Chess

THE COUNTRY with by far the highest number of grandmasters percapita is Iceland, which boasts no fewer than nine, from a populationof about 270,000.

This is no accident, for the stimulus famously provided by the1972 Fischer-Spassky match has been followed up by a whole host ofother impressive tournaments. While their first grandmaster, formerFIDE President Fridrik Olafsson, has for many years been the Speakerof the Parliament.

Fridrik is now more or less retired from active chess but he wasnevertheless one of the six Icelanders grandmasters who took partthis weekend in the powerful Chess@Iceland Speed Championship inReykjavik.

It had been provided in advance that the top seeds, Kasparov andAnand no less, would be separated in the two six-player all-play-allpreliminaries. As expected, both won their groups with Kasparovmaking 4.5 /5 ahead of Margeir Petursson 3 and Jan Timman and HelgiOlafsson 2.5; while Anand headed his group with 4/5 ahead ofAleksander Wojtkiewicz 3.5 and Ivan Sokolov 3.

The semi-finals on Sunday saw Kasparov play Wojtkiewicz, who hadqualified for the event by winning a "virtual" qualifier at theInternet Chess Club (http://www. chessclub.com); and Anand versusPetursson. The first games in both matches were drawn but bothheavyweights won the second to set up a meeting in the final.

Although Anand has over the past few years done very badly againstKasparov at a "classical" time limit, he's fared much better atrapidplay and indeed both of these were drawn, as was the first fiveminute play-off before Kasparov won the second to take first place.While these games were all interesting, I've chosen instead Kasparovsvictory against Wojtkiewicz.

Kasparov with 14.hxg5 varied from 14.Bg2 which he himself hadplayed - to crushing effect - against Loek Van Wely at Wijk aan Zeein January. His idea was the most dangerous novelty 15.e5. Faced withsuch a move against such an opponent most players would go down andWojtkiewiczs 17...Nc4?! looks very bad - presumably he should try17...Qxb6 18.Bxf6 Nc4.

20.Nxe6! rocked the black position and although he resigned alittle early it's clear that lines like 26...b3 27.axb3 cxb3 28.Rxd5exd5 29.Be6 Qg6 30.Qd6+ Ke8 31.Qc6+ Ke7 32.Qc7+ Kf6 (if 32..Kxe633.Re1+ wins) 33.Bxg8 Rxg8 34.Qd6+ Kf7 35.Qxd5+ Qe6 36.Qxe6+ Kxe637.h7 Rh8 38.cxb3 are utterly hopeless.

White: Gary Kasparov

Black: Aleksandr Wojtkiewicz

Reykjavik 2000

Sicilian Najdorf

1. e4 c5

2. Nf3 d6

3. d4 cxd4

4. Nxd4 Nf6

5. Nc3 a6

6. Be3 e6

7. f3 b5

8. g4 Nbd7

9. Qd2 h6

10. 0-0-0 Bb7

11. h4 b4

12. Na4 d5

13. Bh3 g5

14. hxg5 hxg5

15. e5 Nxe5

16. Bxg5 Rg8

17. Nb6 Nc4

18. Nxc4 dxc4

19. Bxf6 Qxf6

20. Nxe6 Bh6

21. g5 fxe6

22. Qd7+ Kf8

23. gxh6 Bd5

24. Qd6+ Qe7

25. Qf4+ Qf7

26. Qe5 1-0