 |
| Storm of the Century March 13, 1996 |
The storm formed over the Gulf of Mexico on March 12, 1993 and was unique and notable for its intensity, massive size, and wide-reaching effects; at its height it stretched from Canada to Honduras. It eventually dissipated in the North Atlantic Ocean on March 15, 1993.
Heavy snow began in the highland areas as far south as Alabama and northern Georgia with up to 35 inches of snow and Birmingham, Alabama reported a rare 13 inches while the Florida Panhandle reported up to 4 inches with hurricane-force wind gusts and record low barometric pressures. Some areas in the Appalachian Mountain region saw 5 feet with snowdrifts as high as 35 feet.
Down in my old stomping ground, Jacksonville, North Carolina, winds hit near hurricane force at 62 miles per hour, but they only got a trace of snow. Between Louisiana and Cuba the hurricane-force winds produced high storm surges across the big bend of Florida which, in combination with scattered tornadoes, killed dozens of people. All told, there were 11 reported tornadoes. In the United States, the storm was responsible for the loss of electric power to more than 10 million households.
Where I live the weather during the storm was not quite so bad: temperatures were in the low 20's to low 30s. We had about 7 inches of snow before the storm developed and got another 10 inches during it, but afterwards temperatures started moving into the 40s and there was only a trace of snow up to March 22; after that, nothing.
Chess happenings:
# As of January the top players were Kasparov (World Champion), Karpov, Ivanchuk, Anand, Gelfand, Kramnik, Shirov, Bareev, Georgiev and Salov.
# Nigel Short defeated Jan Timman 7.5-5.5 in the Candidates Final and became Kaspaov's challenger. Kasparov and Short left FIDE and started the Professional Chess Association to hold their own championship match. FIDE forfeited both players from its world championship cycle, deleted their ratings and stripped Kasparov of his world title. Kasparov decisively defeated Short by a score of 12.5-7.5. The PCA didn't last very long: 1993-1996. For complete details see the Wikipedia article.
# The FIDE world championship match pitted Anatoly Karpov against Jan Timman. Karpov won 12.5-8.5.
# Xie Jun crushed Nana Ioseliani 8.5-2.5 in the Women's World Championship.
# Linares had 11 of the world's top players and Kasparov ran away with first place with a 10.0-3.0 score. Karpov and Anand were a point and a half back.
# The FIDE Interzonal at Biel, Switzerland was won by Boris Gelfand who finished ahead of Adams, Kamsky, Khalifman, Kramnik, Lautier, Salov, van der Sterren, Yudasin and Anand, all of whom qualifiedor the next stage.
# The PCA also held its version of the Interzonal in Geoningen. It is won by Michael Adams and Viswanathan Anand. The other qualifiers for the Candidates Matches were Kramnik, Kamsky, Tiviakov, Gulko and Romanishin. # Alexander Shabalov won the US Open and and Alex Yermolinsky won the World Open.
# The US Women's Championship was shared by Elena Donaldson and Irina Levitina.
# Hastings was a tie for first between Judit Polgar and Evgeny Bareev.
# Gata Kamsky wins the U.S. National Open in Las Vegas.
# Mark Taimanov won the World Senior Championship in Bad Wildbad, Germany.
# Boris Spassky lost a match against Judit Polgar in Budapest.
# The movie Searching for Bobby Fischer was released.
# Wesley So was born
# The chess world also lost Reuben Fine and Vladimir Makogonov. Boris Kogan, a Russian-American IM and former Soviet Junior Champion died on Christmas Day. Alexander Koblencs also died that year.
Nigel Short (born June 1, 1965) may not be widely recognized by some younger players today, but he was a bona fide prodigy. He defeated Korchnoi in a simul at the age of 10 at the age of 12 in 1977 he became the youngest ever participant in the British Championship. At the age of 14, he became British Champion (tied with John Nunn).
When he played Kasparov for the “World Championship” he had defeated challengers Jonathan Speelman, Boris Gelfand, Anatoly Karpov and Jan Timman in matches; impressive!
Both Short and Kasparov were upset with FIDE for a number of reasons: the bidding process to select the site for the match, not consulting with the players for the playing site and what was probably the biggest gripe of all, 20 percent of the prize fund being grabbed (or stolen, if you prefer) by FIDE. Hence, they formed the Professional Chess Association for the marketing and organization of their match.
The Times of London sponsored the event and called it The Times World Chess Championship. It was estimated that as many as one million viewers watched the first few games on television, but the match started badly for Short who lost on time in a better position. After that Short took a drubbing and Kasparov opened up a big lead and most everybody lost interest.
It wasn't that Short wasn't a worthy challenger...just look at who he defeated in matches to get to challenge Kasparov. Rather it was that in those days Kasparov was just that good.
On the January 1993 FIDE rating list the top players were:
1) Kasparov - 2805
2) Fischer – 2780 (inactive)
3) Karpov - 2725
4-5) Anand and Ivanchuk - 2710
6) Gelfand - 2690
7) Kramnik - 2685
8-9) Shirov and Bareev - 2670
10-11) Georgiev and Salov - 2660
12-14) Azmaiparashvili, Short and Kamsky- 2655
15) Lautier and Jussupow - 2645
17 ) Sokolov - 2640
18-20) Topalov,Timman and Polugaevsky - 2635
Other U.S. players in the top 100 list were: Boris Gulko (2625), Gregory Kaidanov (2620), Larry Christiansen (2620), Alex Yermolinsky (2620), Gregory Serper (2600), Michael Rohde (2595), Yasser Seirawan (2595), Joel Benjamin (2585), Patrick Wolff (2580), Alex Shabalov (2575) and Sergey Kudrin (2575).
Short fought hard, but Kasparov was just too much and the following game was Short's only win. Short, by this time already down six points, had white and played one of his quieter games in the match and it was later discovered that he was suffering from a cold.
After about twenty moves everyone in the analysis room was commenting on how dull the game was, how unambitious Short's play was and that a draw seemed likely. British WIM, three-time British Women's Champion and journalist Cathy Forbes observed the awkward way Short was sitting and wondered if he had forgotten to pee before the game.
At move 24 Short could have traded Qs and offered a draw, but he didn't. Later he claimed both he and Kasparov were “a little bit too ashamed to offer a draw” and still later claimed, “I was too lazy to offer a draw and so was he.” For his part, it didn't even appear that Kasparov was trying to win, and why should he? For all practical purposes the match was won.
For whatever reason, Qs were not exchanged and Kasparov began making gestures towards a K-side attack while Short began messing around on the Q-side where he won a P and before you knew it, Kasparov was busted. He shook hands, declined to look at the game and stalked off.
At the press conference Short claimed he had been shaken by his loss in the previous game and so in game 16 he was being careful. English journalist Dominic Lawson said that later that night as they were having dinner, Short wasn't so restrained. According to Lawson, “He jumped up repeatedly from the table, almost between mouthfuls, and clenched his fists together in front of his chest, like a footballer after scoring a goal.” And, he emitted a sound something like, “Wurgh! Wurgh!'”
Before the start of the game, observer Nathan Divinsky had commented that the match had already been over for six weeks. Divinsky, a Canadian mathematician, university professor, chess master, chess writer and chess official who was also the former husband of Canadian Prime Minister, Kim Campbell claimed Kasparov blew his brains out with 24...Ba8 and 27...g5.
Kasparov's explanation was that he was “tired and emotionally exhausted” put Short in a snit. Short retorted that, “He can’t really tolerate the fact that I have been playing on equal terms with him...He’s used to me collapsing, as I used to do before this match. Now something has happened. So he thinks it has to be something wrong with him, because it can’t be something right with me. He likes to think that if only he didn’t have these worries–personal, political, whatever–he would win every game. It’s not modesty at all–quite the reverse.”
After game 16 Kasparov cruised to victory with four rather uneventful draws though Kasparov later confessed that he was “irritated” by the fact that it was Short who had won the last game before the match was concluded.
After the match the two relaxed with some speed chess for the television viewers. Korchnoi had been urging Short to play the French Defense and he finally did in the speed games, but it didn't help…he lost with it, too.
No comments:
Post a Comment