2007 Biel Chess Festival

Carlsen, Motylev and Onischuk leading after three rounds

Main group of the Biel Chess Festival, one of the strongest summer events alongside Dortmund, saw its start on Sunday, July 23rd. Unlike the couple of previous years, this time its single round robin with ten players.

Three rounds have been played and Magnus Carlsen, Alexander Motylev and Alexander Onischuk are leading with 2 points each. Another Alexander, World Chess Championship participant, was struggling in inferior position to score two draws and one loss. Loek van Wely is off again to another poor start.

Alexander Motylev and Alexander Onischuk

First round: Carlsen won a wonderful Rook and opposite-colored Bishops ending against Bu. Particularly neat was his last move 84. f7. Judit Polgar celebrated her birthday by beating Van Wely with Black pieces. It was another of her trademarked "hit all over the board" display and Loek cracked under the pressure. Onischuk sacrificed an exchange for strong initiative against Radjabov's Kings Indian, but Teimour found resourceful Knight sacrifice to force White on moves repetition.

Second round: Alexander Onischuk performed didactic plan against Grischuk's central pawn mass and scored important point. Carlsen held inferior Ruy Lopez Open against Judit Polgar, after she showed some irresolution in the follow-up. Pelletier enjoyed opening initiative against Motylev, but White's timely Queen for two Rooks exchange eliminated danger.

Judit Polgar and Bu Xianghzi

Third round: Bu Xianghzi took the advantage of his first game with White pieces. His original build up against Polgar's Tarasch-like defence paid off when she started to drop pawns. Facing Queen's exchange to lost endgame or deadly attack against the weakened King, she gave up. Van Wely was pressuring on Motylev's centralized King, but his own f2 weakness proved to be decisive factor in the game. Grischuk misplayed against Kings Indian and allowed Radjabov to seize the advantage. Yet, 37. e5 positional sacrifice boiled things up, as Radjabov wanted to counterattack and give couple of pawns in return. After the complicated tactical struggle, game was driven into drawing wrong-colored Bishop endgame.

Round 3 standings:

1-3. Magnus Carlsen (Norway 2710), Alexander Motylev (Russia 2648) and Alexander Onischuk (United States 2650) 2.0
4-8. Judit Polgar (Hungary 2707), Yannick Pelletier (Switzerland 2591), Boris Avrukh (Israel 2645), Teimour Radjabov (Azerbaijan 2746) and Bu Xianghzi (China 2685) 1.5
9. Alexander Grischuk (Russia 2726) 1.0
10. Loek van Wely (Netherlands 2679) 0.5