The International Chess Tournament Carlos Torre Repetto in Memoriam started last week. Today was the first day for my son’s age group. He played his first and second rounds. He won the first one and lost the second.
Tomorrow he plays rounds three and four with five and six being on Friday.
Last year’s overall winner, Vassily Ivanchuk, also started his tournament today. Many of the top players are participating in two types of tournaments this week. The first, which started last Saturday, is a standard tournament. Each player plays a set number of rounds and the person with the most points after the end of the week is the winner. The second tournament is called a Wimbledon style tournament. I am not sure of all the rules, but it seems like it is a single or double elimination type event.
It is fun to be around all these Grand Masters, many of whom I do not know anything about, but I am still in awe of their abilities.
This year there is a new service that the tournament is providing. While the big boys play on stage there is a group of people analyzing their games. They are transmitting the analysis through a closed radio transmission. You can listen in while the games are being played. I will try to grab some audio from one of those tomorrow and stick it on the blog. It will most likely be in Spanish, but for a few moments it would be interesting to hear.
UPDATE: I just read that Ivanchuk knocked out Bruzón. They are the two who fought head to head in the championship game last year with Ivanchuk winning. It is too bad they faced each other so early this year. Bruzón was the winner two years ago when Ivanchuk was not able to attend.