play a world championship match. And I don't think he's talking about losing that match prepare and preparing his feeling was he was going to die a year sooner because of all it took out of you. Right. So, which means botvinic should have lived to be like 100. Instead of I think he died in his mid 80s. Right. Yeah, yeah, he should be around for longer. I think there's some questions in the chat but I just the one quick thing that you guys talked about much earlier. I found that troubling that thing is sitting in the room instead of sitting across him as opponent. We spent all this time and during covert going, gee, I wish I could play over the board of you know like you know my opponent and everything else and that he's not even sitting across him nepo it's almost like he doesn't want to be there which is bizarre to me. And I always read when I see something like that I refer I think of in my 60 memorable games Fisher was playing troponovich who was basically a draw master nobody was able to beat him. And Fisher won the game but he at some point he says something like he was he was thinking about a move. And he said all of a sudden troponovich got very very still and very quiet and Bobby felt that troponovich was sensing his brainwaves. And he immediately saw the cheapo he was about to go into and I, and I think I'm serious about I think had he not been sitting at that board, sensing his opponent and getting his, you know, feelings of what the mood was, etc, etc. He very well might have fallen on the trap or if you've been sitting in a room by himself, he might have fallen in the trap. I think there's something about over the board chess that you have to sit across from your opponent and have an idea what he or she is feeling at any given moment and in poker they call it tells right I mean you're always looking for that. But I mean, I mean, Korshnow I was Korshnow and spasky but I mean, didn't Korshnow I always or it was spasky kept going out of the room and, or looking at the demo board or something like that I was there, there's 78 match, and it wasn't first It was, I think, a candidate's final to determine who would be the challenger for the championship. And there was really bad blood between them. It was one of the most contentious high-level matches of all time. And that was the world championship match. That was 78. Or did you like? No, not. Spassky, sorry. Sorry. Yeah, it was before that. And Spassky at one point took to wearing swimming goggles at the board. And at one point, fortunately, it was like three or four games ahead. And it looked like it was going to be over. But then he lost like three or four games in a row. Right. And it's quite a dramatic match. And there were allegations that Spassky was using. Spassky just before their match, he said, when you're playing Spassky, again, he's sitting across the board from him.  Right. But of course, another world championship match where the players used an actual world championship match where both players were not at the board. At the same time was the match between... Grammick and Tupelo? Yeah, Tupelo and the gate. And then they started alleging that there were all sorts of, you know, go to the restroom and find inspiration. It was a very strange match, what can one say? So such things have happened before in the chess world. I know of no bad relations between Ting and Nippon Miyashiki. I don't think that would be the case. It's not like, you know, obviously they both want to do well, but they don't mean to shield for their opponents. You know the top players much better than I do. Or I mean, I don't know them hardly at all. But I mean, there's a real, they're really collegiate together, it seems to me. Like that there's not much bad blood now between the top players.  I think there's, I mean, there's a couple of reasons that it can readily demand. One is they play against each other. They're much, much more frequently. And two, there's just a lot more money involved.  So I think that, you know, it's like the guys that play in the NBA playoffs. They, they, they really want to do well. But on the other hand, they, they, you know, they're also getting like, you know, tons of money to play. Alexi, as asking about spectators at World Chess Championship matches. What's the question? Do they allow them even like in the rooms? All the allegations about electronic cheating and all that kind of stuff. Are they even allowed, are spectators even allowed at World Chess Championship matches? I would probably, yeah, I don't know. But I know the answer. Yes, Sophia. No, they have, they have like a, now they have a screen where they can't see the spectators. So the spectators are behind a screen. I mean, I think the most spectators was Magnus versus Vishy. If you remember that match, the first one. Was it in New York? No, that was in India. That was, I think it was in Chennai. That had a ton of spectators, but they had, you know, they had a blackout screen. So the players can't see the spectators at all. And the matches that they had in New York, that one really felt like a fishbowl. You could walk in, but they only had enough room for about 30 people at a time. Did sell. I thought they couldn't see out. They can't see out. They can't see the spectators. They can't see them at all. They're blacked out. But this site looks like they can see them. I don't know. I got a weird feeling because it feels like a circle. Did anybody watch it? Like the opening ceremony kind of thing? When they did the walking tour? No. It was kind of, it felt very sort of round and very open like this. Because they were in a hotel and the St. Regis, which is obviously a beautiful hotel. So just looking at it from an organized this point of view. And they seem to have some sort of like seating behind there, but it was very empty. There was a lot of seats open. So there wasn't many. There was only like 20 spectators. Alyssa, I don't know if you're seeing anything in the chat. I always, I see comments more than questions. I do see that Mike Walder is offering to show some analysis. Is that right, Mike? Yeah, I haven't seen many questions. One, Jeff came in from Michael Anderson about did they learn and change hotel? And otherwise we have some comments from earlier from Mike offering to show some analysis. But if there are any additional questions, please feel free to pop them in the chat or feel free to unmute yourself if you'd like to ask your question directly.  Well, no, not Stalingrad, it was Leningrad, yeah. Right. Yeah, if you wanted to take a look at two positions, there are two that you actually, one of them you stopped on. I'm going to take it quickly, Mike. Is it game one, Mike? Both games. The one where H3 was suggested. Right. In this game, okay, in this game, we can go back to Nitex F6. Okay, second here. In this game here, yeah, if instead of Nitex F6, if you played Nitex C5, white is slightly better. It's a small advantage, but white is slightly better. Nitex F6 was not... Opening the G file was almost suicide there. Yeah. So in this case, it's white who gets the G file open, right? Bishop C5. No, you can take back. I'll clean it. You want to take on that. Oh, yes. So what happens here exactly after Nitex C5? Yeah, it's just a slightly better position for white. How does Black play here? So Black can go ahead and... He has to take. Right. And now, you need a good move for Black, probably. Which is why he's slightly better. Right, but still, what does Black play here? This should be 4 or something, or... He needs to try to regain this pawn quickly. Right. Maybe Queen C7 or Wook C8 or... Yeah, I'm trying to remember what they said. I'm sorry I don't... After Queen C7, I might play Bishop D2, Queen take a C5, Wook C1. Yeah, again, you're getting your development out quickly. And then, of course, the question is, what's the knight doing on A5? Right. So maybe it's Wook C8? That looks right. Wook C8. Like Queen E2 because of Knight B3. So I think the pawn... And you can't play E4 either. Well, Queen E2, Knight B3. Wook B1. Oh, and then you take back with the knight on C5. Yeah. Okay. And White would have the two bishops, and I can see that. What was the question about the other game? So the other game where you had played that H3, right, showing that tactic, that is something that Geary pointed out, but he needed sacrious help to find it. In the opening, Paul. Yeah, in the opening. Early middle game. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Move forward. Yeah, the bishop's on G4 or something. Okay. So on H3, the only move that keeps this under control for Black is Rook E8. Protecting the bishop. Now if you change... You're going to take on D4. I would attack in D4, yes.  But now Knight D5 doesn't do anything. So if pawn takes bishop, then you can play Queen takes D4. Again, White... Better than pawn takes bishop, White can maintain a small advantage by playing... Don't take the bishop. Play Queen to G3 instead. And White is slightly better. Okay. Those are interesting comments. Yeah. Yeah. Again, that was Geary, not me, but... I was watching that. My Geary... Geary, he snuck a look at the engine. Yeah, he said that. Yeah. He said that. I will say this. Geary, he's a... Who was here at the Mechanics Institute, by the way, during the turn of the hotel in San Francisco, he knows incredible about chess, and he's very... He can be very funny, too. Yeah. He's a very good sense of humor. He does. And he's the new CEO of chess.com. Right, right. Which looks like it'll soon run out of things to take over in the chess room, and it'll have to be to other... Or at least air chess. Other parts of the world to take over. Alexi, how's your new job? I've been Chief Science Officer for a year for Chessable, but now, yes, I am part of chess.com as well. Right. See, I told you, everybody, chess.com. I could say something funny there, not me. So there's side events, interesting, of course, there usually are. It's... I noticed that Irina Krash made the trip out there. She's doing the commentary. Yeah, that's really terrific. It's great to see her there with Anand. Who are the other commentators on other sites that I haven't seen? Is anybody... Jerry must be, right? I can't find Yasir, but he must be doing it, right? I don't think he is. He made a lot of comments on Spiegelman's Twitch today. Spiegelman's only... Right, but he's not doing any commentary work. But that's interesting. And it's not just Krash and Anand. There are other people who are regularly commenting. Who are those commentators? Spiegelman? Spiegelman's doing it on... He has his Twitch channel that he's doing it on. You can get there from Leach. So the chess.com team includes Fabiano, Karawana, and... That's right. ...And also Tanya Sachev and a few other people. So that's the chess.com commentary team. You, Paul, are talking about the Fide commentary team, which is Irina Krash and Anand. In the early rounds. And then in the later rounds, it's Irina Krash and Dubov. But last night or the night before, I thought it was Geary and Narragitsky. That's what... Yeah, they have a huge team that includes Narragitsky and Geary and Karawana. They're going to rotate people around and Tanya Sachev. So chess.com has a lot of people on that team. So what happened to Spidler and Yasser? Those two are my favorite. They're hysterical. I really like Spidler and Yasser. And Leco. Yeah. Well, Leco. Yeah, but Grushik. Where's Grushik lately? Not around.  Because, you know, he's a five-time Russian champion. He's quite a player. Yeah. He also speaks English better than all Americans. He's bad. He's a great commentator. Usually, he's with... What's his name? Gustav Sachsen. Yeah. Yeah. And that's a great team. Lots of fun. It is. I think one of the greatest commentary teams I saw was Spidler, Grushik commentary on the Karajakan and Karawana matches. They commented on those matches. Totally fantastic. High-level. Without a chess engine. They didn't use chess engines. Right. The situation now, though, is, I mean, like for somebody like Grushik, I'm trying to think when he played last. Yeah. Maybe I'm missing something, but I don't think he's played in a long time. For a while. And of course... I think he played in the Blitz. Did he play in the Well Blitz? I think he played in the Rapid in the Blitz or just the Blitz. But I don't think any classical chess. No, I don't think so. And his wife, Katrina Lana Lagna, she's, you know, born Ukrainian, born self.  Everybody knows about Karajakan, because these are interviews about the Ukraine-Russia conflict. And Dubov, he, like, you know, he, well, pretty much all the top Russian players, with the exception of, with the notable exception of Karajakan, have been, you know, very much against the war. And now we see, like, you know, a number of players have changed their country of affiliation. Or not being heard from. Yeah, or just not playing. No, a good point also, is that the reason why Ding is playing is because Karajakan was pushed out of the, out of the candidates tournament and Ding was his replacement. That's how it developed in a second. Right. And Karajakan didn't receive a special award, like some sort of, like, you know, Hero of Russia from Putin, by way of compensation. Yeah, yeah, he's, he was born in Crimea, that is Karajakan, and, you know, he, he's never been rated, like, in the top three in the world, I don't believe, but did remarkably well, like in all the candidates tournaments he played, and one Norway flying. And also, you know, he was tied with Carlson until they got to the, the tabernacles.  But, but yes, I'm not so attracted to political ideas in my opinion. Wasn't Karajakan, Napalmne actually second? Well, I'm sure, yeah, at one point during the World Championship match with Carlson, I think he was his second. Yeah, he was. And people blame Karajakan, blame the results on, on, well, some people thought that Karajakan was not the right second for Napalmne actually. But the sort of the emphasis on solid play and some of them was not in Napalmne actually style. This is an interesting World Championship match, I think it, it could get really, you know, if, if Dinkin come back and, you know, make a showing for himself, this could be a great match. But if he wins one game, this confidence shoots up and you got Nepo sort of doesn't like to lose. I mean, he plays much weaker after a loss. Yeah. But yeah, I would love to see something besides 4-H3. I don't know. I mean, 1-H3. It probably says something from my age that I just, you know, yeah. I would like, you know, to see, you know, more sort of tradition or fight. But those engines really, you know, the risk is you'll play like 25 minutes of theory and everything will just peter out. So there's a reason why they could do what they did. I have a feeling, Magnus, Mike, Mike Anderson is asking, why isn't Magnus commenting? I have a feeling that we're going to hear from Magnus about this match at some point. Right now, but the other question is, there seems to be a overdue in issuing the report. What report? The report about Magnus and Nahans. And oh, here we go. It was supposed to come out in early April, so, you know, when will that report come out? Maybe they were waiting until after the championship to not sway the politics of things.  There's a kind of a standing joke now in chess cafe. Can we get through a chess cafe? Five minutes away.  Come on. Are there any more questions about the 2023 World Chess Championship? Thank you, Alyssa. I guess I don't usually attend chess. But I can't say. We'll be playing again in May. He has two tournaments. He's playing in at least one in a very strong opens in the Middle East. Good. Yes. Good. I saw a picture of him in looking very dashing and sort of in place in New York in one of the chess squares. It's on the Upper West Side. That's correct. All right. OK. Thank you, everybody, for showing up. Yes.  We have P. Daymaster Paul Whitehead. I am John Donelson and I am and Marshall Chet's club, the white president down in the tarot. We also had our very special guest at the top of our hour with the console general of Kazakhstan, Mr. Adramov, who joined us to give some opening comments about the World Chess Championship being held in their country for the very first time. The historic matchup between Ding Lunar and China and the Ponyaski of Russia. Any closing comments from our esteemed panel? Yes. If you're not already a member of chess cafe, you can join on by going to our page on Jumbila and signing up for chess cafe. We meet every Monday, rain or shine. But not on holidays. And not on holidays. That's right. Thank you. Thank you for putting the link in the chat. And that's it for me.  I noticed that Vinay Bhat, who was a grandmaster from the Bay Area, who developed as a chess player here, he has a new book about his chess career that just came out by a body chess that could well be worth checking out. Well, we'll have to get that in the library, John, for sure. Val any parting comments? Thank you for the invitation. I was delighted to be here. It's great. Good to see you. Thanks. Thanks. I'll see you. Thanks, everybody, for showing up. I think we're going to wrap it up. Yeah, we will put the official portion of our special chess cafe. I will stop the recording and if people want to hang out for a moment longer, you're most welcome.


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