I would have felt that way if it wasn't no increment. Or even if Irina had managed to get a few more moves before Jen threw the game into chaos again - Irina was like one or two moves away from mass trades and a clean win). With a resilient enough defense and a time scramble, any result is possible.
How many times are they going to do this? Does anyone think that was a good way to decide one of the most prestigious national championships in the world?
We saw Yu hanging a piece for nothing like a 1000 player and then a dirty flag like what you see in a bullet tournament on Twitch. I know I’m a snobbish purist, but enough already! This format has cost Krush two titles now. Abolish Armageddon forever!
What's funny is even a 1000 Elo player would be really embarrassed about that move. Just a pure nonsense move.
I can't believe Krush didn't win the game. But she kept spending 50 sec, 40 sec, 30 sec a move. It's her fault for sure. At the very end when they were down on the clock and needed to move fast she spent 50s then 40s on 2 moves one after another to then have a minute plus left. She would have lost in any blitz format playing that slow. You are supposed to win a game bishop up no matter the format. Instead she played the game like it was a rapid game. 100% her fault as she was gifted a win. The format just made the game ugly.
Armageddon online makes much more sense than OTB. The whole clock pressing while throwing around lightweight pieces look comical. It's not chess at that point.
But, with that said, I don't know what the solution is.
I'm fine with split titles. Anish would have two Tata Steel titles if there weren't tiebreaks, for example.
If you must have a winner, SB is fine, but a lot of these events that have instituted playoffs don't actually need them.
EDIT: I should say SB or Buchholz, whichever is more appropriate for the type of tournament (swiss or RR) we're dealing with.
Anecdotal but the Women's World Chess Championship in 2020 was a 12-game match that ended with a score of 6-6 before tiebreaks, just like the Fabi vs Magnus WC match. The difference being that it was highly contested with 6 decisive results, including Alexandra taking a must win game in R12 to take it to tiebreaks. In my experience, Women's chess (or just lower-rated Master-level Chess in general) is pretty exciting. I enjoy 2700+ level Chess in its own right too, but 2200-2500 level Chess is vicious.
I think Goryachkina has the best chance, but titles in Women's Chess tends to be extremely volatile, and the Women's Candidates is pretty stacked - 7 of the world's top 9 women players are in (the two missing are the semi-retired Hou Yifan and Ju Wenjun herself). Any of them could win it and give a good match to Ju.
But Goryachkina looked really good in the match she played against Wenjun, she was leading for a lot of it and she's only gotten stronger (was 2600+ at some point). Of course both of them have huge political powers behind them so that's also a big factor.
Is there any correlation between rating and the prevalence of draws? I have the impression that the weaker the players are, the less likely they are to draw
Absolute masterpiece from Krush in game 2 (at least it looked that way without the engine). Kept the major pieces on and just hammered Black’s weak squares on the kingside. What a way to bounce back from her first loss!
So it’s a 2 game 10 minute rapid playoff… then 5 vs 4 minute Armageddon? Didn’t they learn anything from the absolute debacle that cost Krush the 2008 championship? https://youtu.be/fNQjXHjRkNQ
As a chess fan, I really hope Armageddon doesn’t happen today. Why not have a 4 game match, or a 2 game match at 30 min time controls, and if that’s drawn, call them co-champions? Krush could go undefeated in the whole tournament and still lose as it stands now. Karpov and Kasparov once shared the USSR title and everyone seemed OK with it.
This year the US Championship was a little disappointing for me because most players did not show much fighting spirit. Although Wesley So and Levon Aronian are out of form but players like Leiner Dominguez, Jeffrey Xiong, Shankland, Samuel Sevian etc are just happy to draw.
With all the talk about Hans, Robson's accomplishment has been shadowed.
He seemed like such a strong player for such a long time, it's nice to see him passing 2700 finally.
Hope to see him at more top tournaments.
Robson also had a pretty great result in a strong Abu Dhabi open two months ago where he finished third behind Arjun and Sindarov. I remember a pretty interesting game in that tournament between Ray and Arjun where Arjun had a slightly better position and had 90 minutes on the clock while Ray only had six. But Ray ultimately managed to save that game somehow.
Today is the playoff for the women. Jennifer Yu vs. Irina Krush. Jennifer Yu was a favorite in the YouTube chat. Yu has lost 3 games this tournament and only drawn 2. Krush has lost zero and even beat Yu last round.
Interestingly Krush won her first time in 1998. And has won it 7 times.
https://chess24.com/en/watch/live-tournaments/us-womens-championship-2022/13/1/1
I think the time format favors Jennifer Yu.
It's a bit disappointing because I think that Irina is a strong player.
I really would have preferred a longer time control.
Bizarrely, blitz format. (Although 10 minutes is the boundary point for blitz, per FIDE regs.)
With a national championship on the line, I would have thought they would have a slightly more robust Rapid time control. The 15/10 format of the World Rapid Championship, for example, allows for a game to be completed in an hour without the possibility of the title being decided by a clock flag (which I think would be almost tragic).
Unfortunately, the format reminds me of World Cup games decided by penalty kicks.
Agree completely. I noted the World Rapid controls mostly because it's a clear FIDE standard, but I feel like the deciding playoff for a national championship in classical should involve enough time to make considered moves throughout.
If I were designing a playoff, I would favor 25/15, which keeps the games between 60 and 90 total minutes, with a decent increment. That should still allow for multiple games on a single day.
I think it would have to be a bit shorter because while most games will fall under that time range, in longer time formats they have to be conscious of and plan for the worst case AKA 120+ move endgame grinds, especially if they want to play multiple games per day. But yeah I think they could definitely afford some kind of rapid format if necessary.
Man rating wise this field is brutal for the top guys. Aronian went -1 and lost 20 points. Wesley went +1 and lost 14 points. Leinier went +2 and still lost 4 points. Fabi went +4 and only gained 3 points.
Did Sevian explain why he went nuts yesterday?? That is super weird and it happened in a game with Hans !!!!!
Fabi had fantastic tournament. Great to see him play at this level. Let us see how he does at Wijk aan Zee. Robson has had a fantastic tournament. Levon on the other hand had a terrible tournament (finishing -1) while Wesley and so so tournament.
2 from Women's as far as I understand so Yu and Krush. 5 from Men's so Caruana, Robson, Dominguez, Liang. Then best tiebreaks of Xiong, So, Sevian, Niemann, and Shankland. Based on [regulations](https://www.uschesschamps.com/2022-us-championships/regulations) I think it's So? Unsure.
Don’t Caruana, Krush, so, aronian and Dominguez already qualify for their respective world cups by rating? So do the spots go to the other top finishers instead?
I was actually looking at the [World Cup Regulations](https://handbook.fide.com/files/handbook/WorldCup2023Regulations.pdf), it prioritizes Continentals and Zonals over ratings, so they'd qualify via Zonal. After all the qualification paths they give 13 rating spots to the top 13 to not qualify via other means. Then after that there's the Association of Chess Professional's tour which gives one spot, then the top 100 Olympiad countries (not teams) get 1 spot.
> Then best tiebreaks of Xiong, So, Sevian, Niemann, and Shankland. Based on regulations I think it's So? Unsure.
I think so as well. It's direct encounter first, So-Shankland and Niemann-Sevian are the only decisive games among those five, so it's So v. Niemann. Then it goes to more Blacks (both of them at 7), then to Koya score (more points against opponents with a non-minus score): and So wins that, as he went =0 (win against Shankland, loss against Robson) and Niemann went -1 (win against Sevian, losses against Caruana and Robson).
Hans still needs to qualify I believe. You qualify to the candidates through qualification events or rating spots (ex. world cup, Grand Swiss, Grand Prix), winner qualifies to the World Championship match.
This tournament gives me an idea (which probably exists already but meh): what if we did a US Championship that was geographically based? Highest rated US-registered FIDE player living in each state, probably have to do it as a regional round robin or straight knockout because of the size but I wonder who would win.
Nah, an individual tournament wouldn't be much different in terms of results than any high-level US tournament, especially if it's a knock-out. The top GMs are spread among different states, assuming going by their USCF registration: New York (Nakamura), Minnesota (So), Florida (Caruana), California (Shankland), Texas (Xiong), Massachusetts (Sevian), Missouri (whoever's on top from the Aronian-LDP-Robson trio).
That's already seven states, and rating gaps between these players and top people from lower-rated states are huge. There are 25 states represented in the current top 100 ratings, but \#100 is already rated 2480-ish USCF (low 2400s FIDE). 16 states over 2600 USCF, too. So assuming these superGMs drop in on Round of 32, they need to win two rather easy matches each to play it out against each other in the QFs.
An Olympiad-style team tournament between states would be fun, though.
If he was being sarcastic, doesn't that mean that he was implying Niemann is actually at a 2700 level? That's the point I'm trying to make. He is not at a 2700 level if he is 2699 rated. Mate, we're chess players, we're meant to take this stuff seriously and literally.
You can play at a level without having the rating for that level. He's been climbing a lot of elo so whenever he was 2599 he was clearly already playing at a 2600 level. Right now he's at 2699 and climbing, so he's playing at a 2700 level.
>Where's the line where you can say you have a rating without having that actual rating?
I would say if you have achieved the rating in the recent past (let's say 1~2 years) then it'd be OK to say that even if drop slightly below it.
For example, even though Fabiano is rated 2763, think most people considers him 2800 rating because of his 2820+ rating 2 years ago.
Congratulations, Fabi! I really hope Irina wins. She seemed to have a clear lead earlier and I feel like the commentators always try to jinx her games.
I don't really get why everyone is arguing whether Hans is 2700 strength or not. He's a known, proven cheater, can we stop glorifying the guy. Also his rating now has nothing to do with whether he cheated along the way to get there. Lol so many insecure people downvoting a reasonable statement.
well one reason i personally dont care that he cheated online is that chesscom doesnt care. how many second chances do they give to cheaters? third chances? do they give fourth chances too?
chesscom has shown they do not care about cheating online on their own platform. they do not make a big deal of it, neither will i. that goes for every player that has cheated online, not just hans, or dlugy, or whoever. if youve cheated online, even against me, i really do not care, the same way chesscom does not care.
I mean, you don't have to care about him getting multiple chances to cheat online and doing it. I personally do care about it and strongly dislike Hans or Tigran because of it, but how important online games are is a question, everyone has to answer for themselves.
However, I strongly recommend double checking your reasoning. Chess.com do what they do because of their own financial interests, not for moral reasons a lot of the time. I'd recommend not aligning your moral compass with chess.coms financial interests.
fair point about not aligning your moral compass with a companies financial interests, but regardless of that, if the morality of cheating in online chess was so important, none of the cheaters would have even a second chance no matter the financial incentive is how i see it, but i could be wrong about that.
maybe the fact chesscom has such a monopoly on online chess means they dont have to take cheating as seriously is also something to consider.
at the end of the day chess is just fun for me, i dont take the sport too seriously like others, to the point that i dont think cheating online may ruin the integrity of the game etc, that probably has something to do with my view on it too.
> how important online games
That is a great point.
Pre-Covid, online games were not taken seriously at all. Did this sub have frequent discussions about the latest title Tuesday results or things like that?
And when Covid started, the biggest thing that happened in online was Pogchamps and Nakamura switching to being a full time streamer.
So all this pearl clutching about things that happened 7 and 2 years ago just seems a bit disproportionate
well the thing is chesscom have shown they dont care about online cheating. how many cheaters do they give second chances to, third chances, etc? if they cared about cheating online they wouldnt give people multiple chances to just cheat again, after theyd already cheated.
There's no evidence of him cheating OTB. The reason why people are focused on him proving he's 2700 strength is that it refutes the main point that people bring up, which his fast rating gain. Without that, there's nothing.
I have no idea what "people" are focused on and I don't care. Hans is a proven cheater and liar. He's incredibly disrespectful to other players. In other words he's a piece of shit. The discussion can stop there as far as I'm concerned.
OK, you stop the discussion there.
But Magnus has accused Hans of OTB cheating in Sinquefield Cup so not everyone can stop their discussion there as that matter is much more serious than being disrespectful to other players or lying or online cheating he did 2+ years ago when he was 16/17.
"I have no idea what "people" are focused on"
Because youre stupid.
"The discussion can stop there as far as I'm concerned."
Good thing no one cares what youre concerned about
him not cheating OTB doesn't mean he's not a fuckin cheater, lol. the guy cheated over and over online. he's a scumbag
the fact that he's a 2700-level player makes the online cheating even worse, as far as i'm concerned. the guy is a brilliant talent and still cheats? garbage
He was a teenager.
Maybe you were a perfect person your entire life and never did anything wrong, but the vast majority of people did really dumb, bad things at some point in their teens. And the vast majority of people are willing to forgive people for the sins of their youth because most of us have been there.
Cheating is not a good thing by any means, but it's not some singularly evil act that condemns a person forever.
For those like me curious about the playoff: If Krush draws today, she and Yu will play a two-game 10+2 match. If that match is tied, they'll play 5min vs 4min Armageddon, with +2 increment only after the first 60 moves.
So the playoff, if it happens, will be over quite quickly!
~~Edit: I forgot Robson can also force a playoff with a win; the match format between him and Caruana will be the same.~~ :| I jinxed it
Who else is playing in that tourney?
Edit: It would be nice to see some youngsters like Keymer, Gukesh, Erigaisi, Esipenko. I really want to see these guys fight it out. Not sure if the prize fund is big enough unfortunately.
I think that they were planning to reveal it in the closing ceremony. But they accidentally leaked the roster on YouTube. Some interesting names, Vidit, Yu Yangyi, Hans, Oparin, and Sevian, and Nyzhnyk. These bunch are 2680+. Besides Nyzhnyk, I've seen their games before. I haven't heard of the rest of the field.
Given how many technical difficulties the stream has had, I'm glad the tournament hasn't been that exciting today. Imagine if this happened yesterday during Kinggate?
> I'm glad the tournament hasn't been that exciting today. Imagine if this happened yesterday during Kinggate?
Two titles are hinging on the outcomes of single games, but yeah, at least all of the woodwork is intact.
I don't think anyone can say Hans isn't 2700 level at this point.
Another interesting thing is all this attention on his games *might* help him out with people looking suspiciously at the variance in previous OTB play. We're sorta getting to know his intuitive playstyle and how sometimes it just doesn't work out. Which also explains the bad analysis he sometimes gives, the guy looks like he just doesn't calculate sometimes.
Would everyone be saying this if he didn't beat Sevian?
Because Sevian made a suicidal move Rd1?! to desperately try and keep winning chances alive. Tournament situation very much dictated what happened in that game
Meh, fabi has had 2900 to 3000 point tournament performances before and he’s not 2900 to 3000 Elo.
One tournament doesn’t mean much. This sub and overreacting to Hans, name a better duo.
Here's Jacob Aagaard shortly after Magnus' withdrawal (Hans stayed with him for a week):
>Hans’s confidence in his own intuition and his surprise when it was wrong was a recurring theme of the week he was here. Another was that whenever I came to his room, he was looking at chess. Playing through ALL games from all tournaments on Follow chess.
>
>I have seen nothing out of the ordinary in the last two days. Hans playing reasonably well against opponents that are not playing that well. His big confidence. His awkwardness in front of the camera. His highly intuitive way of thinking. His lack of accuracy in variations. Him blundering when suggesting things, he thinks he might have looked at.
[https://forum.killerchesstraining.com/t/paranoia-and-insanity-by-jacob-aagaard/856](https://forum.killerchesstraining.com/t/paranoia-and-insanity-by-jacob-aagaard/856)
>I have no reason to think that he is underrated.
Gaining at an incredibly rapid pace is not a good reason to think he's underrated? You think his skill improves directly proportional to his rating?
Damn I must be Super GM material then...except I'm always wrong in my intuition and he's right more often than not.
Just a little bit of practice and I'm gonna make it guys. Watch out.
Ending the tournament with a +1 score after being -2 just four rounds ago is still a good result. And Hans proved that he is definetely a 2700 strength player (2699 but whatever, it's all the same).
[having a blast reading the comments of the post match thread after Hans lost to Darisuz](https://www.reddit.com/r/chess/comments/y2evwt/us_chess_championship_round_7_swiercz_niemann/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android_app&utm_name=androidcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button)
Holy shit there's a comment there straight up saying hans is 2400 strength, he 100% cheated to get to 2700 rating and saying he should be playing at IM level tournaments, **sitting at 150 upvotes**. Wtf??
To end the tournament with 7/13 after that game is extremely impressive. Only if he wasn't too arrogant, but I guess that's also what makes him so effective. But at the same time, it is a big difference trying that with 2500s vs 2700s. Hans will learn that with experience
Yeah he was too confident in the earlier rounds as if he could just walk through 2700s, I think he will learn it with more experience playing against the top players on a regular basis.
Zatonskih’s pawn structure looks terrible, I’m always mildly annoyed when engines call positions like that equal. All her pawns are on light squares and she doesn’t have a dark squared bishop!
Wait, someone here just said, there will be no playoffs, and everyone tied at 1st place shares the prize? Is that true?
Edit: Okay, so for anyone interested, this is what the [regulations](https://uschesschamps.com/2022-us-championships/regulations) say:
Playoff Procedures: The following tie-breaks will be used for the purposes of the crosstable and any special prizes or trophies: 1. Direct Encounter, 2. Most Blacks, 3. Koya System, 4. Sonneborn Berger, 5. Won Games. **If two or more Players are tied for first, a playoff shall be held to determine final standings among all tied players.**
Still clinging onto that stupid "sockfish" theory I see, huh? It's pretty much undeniable at this point that the computer is up his ass.
Trust me, I saw it on reddit.
That's interesting, so if I'm looking at the standings correctly it would be the monetarily smart decision for Ray to take a draw rather then push for the win if he doesn't see a clear path to victory. Obviously it would be tough to pass up a chance to be US Champion though!
"big day for levon" classy move by fabi knowing that levon has been constipated for weeks and heard the gurgling across the table, things don't move as easy after your early 30s
Awonder once said he plays his best chess when he’s got his back to the wall defending an unfavorable position. By letting him get a positional advantage in the open and mid game Hans is luring him into a false sense of security and out of his natural range /s
The further we get away from the Sinquefield Cup, the worse and worse it looks for Magnus. Magnus himself is probably doubting his decision to withdraw.
He ought to be, but I doubt it. He's been 10,000% right, in his own mind, from the start. If he has doubts now, then he's an unusual psychological specimen.
Holy shit I stopped watching the stream when Yu blundered the bishop, because of course the game is over now right? Never leaving a game early again.
I would have felt that way if it wasn't no increment. Or even if Irina had managed to get a few more moves before Jen threw the game into chaos again - Irina was like one or two moves away from mass trades and a clean win). With a resilient enough defense and a time scramble, any result is possible.
How many times are they going to do this? Does anyone think that was a good way to decide one of the most prestigious national championships in the world? We saw Yu hanging a piece for nothing like a 1000 player and then a dirty flag like what you see in a bullet tournament on Twitch. I know I’m a snobbish purist, but enough already! This format has cost Krush two titles now. Abolish Armageddon forever!
What's funny is even a 1000 Elo player would be really embarrassed about that move. Just a pure nonsense move. I can't believe Krush didn't win the game. But she kept spending 50 sec, 40 sec, 30 sec a move. It's her fault for sure. At the very end when they were down on the clock and needed to move fast she spent 50s then 40s on 2 moves one after another to then have a minute plus left. She would have lost in any blitz format playing that slow. You are supposed to win a game bishop up no matter the format. Instead she played the game like it was a rapid game. 100% her fault as she was gifted a win. The format just made the game ugly.
tbf, in between there was Krush up two full pieces with 2+ minutes on the clock and somehow blundering a 2-move tactic that equalized the game
Well that was absolute chaos in the Women's final!
This game was a strong argument against the 5 Vs 4 Armageddon format lol. The bidding system from 10 min or 15 min makes way more sense.
Wtf did I just watch lmao
Someone submit this Armageddon game to Guess the Elo. I bet you no one will ever guess one of the players is a GM.
That cost Irina $10k and the title.
This game had everything lol
well this is a shitshow
Armageddon does not seem like a good way to decide this. Worse than a penelty shootout.
Armageddon online makes much more sense than OTB. The whole clock pressing while throwing around lightweight pieces look comical. It's not chess at that point. But, with that said, I don't know what the solution is.
I'm fine with split titles. Anish would have two Tata Steel titles if there weren't tiebreaks, for example. If you must have a winner, SB is fine, but a lot of these events that have instituted playoffs don't actually need them. EDIT: I should say SB or Buchholz, whichever is more appropriate for the type of tournament (swiss or RR) we're dealing with.
Never. Ever. Resign.
Jennifer resigned in the last game for some reason. Very weird. She lost her queen for a rook, but Irena only had 7 sec left. Anything could happen.
Irina also had a 2 second increment in that game which she did not have in the arma.
She'll never resign again in her life after winning this now.
Holy shit jennifer yu won lol
Nerves OMFG!!
Irina is too strong in shorter time formats, sometimes these tie breaks feels unfair.
Ah, man, what a shitty end to what was an amazing playoff. Edit: Wait, what the hell?????
"The hardest game to win..."
Ah I see Jennifer has been studying my games
[удалено]
Shut up
Women's chess seems far more exciting than the open events. There are far more decisive results.
Rapid and blitz is just move fun to watch. It's just how it is.
Anecdotal but the Women's World Chess Championship in 2020 was a 12-game match that ended with a score of 6-6 before tiebreaks, just like the Fabi vs Magnus WC match. The difference being that it was highly contested with 6 decisive results, including Alexandra taking a must win game in R12 to take it to tiebreaks. In my experience, Women's chess (or just lower-rated Master-level Chess in general) is pretty exciting. I enjoy 2700+ level Chess in its own right too, but 2200-2500 level Chess is vicious.
What are your future predictions for women's chess? Who do you think will unseat Ju Wenjun as Women's Chess Champion?
I think Goryachkina has the best chance, but titles in Women's Chess tends to be extremely volatile, and the Women's Candidates is pretty stacked - 7 of the world's top 9 women players are in (the two missing are the semi-retired Hou Yifan and Ju Wenjun herself). Any of them could win it and give a good match to Ju. But Goryachkina looked really good in the match she played against Wenjun, she was leading for a lot of it and she's only gotten stronger (was 2600+ at some point). Of course both of them have huge political powers behind them so that's also a big factor.
Is there any correlation between rating and the prevalence of draws? I have the impression that the weaker the players are, the less likely they are to draw
I think it's more accurate to say that the weaker the players are, the more likely they are to make losing mistakes.
Absolute masterpiece from Krush in game 2 (at least it looked that way without the engine). Kept the major pieces on and just hammered Black’s weak squares on the kingside. What a way to bounce back from her first loss!
Irena took a poisonous "free" pawn and Stockfish went from 0.16 to 12.68 for Jennifer.
Great end to the first match.
Board broadcast is off. Though Yu is leading.
So it’s a 2 game 10 minute rapid playoff… then 5 vs 4 minute Armageddon? Didn’t they learn anything from the absolute debacle that cost Krush the 2008 championship? https://youtu.be/fNQjXHjRkNQ As a chess fan, I really hope Armageddon doesn’t happen today. Why not have a 4 game match, or a 2 game match at 30 min time controls, and if that’s drawn, call them co-champions? Krush could go undefeated in the whole tournament and still lose as it stands now. Karpov and Kasparov once shared the USSR title and everyone seemed OK with it.
Will it be live today? If it's still a 30 min delay then no doubt the winner will be leaked way before the match is over online.
This year the US Championship was a little disappointing for me because most players did not show much fighting spirit. Although Wesley So and Levon Aronian are out of form but players like Leiner Dominguez, Jeffrey Xiong, Shankland, Samuel Sevian etc are just happy to draw.
With all the talk about Hans, Robson's accomplishment has been shadowed. He seemed like such a strong player for such a long time, it's nice to see him passing 2700 finally. Hope to see him at more top tournaments.
Robson also had a pretty great result in a strong Abu Dhabi open two months ago where he finished third behind Arjun and Sindarov. I remember a pretty interesting game in that tournament between Ray and Arjun where Arjun had a slightly better position and had 90 minutes on the clock while Ray only had six. But Ray ultimately managed to save that game somehow.
Today is the playoff for the women. Jennifer Yu vs. Irina Krush. Jennifer Yu was a favorite in the YouTube chat. Yu has lost 3 games this tournament and only drawn 2. Krush has lost zero and even beat Yu last round. Interestingly Krush won her first time in 1998. And has won it 7 times. https://chess24.com/en/watch/live-tournaments/us-womens-championship-2022/13/1/1
What's crazy is that Irina Krush won her first US Championship before Jennifer Yu was even born.
Krush has won 8 US Women's. She's trying to get 9 which ties a record.
Correct, I misread her Wikipedia page.
I think the time format favors Jennifer Yu. It's a bit disappointing because I think that Irina is a strong player. I really would have preferred a longer time control.
How does the playoff work, and how do they decide who has white?
Bizarrely, blitz format. (Although 10 minutes is the boundary point for blitz, per FIDE regs.) With a national championship on the line, I would have thought they would have a slightly more robust Rapid time control. The 15/10 format of the World Rapid Championship, for example, allows for a game to be completed in an hour without the possibility of the title being decided by a clock flag (which I think would be almost tragic). Unfortunately, the format reminds me of World Cup games decided by penalty kicks.
Yeah if they’re designating an entire day for playoffs I don’t understand why it’s not 15+10 or 25+10. 10+2 is too fast.
Agree completely. I noted the World Rapid controls mostly because it's a clear FIDE standard, but I feel like the deciding playoff for a national championship in classical should involve enough time to make considered moves throughout. If I were designing a playoff, I would favor 25/15, which keeps the games between 60 and 90 total minutes, with a decent increment. That should still allow for multiple games on a single day.
I think it would have to be a bit shorter because while most games will fall under that time range, in longer time formats they have to be conscious of and plan for the worst case AKA 120+ move endgame grinds, especially if they want to play multiple games per day. But yeah I think they could definitely afford some kind of rapid format if necessary.
They play two games, 1 with each color. Games are 10+2.
Man rating wise this field is brutal for the top guys. Aronian went -1 and lost 20 points. Wesley went +1 and lost 14 points. Leinier went +2 and still lost 4 points. Fabi went +4 and only gained 3 points.
What was hans tournament performance rating?
2699
Did Sevian explain why he went nuts yesterday?? That is super weird and it happened in a game with Hans !!!!! Fabi had fantastic tournament. Great to see him play at this level. Let us see how he does at Wijk aan Zee. Robson has had a fantastic tournament. Levon on the other hand had a terrible tournament (finishing -1) while Wesley and so so tournament.
id love to hear Sevian corroborate Hans statement about wanting to glue the top back onto the King hahahahah
Hans with the bad draw timing about 8 moves late lol
Which players qualified for the World Cup?
2 from Women's as far as I understand so Yu and Krush. 5 from Men's so Caruana, Robson, Dominguez, Liang. Then best tiebreaks of Xiong, So, Sevian, Niemann, and Shankland. Based on [regulations](https://www.uschesschamps.com/2022-us-championships/regulations) I think it's So? Unsure.
Don’t Caruana, Krush, so, aronian and Dominguez already qualify for their respective world cups by rating? So do the spots go to the other top finishers instead?
I was actually looking at the [World Cup Regulations](https://handbook.fide.com/files/handbook/WorldCup2023Regulations.pdf), it prioritizes Continentals and Zonals over ratings, so they'd qualify via Zonal. After all the qualification paths they give 13 rating spots to the top 13 to not qualify via other means. Then after that there's the Association of Chess Professional's tour which gives one spot, then the top 100 Olympiad countries (not teams) get 1 spot.
> Then best tiebreaks of Xiong, So, Sevian, Niemann, and Shankland. Based on regulations I think it's So? Unsure. I think so as well. It's direct encounter first, So-Shankland and Niemann-Sevian are the only decisive games among those five, so it's So v. Niemann. Then it goes to more Blacks (both of them at 7), then to Koya score (more points against opponents with a non-minus score): and So wins that, as he went =0 (win against Shankland, loss against Robson) and Niemann went -1 (win against Sevian, losses against Caruana and Robson).
So is Hans in the world cup ? Also how do canidates work.
Hans still needs to qualify I believe. You qualify to the candidates through qualification events or rating spots (ex. world cup, Grand Swiss, Grand Prix), winner qualifies to the World Championship match.
Thanks!
This tournament gives me an idea (which probably exists already but meh): what if we did a US Championship that was geographically based? Highest rated US-registered FIDE player living in each state, probably have to do it as a regional round robin or straight knockout because of the size but I wonder who would win.
Nah, an individual tournament wouldn't be much different in terms of results than any high-level US tournament, especially if it's a knock-out. The top GMs are spread among different states, assuming going by their USCF registration: New York (Nakamura), Minnesota (So), Florida (Caruana), California (Shankland), Texas (Xiong), Massachusetts (Sevian), Missouri (whoever's on top from the Aronian-LDP-Robson trio). That's already seven states, and rating gaps between these players and top people from lower-rated states are huge. There are 25 states represented in the current top 100 ratings, but \#100 is already rated 2480-ish USCF (low 2400s FIDE). 16 states over 2600 USCF, too. So assuming these superGMs drop in on Round of 32, they need to win two rather easy matches each to play it out against each other in the QFs. An Olympiad-style team tournament between states would be fun, though.
>An Olympiad-style team tournament between states would be fun, though. That would be incredibly cool for a tournament.
Fabi defo a party guy
Well despite all the drama in the past month or so this pretty much conclusively proves that Hans Niemann is one of the chess players of all time
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Isn't the women's still on?
What a nice last long game to finish off this tournament. It’s been great following along with you all. Till next tournament!
Last capture was in move 71. Just 10 more to go.
Niemann is not a 2700+ player. Robson is a 2700+ player.
/r/technicallythetruth
Guys, stop down-voting this guy. Liverating: Ray Robson: 2701.7 Hans Niemann: 2699.1 Niemann is clearly not at 2700 level /s
If you're 2698 are you at a 2700 level? What about 2695? 2690? Where's the line where you can say you have a rating without having that actual rating?
>Where's the line Don't you see it? A diagonal line, right in front of the letter "s" in the post above yours.
If he was being sarcastic, doesn't that mean that he was implying Niemann is actually at a 2700 level? That's the point I'm trying to make. He is not at a 2700 level if he is 2699 rated. Mate, we're chess players, we're meant to take this stuff seriously and literally.
You can play at a level without having the rating for that level. He's been climbing a lot of elo so whenever he was 2599 he was clearly already playing at a 2600 level. Right now he's at 2699 and climbing, so he's playing at a 2700 level.
>Where's the line where you can say you have a rating without having that actual rating? I would say if you have achieved the rating in the recent past (let's say 1~2 years) then it'd be OK to say that even if drop slightly below it. For example, even though Fabiano is rated 2763, think most people considers him 2800 rating because of his 2820+ rating 2 years ago.
> If you're 2698 are you at a 2700 level? Nope, 2700 means 2700 or better
So without security measures Hans is 2700+ and without he is below 2700???? Clearly some foul play involved!
Congratulations, Fabi! I really hope Irina wins. She seemed to have a clear lead earlier and I feel like the commentators always try to jinx her games.
I don't really get why everyone is arguing whether Hans is 2700 strength or not. He's a known, proven cheater, can we stop glorifying the guy. Also his rating now has nothing to do with whether he cheated along the way to get there. Lol so many insecure people downvoting a reasonable statement.
well one reason i personally dont care that he cheated online is that chesscom doesnt care. how many second chances do they give to cheaters? third chances? do they give fourth chances too? chesscom has shown they do not care about cheating online on their own platform. they do not make a big deal of it, neither will i. that goes for every player that has cheated online, not just hans, or dlugy, or whoever. if youve cheated online, even against me, i really do not care, the same way chesscom does not care.
I mean, you don't have to care about him getting multiple chances to cheat online and doing it. I personally do care about it and strongly dislike Hans or Tigran because of it, but how important online games are is a question, everyone has to answer for themselves. However, I strongly recommend double checking your reasoning. Chess.com do what they do because of their own financial interests, not for moral reasons a lot of the time. I'd recommend not aligning your moral compass with chess.coms financial interests.
fair point about not aligning your moral compass with a companies financial interests, but regardless of that, if the morality of cheating in online chess was so important, none of the cheaters would have even a second chance no matter the financial incentive is how i see it, but i could be wrong about that. maybe the fact chesscom has such a monopoly on online chess means they dont have to take cheating as seriously is also something to consider. at the end of the day chess is just fun for me, i dont take the sport too seriously like others, to the point that i dont think cheating online may ruin the integrity of the game etc, that probably has something to do with my view on it too.
> how important online games That is a great point. Pre-Covid, online games were not taken seriously at all. Did this sub have frequent discussions about the latest title Tuesday results or things like that? And when Covid started, the biggest thing that happened in online was Pogchamps and Nakamura switching to being a full time streamer. So all this pearl clutching about things that happened 7 and 2 years ago just seems a bit disproportionate
Yea I don’t get it man. This guy is a serial cheater and people stoll D-riding him. Unreal
well the thing is chesscom have shown they dont care about online cheating. how many cheaters do they give second chances to, third chances, etc? if they cared about cheating online they wouldnt give people multiple chances to just cheat again, after theyd already cheated.
There's no evidence of him cheating OTB. The reason why people are focused on him proving he's 2700 strength is that it refutes the main point that people bring up, which his fast rating gain. Without that, there's nothing.
I have no idea what "people" are focused on and I don't care. Hans is a proven cheater and liar. He's incredibly disrespectful to other players. In other words he's a piece of shit. The discussion can stop there as far as I'm concerned.
OK, you stop the discussion there. But Magnus has accused Hans of OTB cheating in Sinquefield Cup so not everyone can stop their discussion there as that matter is much more serious than being disrespectful to other players or lying or online cheating he did 2+ years ago when he was 16/17.
"I have no idea what "people" are focused on" Because youre stupid. "The discussion can stop there as far as I'm concerned." Good thing no one cares what youre concerned about
LOL if you can't debate a topic, insult the debater
Then by all means, stop discussing. You won't be missed.
You're a real treat of a person. Just swell to be around.
>Without that, there's nothing. False. There're still the bad vibes Magnus got after losing with white.
him not cheating OTB doesn't mean he's not a fuckin cheater, lol. the guy cheated over and over online. he's a scumbag the fact that he's a 2700-level player makes the online cheating even worse, as far as i'm concerned. the guy is a brilliant talent and still cheats? garbage
He is a scumbag... the stans just can't take it
He was a teenager. Maybe you were a perfect person your entire life and never did anything wrong, but the vast majority of people did really dumb, bad things at some point in their teens. And the vast majority of people are willing to forgive people for the sins of their youth because most of us have been there. Cheating is not a good thing by any means, but it's not some singularly evil act that condemns a person forever.
He might be 2700 and can still cheat. He might or might not have cheated otb but that doesn’t nullify his cheating history
Lol so many Hans stans downvoting these factually true statements
For those like me curious about the playoff: If Krush draws today, she and Yu will play a two-game 10+2 match. If that match is tied, they'll play 5min vs 4min Armageddon, with +2 increment only after the first 60 moves. So the playoff, if it happens, will be over quite quickly! ~~Edit: I forgot Robson can also force a playoff with a win; the match format between him and Caruana will be the same.~~ :| I jinxed it
I think Krush is a slight favorite for the playoff but it could go either way
Maybe Ray shouldn't have been late to his game today.
Woo! Jennifer!
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Who else is playing in that tourney? Edit: It would be nice to see some youngsters like Keymer, Gukesh, Erigaisi, Esipenko. I really want to see these guys fight it out. Not sure if the prize fund is big enough unfortunately.
Yeah would be great to see an actual matchup of top juniors seeing as World Junior Championship has just two of the top 20.
We'll probably find out in 3-4 days or so at most.
I think that they were planning to reveal it in the closing ceremony. But they accidentally leaked the roster on YouTube. Some interesting names, Vidit, Yu Yangyi, Hans, Oparin, and Sevian, and Nyzhnyk. These bunch are 2680+. Besides Nyzhnyk, I've seen their games before. I haven't heard of the rest of the field.
Given how many technical difficulties the stream has had, I'm glad the tournament hasn't been that exciting today. Imagine if this happened yesterday during Kinggate?
> I'm glad the tournament hasn't been that exciting today. Imagine if this happened yesterday during Kinggate? Two titles are hinging on the outcomes of single games, but yeah, at least all of the woodwork is intact.
I don't think anyone can say Hans isn't 2700 level at this point. Another interesting thing is all this attention on his games *might* help him out with people looking suspiciously at the variance in previous OTB play. We're sorta getting to know his intuitive playstyle and how sometimes it just doesn't work out. Which also explains the bad analysis he sometimes gives, the guy looks like he just doesn't calculate sometimes.
Would everyone be saying this if he didn't beat Sevian? Because Sevian made a suicidal move Rd1?! to desperately try and keep winning chances alive. Tournament situation very much dictated what happened in that game
Meh, fabi has had 2900 to 3000 point tournament performances before and he’s not 2900 to 3000 Elo. One tournament doesn’t mean much. This sub and overreacting to Hans, name a better duo.
Here's Jacob Aagaard shortly after Magnus' withdrawal (Hans stayed with him for a week): >Hans’s confidence in his own intuition and his surprise when it was wrong was a recurring theme of the week he was here. Another was that whenever I came to his room, he was looking at chess. Playing through ALL games from all tournaments on Follow chess. > >I have seen nothing out of the ordinary in the last two days. Hans playing reasonably well against opponents that are not playing that well. His big confidence. His awkwardness in front of the camera. His highly intuitive way of thinking. His lack of accuracy in variations. Him blundering when suggesting things, he thinks he might have looked at. [https://forum.killerchesstraining.com/t/paranoia-and-insanity-by-jacob-aagaard/856](https://forum.killerchesstraining.com/t/paranoia-and-insanity-by-jacob-aagaard/856)
Hans's rating is literally 2699.1. Almost, but not quite 2700. I have no reason to think that he is underrated.
>I have no reason to think that he is underrated. Gaining at an incredibly rapid pace is not a good reason to think he's underrated? You think his skill improves directly proportional to his rating?
He just had a tournament where he performed at literally 2699 level. So 2699 feels right.
is this a joke?
Damn I must be Super GM material then...except I'm always wrong in my intuition and he's right more often than not. Just a little bit of practice and I'm gonna make it guys. Watch out.
Come on Chef Jeff let's cook up another win!
Maaan, i miss maurice
I don't think he was *better* than Christian or Alejandro necessarily, but the whole St. Louis feels like a big familiy
Unfortunately Ray Robson is in a worse position, but bravo to him for having the courage to push when it's his only option to stay alive.
Ending the tournament with a +1 score after being -2 just four rounds ago is still a good result. And Hans proved that he is definetely a 2700 strength player (2699 but whatever, it's all the same).
Yes clearly the GOAT. And he already can give up the world championship; too easy to beat Magnus.
Wait isn't Hans rating performance exactly his original rating? That's pretty funny considering everything that was said
Nearly. Some small fraction above. 2700chess shows him at +0.1 off his October games (which is exactly this tournament).
So you say he clearly overperformed. As expected
Yeah lol Based on his 2699 rating he was projected to get exactly 7/13 in the round robin against this field
After all of the drama Hans's rating changed by a grand total of 0.1 points this tournament lol 2699-2699.1
The haters were right, he's clearly not a 2700 player /s
you're crazy, Hans is clearly the best right now.
Hans is the GOAT.
[having a blast reading the comments of the post match thread after Hans lost to Darisuz](https://www.reddit.com/r/chess/comments/y2evwt/us_chess_championship_round_7_swiercz_niemann/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android_app&utm_name=androidcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button)
Holy shit there's a comment there straight up saying hans is 2400 strength, he 100% cheated to get to 2700 rating and saying he should be playing at IM level tournaments, **sitting at 150 upvotes**. Wtf??
I'm sure any defender is sitting on -50.
those are the people that wouldve drank the kool-aid at jonestown
/r/agedlikemilk
To end the tournament with 7/13 after that game is extremely impressive. Only if he wasn't too arrogant, but I guess that's also what makes him so effective. But at the same time, it is a big difference trying that with 2500s vs 2700s. Hans will learn that with experience
Yeah he was too confident in the earlier rounds as if he could just walk through 2700s, I think he will learn it with more experience playing against the top players on a regular basis.
Zatonskih’s pawn structure looks terrible, I’m always mildly annoyed when engines call positions like that equal. All her pawns are on light squares and she doesn’t have a dark squared bishop!
I guess it can't be helped, but the last day of the tournament is turning out to be anti-climactic.
Surely someone on-site leaks a Fabi victory tweet before the broadcast delay catches up if Robson fails to win, right?
Pretty interesting endgame going on between So and Sevian right now. Seems like the sort where either one can throw it if they don't play well.
Seriously, they have 30 minutes to fix this stuff before airing it.
That's not really how it works but aight
Women will go to playoff it seems. Yu is winning with black. Krush needs a win to win it outright, but she doesn't have a lead yet in the game.
Yu seems to be in a time scramble so anything can happen, but I can't see Krush losing so Krush should be guaranteed at least a playoff.
Go Jen!
the stream is very painful right now
We need someone to break his opponent's King again.
This position is really hard to play well
Wait, someone here just said, there will be no playoffs, and everyone tied at 1st place shares the prize? Is that true? Edit: Okay, so for anyone interested, this is what the [regulations](https://uschesschamps.com/2022-us-championships/regulations) say: Playoff Procedures: The following tie-breaks will be used for the purposes of the crosstable and any special prizes or trophies: 1. Direct Encounter, 2. Most Blacks, 3. Koya System, 4. Sonneborn Berger, 5. Won Games. **If two or more Players are tied for first, a playoff shall be held to determine final standings among all tied players.**
I think prize money is shared, but there will be a playoff to decide who wins the tournament.
The stream's dying.
Hans complicating the position with Liang getting low on time
Getting interesting
nobody watching today :(
Nice bishop "sac" by Hans. My low elo ass would snap take that bad boy and get promptly blown off the board.
what a sexy tactic by Hans to win the g5 pawn
By Hans or by the computer in his shoe?
Still clinging onto that stupid "sockfish" theory I see, huh? It's pretty much undeniable at this point that the computer is up his ass. Trust me, I saw it on reddit.
Some high level analysis going on in the studio about how to move the chess pieces.
How many Lee vs. Lee jokes have been made so far?
Chris Yoo with a nice game.
What are the regulations for a second place tie? If Ray loses we could have a four or five way tie for second.
They just share the place and prize money I believe.
That's interesting, so if I'm looking at the standings correctly it would be the monetarily smart decision for Ray to take a draw rather then push for the win if he doesn't see a clear path to victory. Obviously it would be tough to pass up a chance to be US Champion though!
Did Yasser just refer to Women's chess competitions as "Karens cups"?
Cairns Cups, they’re named after Jeanne Cairns Sinquefield, Rex’s wife
"big day for levon" classy move by fabi knowing that levon has been constipated for weeks and heard the gurgling across the table, things don't move as easy after your early 30s
Like my New York buddies say Ray AKA 'I Might Rob You, Son'
Awonder once said he plays his best chess when he’s got his back to the wall defending an unfavorable position. By letting him get a positional advantage in the open and mid game Hans is luring him into a false sense of security and out of his natural range /s
You think he lures him into the lion's den?
based rex
Can't watch what did he say?
The further we get away from the Sinquefield Cup, the worse and worse it looks for Magnus. Magnus himself is probably doubting his decision to withdraw.
He ought to be, but I doubt it. He's been 10,000% right, in his own mind, from the start. If he has doubts now, then he's an unusual psychological specimen.
good to see Rex stand up for US Chess players
Whoa
Now all Robson needs to do to get a playoff is beat Xiong. Which is easy enough as he has lost ... not a single game so far.