Marcel Sisniega

     

     Although virtually unknown among chess players, Sisniega was one of the top two or three strongest players ever from Mexico. 
     Marcel Sisniega Campbell (July 28, 1959 – January 19, 2013) was a Mexican GM and film director. With an American mother and Mexican father he grew up in Cuernavaca near Mexico City. 
     After being the awarded the IM title in 1978 be developed into very strong player that was clearly of GM strength long before he was finally awarded the GM title in 1992. After that he eventually became disappointed with the chess world and devoted most time to being a film director. He died unexpectedly of a heart attack.
      Never afraid to play sharp gambit, Sisniega's games were lively and enterprising and often featured attacks against his opponent's King. His brother, Ivar, is a Summer Olympian pentathlete, politician and businessman. Sisniega had two boys and two girls. Daughter Vera is a prominent political activist who fights against corruption and other problems in Mexico. Sofia is a Mexican-American actress, vegan and animal rights activist. 
     The following game was played in Reggio Emilia, Italy in 1981. In Italian, the tournaments were known as Torneo di Capodanno (New Year's tournament), as it used to start just after Christmas and end on the day of Epiphany, or January 6th. It was established as an annual event in 1958 by GM Enrico Paoli. In 1982/83 the tournament attracted a new sponsor and by the 1990s the tournament had gained significant international reputation. The strongest ever tounament was the 1991/1992 event. It was won by the 22-year-old Viswanathan Anand ahead of Garry Kasparov, Anatoly Karpov and Vassily Ivanchuk.
     Usually a 10 to 16 player round robin, it became Italy's oldest and most renowned tournament usually played as a 10 to 16 player round-robin tournament. The last tournament was held in 2011/2012. Unfortunately this great tournament then had to be canceled due to economic reasons. 

Final Standings, 1981 
1) Arne Duer, 10.5 
2) Rafael Vaganian 9.5 
3) Avigdor Bykhovsky 9.0 
4-5) Carlos Cuartas and Edward Formanek 8.0 
6-7) Marcell Sisniegaand Janos Rigo 7.5 
8) Pierluigi Passerotti 7.0 
9) Roberto Messa 6.5 
10) Franco Trabattoni 5.5 
11) Luigi Santolini 5.0 
12) Mauro Reggiani 3.5 
13) Carlo Rossi 3.0 
14) Giorgio Coppini 0.5 

How Can This Be?!

 

How was this position arrived at?

     In most chess problems the goal is to mate in x moves or win material, but in retrograde problems you are asked to determine moves that lead up to the position. Of course, the moves have to legal, not necessarily good. 
     In retrograde problems, as well as in standard problems, castling is assumed to be legal unless it can be proved otherwise. An en passant capture, on the other hand, is permitted only if it can be proved that the last move was a double step of the pawn to be captured. These two conventions lead to features unique to retrograde analysis problems. 
     I finally got around to reading my copy of Chess Mysteries of Sherlock Holmes: Fifty Tantalizing Problems of Chess Detection by Raymond Smullyan.  I don't normally have any interest in problems, but always liked Sherlock Holmes and this book is quite entertaining.  A sample dialogue between Holmes and Dr. Watson:

      What about a stroll to the chess club?" Holmes remarked one early afternoon.
     "Why, Holmes!" I cried in amazement. "I did not know you were a chess enthusiast!"
     "Not of the conventional sort," laughed Holmes. "I do not have too much interest in chess as a game—indeed, I do not have much inclination for games in general."
     "But what is chess, if not a game?" I asked in astonishment.
     Holmes's face grew serious. "There are occasional chess situations, Watson, which challenge the analytic mind as fully as any which arise in real life. Moreover, I have found them as valuable as any exercises I know in developing those powers of pure deduction so essential to dealing with real-life situations."
     "Tell me more," I replied with interest.
     "What I have in mind, Watson, is this: In an actual game, both players have their eyes fixed entirely on the future. Each player tries to control the future in a way favor-able to his own position. Also, in most chess problems of the usual sort—White to play and mate in so many moves—the entire emphasis is on doing something to control the future. Now, although I have the deepest respect for the better problems of this sort—many of them are really ingenious works of art!—the type of strategies involved, clever as they are, is hardly of any use to me in my own work."
     "I am afraid I am still in the dark," I responded.
"There are certain chessboard situations," explained Holmes, "which are of no interest to the player of chess as a game—of no interest with regard to future outcomes—but are of vital interest in providing clues as to what must have happened in the past."

For the solution see HERE. 

The Retrograde Analysis Corner 
The Problemist 
Working backwards by GM Maurice Ashley- how it can help your chess

Minnie Makes A Mistake

      The other day while preparing the post on Folke Ekstrom I was looking through some of the history of the tournaments at Hastings and noticed that the 20th Hastings Chess Congress which was held from December 28, 1939 to January 4, 1940 was comprised of only eight British players. 
     World War II had begun a few months before and many European players were stranded in Buenos Aires after the Olympiad or else were unavailable. Even this congress had most of the strongest players missing. The finish was 1-Parr (6.0), 2-Ritson-Morry (5.5), 3-Golombek (5.0), 4-5-Kirk and Thomas (3.0), 6-7- Winser and Schenk (2.0) and 8- Mackenzie (1.5).
     Nowhere could I find information on any of the side events, but I did come across entertaining game Fenny Heemskerk vs. Minnie Musgrave given below. I have posted on Heemskerk before, but who was Minnie Musgrave? 
     Finding any information on the 1938 British Ladies Champion turned out to be quite difficult as little is known about her personal life. It appears her career lasted about 30 years and she is known to have played at Hastings in January 1919, when she was one of 21 players to take part in a simultaneous against Blackburne; she lost. 
     Then she shows up in 1924 when she played way down on board 47 for Sussex against Kent. From 1924 to 1927 she played for the Susses team on the lower boards, but by 1928 she started moving up. When she first started playing for the Hastings Chess Club it was also on the lower boards, but she soon moved up to board 10. 
     In 1925 she played a match against one of the strongest British lady players, losing 3.5 to 1.5 against Mrs. Agnes Stevenson. Poor Mrs. Stevenson died on 20 August 1935, when she was on her way to Warsaw to help the English players in the world ladies’ world championship. Mrs. Stevenson arrived at Posen by plane from Berlin on Tuesday, the 20th and went through customs. While hurrying back to the plane, she walked into the propeller which struck her on the head and killed her instantaneously. Her widower, Rufus Stevenson, married Vera Menchik a couple of years later. 
    During the 1920s Miss Musgrave played for the Hastings in club in team competition and her name appears in 1927 and 1928, when Hastings won the trophy. By the late 1930s Miss Musgrave's career peaked when she won the British Ladies' Championship at Brighton, mostly because Vera Menchik was playing in the men's event. 
     From the early 1930s she had been on the Hastings' club committee representing ladies' chess and after winning the championship was then named an honorary vice president of the Hastings club. At sometime during the 1930s she was married to British player Arthur Winser. 
     After the outbreak of World War II Miss Musgrave continued to be an active member of the Hastings Chess Club and in 1941, one of her games was published in the American Chess Bulletin. 
     It's not certain, but later during the war she appears to have moved away from Hastings. Refer to the post on Folke Ekstrom for the conditions in Hastings during the war. Her named popped up in a couple of newspapers in late 1946 where it was reported that she wanted to return to Hastings, but had been detained in Wales by work commitments. 
     By 1947 she was back to playing for the Sussex and Hastings club where she was the strongest lady player in Hastings. She also won the Sussex Ladies' Championship in 1951 and 1952 and shared the title in 1953 or 1954. After 1956, she seems to have disappeared from the chess scene. 
     She died at the end of 1968 at the age 88. 

Danish and Goring Gambit

     This post is about the Danish, or Goring, Gambits which I have monkeying around with in online games recently, but somewhere I ran across a paper titled Evaluation of Chess Gambits which is available for download as a pdf file. 
     It was written by Jamal Munshi of Sonoma State University He used engines to evaluate the effectiveness of gambits by comparing ten gambit continuations with their closest mainline non-gambit twin. Six of the gambits failed because they favored the opponent. If you are a math person, you might find the statistics interesting.  
     I can't tell the difference between the Danish and the Goring, but in the Danish Gambit (1. e4 e5 2. d4 exd4 3. c3) white sacrifices one or two Pawns for the sake of rapid development and, hopefully, an attack. The only problem is that if black is careful he can defend and keep the Pawns, or he can simply decline it which leads to rather boring (I think) play.
     Danish player Martin Severin From essayed the gambit in Paris 1867 tournament and is usually given credit for popularizing it. The Danish Gambit was popular with attacking players like Alekhine, Marshall, Blackburne, and Mieses, but defensive lines for black were discovered and it lost favor. Frank Marshall once commented that he had to give it up because the players at his club were getting booked up and it no longer worked. 
     It's not for the faint of heart because many games are short...white either breaks through and mates early or if black defends well, white's game will either be in a shambles or he will have equality at best. If black accepts, white will have a strong pair of Bishops aimed at black's K-side, plus black will be behind in development. That's why it is often declined.  It's important for white to hang on to the B-pair. 
     GM Boris Alterman's blog has some interesting analysis on the Danish: 
Part 1 
Part 2 
Part 3 
     I can't say that I recommend playing the Danish (or Goring) because even though white CAN get a very dangerous attack, it seems we amateurs lack the tactical prowess to take advantage of any mistakes black makes and the result is we may easily find ourselves down a P or two right out of the opening and no big-time attack like the books say...at least that's what happened to me. 
     Even Homer nods as we see in the following game by Nakamura. 

The Year Was 1941

Actually 2403 people died

     On December 7, 1941 the United States entered World War II by declaring war on Japan following the attack on Pearl Harbor, but before that other things happened. 
     In January, President Franklin D. Roosevelt was sworn in for his third term and aviator Charles Lindbergh testified before Congress and recommended that the United States negotiate a neutrality pact with Adolf Hitler. Also, in January, US Ambassador to Japan, Joseph Grew, passed on to Washington a rumor overheard at a diplomatic reception about a planned surprise attack upon Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. 
     Baseball fans across the nation witnessed Joe DiMaggio step up to the plate in 56 consecutive baseball games and hit safely to break a record that had stood since 1897 when Wee Willie Keeler hit safely in 45 consecutive games over the course of the 1896 and 97 seasons. And, Ted Williams managed to finish the season with an unparalleled .406 batting average; no player has hit .400 or better since. 
     A lot of famous people were born in 1941. On January 30th Dick Cheney, 46th Vice President of the United States from 2001 to 2009 was born. He served under “Dubya,” aka George W. Bush. Ol' Dick is probably best remembered for an incident that happened in February 11, 2006, when he accidently shot Harry Whittington, a 78-year-old Texas attorney, when they were participating in a quail hunt on a ranch in Riviera, Texas. 

Cheney

     When he left office his approval rating, thanks to various nefarious activities, stood at a staggeringly low 13 percent. Cheney got rich by exploiting contacts with corrupt Arabs while drawing a public salary. He served as Chief Executive of Halliburton which donated to his campaign and got numerous lucrative contracts during the Bush Administration.  And, it was discovered to have overcharged the US for prior services rendered. 
 

Stewart

    Martha Stewart, television personality and media entrepreneur was born on August 3rd. Martha avoided a loss of $45,673 by selling all 3,928 shares of her ImClone Systems stock on December 27, 2001, after receiving non-public information from her stock broker. In 2004, Martha was convicted of felony charges of conspiracy, obstruction of an agency proceeding, and making false statements to federal investigators, and was sentenced to serve a five-month term in a federal correctional facility and a two-year period of supervised release that included five months of electronic monitoring. I always thought she got a bum rap; prominent people, businessmen and politicians, have gotten away with far worse.  Did I mention Dick Cheney, for example?

Keach

     One of my favorite actors, Stacy Keach, was born on June 2nd. Keach has played mainly dramatic roles throughout his career, often in law enforcement or as a private detective. Who can forget his role as Mike Hammer, which he played in numerous stand-alone television films and at least three different television series throughout the 1980s and 1990s? 
     On the US chess scene, Al Horowitz was unable to play in the 1940 US championship because he was still recovering from injuries sustained in an automobile accident two months before the event. I posted on this incident HERE. 
     In 1941, Horowitz and Reshevsky played the first US championship match held since the Marshall - Edward Lasker match in 1923. The understanding was that the winner of the match would be US champion until the 1942 tournament. Originally planned as a fourteen-game match, two games were added to make it a match of sixteen games. 
     Game 1 was played at the apartment of Maurice Wertheim, president of the Manhattan Chess Club. The time control was 32 moves in 2 hours. For most of the remaining games, the time control was 40 moves in 2.5 hours, but a few games used the original time control of 32 moves in 2 hours. Games were held in a variety of locations. 
     Horowitz had recovered from the accident and within months had resumed his duties at Chess Review, the magazine he had founded seven years before. In those days the magazine was extremely popular, but not financially successful so Horowitz was always on tour trying to make ends meet. 
     Once described by US Master Sidney Bernstein as a super coffee house player, Horowitz had earned a reputation by winning the 1936 US Open and sharing first place with Isaac Kashdan in the Open in 1938. This gave the optimistic Horowitz the confidence that he could take down Reshevsky, so in late 1940, rather than wait for the next championship tournament which was two years away, he challenged Reshevsky to a match in the spring.
     Reshevsky had a plus score against Horowitz, but Horowitz had defeated Reshevsky in the 1936 championship, one of the few Americans to have defeated Reshevsky in any tournament in the previous five years. Of course, the prize fund was attractive to Reshevsky. Also, Alekhine was on the run from the war in Europe and it seemed possible that he would end up in the United Staes.  That meant that there was a possibility of a Reshevsky – Alekhine match. Reshevsky had never played a match, so Horowitz would be good practice.
     The match schedule was tight with seven different playing sites for the 16 games in three weeks. The first game was held at the penthouse home of Maurice Wertheim, a wealthy investment banker and publisher of the liberal monthly, The Nation. 
     Wertheim had just been elected president of the Manhattan Chess Club and he invited most of the city's leading players to witness the game. More than 150 players showed up! The first four games were drawn, but Reshevsky won the fifth when Horowitz botched the ending in a King's Indian Defense, the game given below. 
     The next three games were drawn. Then in the 9th game Horowitz lost a Pawn in a difficult position and got ground down in 82 moves, giving Reshevsky a two point lead. Another draw followed. 
     The 11th game was at the home of bookseller Albrecht Buschke and its start had to be delayed when Reshevsky showed up late. The time limit was adjusted to 32 moves in two hours rather than 40 in two and a half. 
     After 16 moves Horowitz had a promising position, but missed the best move and made a mistake which ended up giving Reshevsky a promising B vs. N ending.   To make matters worse, Horowitz forgot that the time limit had been changed and found himself with only five minutes left for nine moves. He made the time limit with seconds to spare and the game was adjourned at 1:45am! 
     Buschke then invited the players and and 50 or so guests to a buffet supper. After the supper Horowitz and Reshevsky, longtime friends, agreed to finish he game that night and it was resumed at 3:30am!! At 5:00am on move 42 Reshevsky threatened mate. Horowitz thought for 10 minutes, tapped the table, smiled and said "Very pretty, Sammy. I resign." When the match referee left he found his car had been stolen. 
     With almost no sleep, the contestants head to Queens, New York for their 12th game to be played in the afternoon and it turned out to be another marathon. A careless blunder in a K and P ending cost Horowitz the only winning position in the match and he ended up drawing. All the remaining games were also drawn giving Reshevsky a +3 -0 =13 victory. Three weeks later, he got married.
 

A Modern Rare Bird: double N-sac, K-hunt, mate

     The Phillips & Drew “'King's” Tournament held in London in 1980 was composed of some of the West's strongest players plus England's most promising players, including 14-year old prodigy Nigel Short. 
     It promised to be an exciting event and Harry Golombek waxed eloquent in describing the players: the dynamic energy of the “vice-champion” of the world, Korchnoi; the powerful play of Miles; the wonderful subtly of Andersson who Golombek described as “the wisest head on young shoulders I have ever met.” The intelligent solidity of former Soviet, then Dutch GM, Sosonko; the lively resourcefulness of Speelman; the elegant attacks of Gheorghiu; the explosive and fiery spirit of Ljubojevic; the sheer talent of Timman; the typical panache of Sax. 
      Neither Ljubojevic nor Sax quite lived up to expectations nor did the colorful Browne who only occasionally gave evidence of his tactical ability. Larsen also was only a shadow of himself and Stean only came alive in the last two rounds to strut his attacking style. Nunn suffered from a nasty cold throughout the whole tournament. And, Short, who had performed brilliantly at Hastings only a few months earlier, seemed to suffer the bad effects of his failure to force a win against Miles in the first round. 
     The tournament was conceived when a fellow named Len Harris was elected to the Greater London Council ans persuaded them to put up two weeks worth of lottery money towards the tournament which convinced the BCF to persuade stockbrokers Phillips and Drew to put up the rest of the money. 
     Not quite sure how to put on a first class GM tournament one of the organizers flew to Tilburg to see how it was done and in the process spoke to Karpov who agreed to play. However, the Soviet Chess Federation said they couldn't send anybody, but according to Karpov it had to do with the Soviet Union not liking the British attitude towards the situation in Afghanistan. That was unlikely though because Soviet players had recently participated in Lone Pine. 
     Soviet officials claimed they had too many team events scheduled, but they would try to get two players. By then their offer was refused because Korchnoi had agreed to play if his match with Petrosian was over. It had been hoped that Huebner would be able to play, but he couldn't because he was playing a match against Adorjan. Hort withdrew at the last moment claiming that he had to play in the West German league. 
     The distribution of the record breaking prize fund was somewhat unusual. First, all 14 players received prize money and second, there was a big difference between first prize and second. First was 3000 pounds and second dropped off to 1750. Some even suggested the rather novel idea that all the prize fund be distributed as appearance fees before the tournament and let the players just come and play. The hours of play were 1:15pm to 6:15pm, adjournments from 8:30 pm to 10:30pm and there were three rest days during to event. 
     From early on Miles and Korchnoi were in the lead, but by round 9 Andersson, Korchnoi and Sosonko were tied for first with 6 point while Miles was a half point back. 
     At the end of round 12 Andersson and Korchnoi had 8 points and Miles had come back to tie them while Sosonko's score stood at 7.5. 
     The last round promised to be exciting as Miles was paired against the tough Ljubojevic while Andersson was paired against Korchnoi. 
     Unfortunately for the many spectators (and the organizers) the last round was a farce. Even though Miles had a promising position out of the opening, he offered a draw at move 10 which was gladly accepted. Andersson and Korchnoi split the point at move 18. 
     That left Sosonko, who was paired against Stean, a shot at tying for first if he could win. He played aggressively in the center, but he had misjudged the situation and found himself with a weak d-Pawn which was lost at move 18. After that he could put no real resistance and resigned at move 31. The disappointing lack of fighting spirit by the the leaders left a three-way tie for first.

 1-3) Miles, Korchnoi and Andersson 8.5 
4-5) Sosonko and Speelman 7.5 
6-8) Timman, Gheorghiu and Ljubojevic 7.0 
9) Sax 6.5 
10-12) Stean, Browne and Larsen 5.5 
13) Nunn 4.5 
14) Short 2.0 

One of the more exciting games of the tournament happened in the second round.  The players: 
     Jonathan Speelman (October 2, 1956) is a GM, mathematician and chess writer. He won the British Championship in 1978, 1985 and 1986. He qualified for two Candidates Tournaments. In the 1989–1990 cycle he qualified by placing third in the 1987 Interzonal Subotica, Yugoslavia. After beating Yasser Seirawan in his first round 4–1, and Nigel Short in the second round 3.5-1.5 he lost to Jan Timman in the semi-final 3.5-4.5. In the next event he lost 4.5-5.5 in the first round to Short. He has written a number of books on chess.
     Michael Stean (September 4, 1953) is a GM, chess book author and tax accountant. He learned to play chess before the age of five, developed into promising junior winning the London under-14 and British under-16 titles. He was awarded the IM title in 1975 and the GM title in 1977. 
     In 1971, he placed third at a junior event in Norwich and in 1973, he won a tournament in Canterbury ahead of Adorjan which lead to speculation that he might become England's first GM. In 1973 at the World Junior Championship he finished third behind Alexander Beliavsky and Anthony Miles. Both Stean and Miles defeated Beliavsky, but couldn't match his score against the lesser players. He tied for first in the 1974 British Championship, but lost the play-off to George Botterill. 
     In 1977-78 and 1980-81 he served as one of Viktor Korchnoi's team of seconds for the world championship campaigns. Stean's role was mostly involved with opening preparation and he and Korchnoi became good friends.  There were some well-documented divisions in the camp, with fellow second Raymond Keene standing accused of treating his book writing and journalistic duties as his first priority. 
     Stean served for a while as the manager of Nigel Short. In 1982, at the age of 29 and in his prime, Stean retired from chess to become a tax accountant. Stean wrote two books, one on the Najdorf Sicilian and one titled Simple Chess which has become a classic. I reviewed this excellent book HERE.  
     The following game from round two was a game in which Speelman took some chances in the opening, got nothing, but Stean drifted into time pressure and as the storm clouds gathered, a double Knight sacrifice lead to a good old fashioned King hunt that culminated in mate.

If I Didn't Play Chess I'd Play...

the harmonica...

The Greatest Player in the World

     No doubt about it, it was Reuben Fine. At least he thought so. Author Sam Sloan, who knew Fine, could never figure out if he was joking or if he really believed it. Arnold Denker wrote that he always felt sorry for Fine, mentioning that he lied a lot. Nevertheless, Fine was a great player, at least for a brief period of time and some of his chess books were pretty good, too. 
     Of Basic Chess Endings, Fine said that if it wasn't in the book, then it wasn't known. In a 1984 interview, Fine stated that it took him three months to write the book which was published in 1941. 
     Needless to say, over the years, many errors were found and many of them were published in Larry Evans' Chess Life column. Over one hundred errors were found and a mimeographed list of them was printed by Paul L. Crane and Rev. David Chew. An 18-page booklet containing over 200 corrections was published by Samuel Louie in 1990 and 1993.
     Burt Hochberg finally convinced the publisher to create a new edition. Endgame expert Pal Benko, whose own copy of the book contained hand-written notes of almost all of the errors, did the revision. The revised edition was published in 2003. Of course, endgame tablebases have revealed some errors have not been corrected. 
     Even with the inevitable errors bound to be found in such a work, Larry Evans listed it in his "basic chess library" and World Champion Mikhail Botvinnik considered it the best book on the endgame. Yuri Averbakh (who wrote the five-volume Comprehensive Chess Endings and Chess Endings: Essential Knowledge) based his research on Fine's book. And, John Nunn, who wrote a review of Basic Chess Endings, both the original version and the revised edition, called it a classic. Nunn also added that Fine was at his best when he gave general descriptions and the book has been rightly praised for its instructional value. 
     Nunn added that while it was well worth reading, much of the material on Queen endings was seriously misleading because knowledge of those ending has greatly increased since Fine wrote the book. Benko's revision has been described as poor. Many positions are without diagrams and some positions have been removed and the chapter on Queen endings was not brought up to date. Benko also failed to correct many errors in the original book. No computer-checking of the analysis was done; Benko does not use computers. The layout has also been described as shabby. 
     I said all that to ask, how many modern Grandmasters could write such a great classic (without a computer, no less), which Basic Chess Endings is, in three months?! That is if it really took him three months...remember what Denker said. 
     Up until the early 1930s, Fine claimed he had never read a chess book, but then he discovered them. The only problem was he didn't think any of them were worth reading. Books by Marshall and Capablanca were too elementary and the tournament book of Saint Petersburg 1914 had too many errors in the notes. Fine wrote that at first he thought he was mistaken, but later discovered that many chess authors were just plain sloppy. 
     After Pasadena 1932, Fine began studying German chess literature; he thought they were the only books worth the effort. He especially praised Tarrasch's Three Hundred Games. After that, he turned to the Hypermoderns, especially Reti's Masters of the Chessboard and Nimzovich's My System. Fine especially praised Nimzovich for pointing out principles for handling closed and cramped positions. 
     Those books didn't help with practical play so then he turned to studying the games of Lasker, Capablanca and Alekhine. After that he became the greatest player in the world. 
     For all his braggadocio, according to Chessmetrics Fine was rated number one in the world six different months between the October 1940 rating list and the March 1941 rating list. And, his highest assigned rating was 2762 on the July 1941 rating list which placed him number two in world behind Botvinnik at 2786. 
 

Moscow 1947

     
     The Chigorin Memorial in honor of Mikhail Chigorin (1850–1908), founder of the Soviet Chess School and one of the leading players of his day was first held in Saint Petersburg in 1909. 

    Later an international invitational memorial series was established; they were mainly played in the Black Sea resort Sochi (from 1963 to 1990). Prior to that irregular tournaments had been held in 1947, 1951, 1961, and 1972, played in diverse venues. When, in 1993, the venue returned to Saint Petersburg it had degenerated into an open tournament.
     In 1947 it was a given fact that the next World Champion was going to be Botvinnik. He had won the first major tournament to be held after World War II, Groningen in 1946, and he had turned in an excellent performance in the Soviet championship. So, for him, along with Paul Keres and Vasily Smyslov, the Chigorin Memorial held from November 25 to December 23 was to be their final appearance before the upcoming world championship tournament. Officially the tournament was limited to Slavic players, but by international standards it was still a very strong event. 

     Botvinnik, thanks to a series of wins from rounds 6-10, established a one point lead. Then after round 11 his lead was a comfortable 1.5 points, but a draw in round 12 cut it back to one point ahead of Keres and Kotov. 
     Then came the fateful 13th round. Botvinnik had white against the newcomer Pachman while Keres had black against Gligoric and Kotov had black against Bondarevsky. Naturally, that put Botvinnik in a good position to increase his lead. But disaster struck when Botvinnik committed a rare gross blunder that cost a piece. He played on but the issue was never in doubt. 
     Both Keres and Kotov faded while Botvinnik recovered in round 14 when he defeated Keres in a marathon 80-move game. In the final round with first place assured he took a 13-move GM draw against Trifunovic. Of the foreign masters, only Pachman (Czechoslovakia) and Trifunovic (Yugoslavia) managed to score more than 50 percent. 

1) Botvinnik 11.0 
2) Ragozin 10.5 
3-4) Boleslavsky and Smyslov 10.0 
5) Kotov 9.5 
6-7) Keres and Novotelnov 9.0 
8) Pachman 8.5 
9) Trifunovic 8.0 
10) Gligoric 7.5 
11) Bondarevsky 6.5 
12) Kholmov 5.5 
13) Kottnauer 5.0 
14-15) Plater and Sokolsky 4.0 
16) Tsvetkov 2.0