Kosteniuk wins first round in Lenzerheide

Hi everyone!

Today was the first round of the National Swiss Chess Championship  in Lenzerheide, and I won against International Master Beat Züger (ELO 2405). The tournament has 10 players and will run 9 rounds, one game against each player, from July 8 to July 16, 2010.

See the diagram below for a nice series of moves.

Kosteniuk – Züger, Lenzerheide 2010, round 1

In this position it’s white to play and win.

I played 23. Nc7 after which Black responded 23…Qc6, which allowed 24. Rxg7! Rxg7 25. Rxg7 Kxg7 26. Qxe7+ Kg6 27. e6 winning a few moves later. An interesting and more complicated variation  was in the case black would respond 23…Qf7, I was planning to play 24. Rg6!! and black cannot take 24…Nxg6? 25. Qd8+ Qe8 26. Qxe8 mate, and if 24… Bd7 25. Rd6 Bc6 26. Rf6!! gxf6 27. Qxh6+ Rg7 28. Rxg7 Qxg7 29. Ne6+ wins.

Tomorrow will be the second round of the tournament.

The month before the tournament started the Swiss Chess Review had me on their cover (issue of May 2010), which helped attract the strongest field ever to the National Swiss Championships, never 5 GM’s had ever participated in the Swiss Championship, the ELO average is also an all-time record.

Posted by Alexandra Kosteniuk
Women’s World Chess Champion
www.chessqueen.com

Tags: Kosteniuk, Lenzerheide
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