Here’s a position that shows that everybody can make mistakes and you can learn from them. It’s from the recent Kazan Russian Championship, where Alexandra is playing GM Popov. Alexandra played very convincincly the beginning of the game and had the advantage. Alexandra’s last 2 moves were 28…c4!! 29.dxc4 d3!! 30. Qb1 (current position). Here Alexandra missed the very precise 30…Qe6!! which would have probably won the game. Instead she played 30…Qg6? which lost, and she was quite disappointed to have missed winning against a GM. The lesson to learn is that one has to play precise moves till the end! If you would like to see the position commented in detail, click here to see the pgn.

Alexandra Kosteniuk won convincingly the Golden Blitz tournament in Moscow, by defeating in the semi-finals ex-world champion Zhu Chen 2-0 and in the finals Almira Skripchenko 2-0. In the men’s competition Ponomarev beat Bareev in the finals. It’s a great promotion of chess to have such events on TV! We have a super photo album about the event for you (with 52 photos), you can watch it by clicking here.

Alexandra Kosteniuk took her revenge today from the final of the 2001 World Chess Championship (when Alexandra became vice-champion of the world) by beating ex-world champion Zhu Chen from China by a clean 2-0 in the Golden Blitz tournament in Moscow. The event is shown live on the Russian and satellite channel NTV+ and we expect it will be shown also all over the world later on. Thanks to the organizer, VV Profi, for this great idea to bring chess to the masses via Chess Blitz TV Shows. News here and here.

On the left you see a photo of the winner of the new Russian Championship in Kazan Evgeny Bareev, next to Alexandra Kosteniuk. Later today we will have for you a superb additional general photo album of the tournament, including the prize ceremony. Make sure to visit our Kazan Tourism album, and see our Gallery of all Players of the championship.

The Russian Men’s Championship was tough and Alexandra fought each game hard against strong male GM’s. After winning her game of the last round, she finished the tournament with a respectable 4/9 with a very strong ELO average of 2541 and 7 male GM’s. We have for you a GALLERY of ALL Players in the Kazan Championship that you can see by clicking here. We will soon put up another album of the closing ceremony and other Kazan photos.

Alexandra Kosteniuk continues to hold her own against the strong male competition in Kazan. In the second and third rounds she drew GM Belov (ELO 2596) and GM Dvoirys (ELO 2589), so she has 1.5 points after 3 rounds against 3 GM’s with ELO average close to 2600. Yesterday she had a walk around the beautiful city of Kazan, Tatarstan, and we have a photo album with 33 photos for you to see here. Enjoy!

Alexandra Kosteniuk drew GM Pavel Tregubov (ELO 2607) in the first round of the very strong Men Russian Chess Semi-Final Championships. You can watch the games live at 3 PM Moscow time (1 PM Paris time and 7 AM New York time) by clicking here and see news and results by clicking here or here. Please keep your emails of encouragement to Alexandra coming!

At the opening of the 58th Men Russian Championship in Kazan, Alexander Bakh, in the name of the Russian Chess Federation, handed over the official FIDE Grandmaster (men) Diploma to Alexandra Kosteniuk, which had been approved by the FIDE Board last year in Calvia. Alexandra is the first Russian woman to ever that that supreme title, and she is the Xth woman in the whole history of Chess, congratulations! You can see the diploma here and the official GM pin here.

Alexandra is leaving tomorrow for Kazan (Russia) to participate in the extremely strong Men Russian Chess Semi-Final Championships, a qualifyer for the Russian Men Superfinal, with $100,000 in prizes. More than 50 (male) GM’s are playing in this event. You will be able to see the results here or here. When she comes back Alexandra will play on Sept. 13-14 in a blitz tournament organized by the ACP shown on TV called “Golden Blitz”. More info here.