Kramnik wins Game Two against Kasparov

The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner

Just a block away the Thames, in its unhurried grace, proceeds below the Hammersmith Bridge, under repair after damage by a terrorist bomb. Or perhaps it was local residents not happy at the imminent resumption of traffic noise.

1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 g6 3.Nc3

3...d5 4.cxd5 Nxd5 5.e4 Nxc3 6.bxc3 Bg7 7.Nf3

7...c5 8.Be3 Qa5 9.Qd2 Bg4

Kasparov sits in his chair, his balding hair revealed from the upper galleries. He sits hunched like a leopard, ready to pounce. But Kramnik has offered a variation where Kasparov's major paths involve trading queens. Not far away, at Queens Wharf, the Thames slides by.

10.Rb1 a6

11.Rxb7 Bxf3 12.gxf3 Nc6 13.Bc4

Except in those moments when the fruits of heavy thinking, the moves, drop like grapes in October to the board, only one player is present. While Kasparov thinks, Kramnik is backstage in his private room. There a monitor displays the current position. When it changes, he knows that Kasparov has moved. He can walk about, have a snack, or even yawn, away from the scrutiny of some 90 spectators. But trading queens is one of the last things that a leopard wants to do. He would rather leave that sort of thing to the Boa Constrictor. Here in the second game, there is not likely to be any deep attack conjured out of the depths, with the queen emerging suddenly from the waters. The mind casts back to the second game at New York, 1990, where White's queen travelled to all corners of the board, her long arm felt everywhere.

Kasparov sits at the board, as the minutes slide by. Occasionally he looks up at one of the display boards, gaining another view of the position in front of him. He is the only one on the stage. His is the loneliness of the long distance runner.

The move 13.Bc4 is, incidentally, the first original move of the game. In a postal game, 13.Bh3 was played.

13...O-O 14.O-O cxd4 15.cxd4 Bxd4

16.Bd5

As Kramnik made this strong but expected move, the unexpected happened on the display projection boards: nothing! Chief Arbiter Andrzej Filipowicz noticed it, went to Kasparov's backstage area, and told him that the move had been made. Then he went to the display people and told them they would have to watch the TV cameras and make the moves manually. So for the rest of the game there was a kind of time lapse.

But matters were not concluded. Kasparov wanted some time back on the clock. Filipowicz at first figured that a minute would do it, but after consulting his records (not completely trusting the technology, he keeps track by hand of the moves and the times), figured that it was more like a minute and a half. In the world of digital clocks, that means two minutes.

16...Bc3

Suddenly, he moves. Those who were not riveted to the board have missed it. But soon the move appears on the screen. Kasparov sits back with a grim look of satisfaction on his face. Kramnik appears from backstage. Both men are trim and conservatively dressed in light-coloured suits. Kasparov gets up and retreats backstage as Kramnik arrives at the board.

The playing hall could probably hold another 50 people. Attendance is depressed by the 20 pound admittance fee, but after the result of this game, the crowds were about 50% bigger for Game Three.

About 30 journalists are away in the press room, two stories above, following the game on screen monitors, or sitting at LCD monitors (provided by the organizers) or their own laptop computer. Some are checking their email, or following the game from servers in Israel (in English) or Spain (in Spanish), or the organizers' site at www.braingames.net.

The game continues and queens are not traded. Kramnik, early ahead on time, goes into a long think. He is a giant, at 2 metres in height, and he sits at the board with his back straight, leaning over slightly. His animal is huge, without the irritability of the bear or the elephant, perhaps a whale, confident in his ocean. When he was a teenager, only 7 years ago, Kramnik opined that he knew what there needed to be known about chess, that nobody could teach him anything, that improvement for him would henceforth be a question of refining his skill. As we know from Darwin, however, entities which do not learn from their environment are doomed. Maybe it was just youthful bravado, or what passes for bravado in the world of chess.

17.Qc1

Only after Kramnik's 40-minute on this move think was the arbiter, Filipowicz, able to restore the two minutes on Kasparov's clock from move 16.

At the press conference, Kramnik was asked why he took so long on this move, that it was the one predicted in the press gallery. That question was a bit of a surprise to me, because I had been predicting Qe2! I would have liked to ask Kramnik how he came to choose Qc1, but I guess the answer could take 40 minutes or so, which would make an extraordinary post-game event! Just imagine the cameras on the specatators, wondering whether it would be polite to leave just now....

Kramnik replied that it was not such a simple matter, he had to consider other moves such as Qc2, Qd1 "or even Qe2". Besides, he was calculating the game continuation.

17...Nd4 18.Bxd4 Bxd4 19.Rxe7 Ra7 20.Rxa7 Bxa7

21.f4 Qd8 22.Qc3

Dr. Nathan Divinsky of Vancouver is the doyen of the press room analysis area tonight. On other occasions you might hear his deep but mellifluent voice opine frequently, but tonight the position is too subtle. Is the position sliding towards an inevitable draw? Or will Kramnik hold his extra pawn and his initiative?

And who is holding the wine glass? Behind Dr. Divinsky, do you recognize the hands of a prominent English grandmaster? Probably not. Tonight, the organizers have provided crackers and wine (Spanish, Rioja, tasty, but not overindulged in by the journalists. What is happening to the world?).

In the game, Kramnik, via a strange-looking triangulation with his queen (Qd2-c1-c3-f3), when it might have arrived more directly (Qd2-e2-f3), managed to get his central pawns going.

22...Bb8

23.Qf3 Qh4 24.e5

Kasparov ripped apart the f4-e5 pawn chain with g6-g5, the kind of move the chess columnists advise their readers not to try at home, because it is too dangerous to one's own king safety unless the consequences are precisely calculated.

At the press conference after the game, Kasparov said a lot about these positions. First, he had failed to consider 23.Qf3, instead concentrating on 23.Qg3 Qd6 24.f5 Qxd5, which he believed to be a draw. Second, when he did find the move he is about to play here, he relaxed. He thought that the hardest work was over.

24...g5 25.Re1

...third, that he had overlooked this move, which keeps life in the position.

25...Qxf4 26.Qxf4 gxf4

In the press room, there are no lights. The sunlight through the windows is failing. Somebody jokes: "do we put another coin in the meter?". It is the evening of our chess lives, and darkness gathers.

Kasparov's thrust g6-g5 has succeeded in its purpose. Now Black is lord of the dark squares.

The light returns to the press room. Those working at backlit LCDs did not notice the lack, so long as they did not succumb to the temptation to walk to the analysis area for a shrimp cracker.

27.e6 fxe6 28.Rxe6 Kg7 29.Rxa6

Queens have been traded and Kramnik is a pawn ahead again. This time it it definitely not a temporary matter. This is a permanent pawn. Other things being equal, a pawn up is enough to win, but of course, other things are not equal. Each side has a rook and a bishop. The rooks are equal, but the bishops run along opposite colours. This factor, in the absence of rooks, would guarantee Kasparov a draw. Why? Because on its road to becoming a queen, each pawn (including Kramnik's extra one) has to pass alternately over a dark square, then a light square, then a dark square... If Black has a dark-square bishop and White does not, then how does the pawn become a queen? In the presence of rooks, however, tactics rear their head. Either king may become the object of a withering attack. A small tactical transaction may result in a trade of bishops, giving a rook ending where the pawn up might well be enough to win.

29...Rf5 30.Be4 Re5 31.f3

31...Re7 32.a4 Ra7 33.Rb6

...fourth, that he had intended to put his bishop on e3 (which could be accomplished here directly), have the rook on the 5th rank, and play h7-h5. Kasparov then felt that White would have severe difficulties in winning. But in the game he simply played something else, and he was not sure why, maybe a symptom of relaxing after getting g6-g5 in.

33...Be5 34.Rb4 Rd7 35.Kg2

Asked when he felt sure of victory, Kramnik mentioned Kg2. Up to then it was just a good initiative.

Under the terms of their contracts, both players must show up for the post-game conference. Kasparov, understandably, takes a bit longer to show up. At first nobody in the audience has the nerve to put any question, but then a woman asks Kramnik which moves in the game surprised him. He answers matter-of-factly that no move in the game surprised him.

That might be a measure of success in the match. If Kasparov is able to surprise his opponent, he is more likely to be able to start putting full points on the table.

35...Rd2+ 36.Kh3 h5 37.Rb5 Kf6 38.a5 Ra2

The Riverside Studios have a 60s feel, with stainless steel and aluminum, er, aluminium, strange entryways and staircases leading up to large open rooms with plenty of natural light. It is showing its age, though that age is not great.

The horsies, having been traded, gather in front of the playing hall. They will be back for Game Three.

To get to the Riverside Studios, you walk down Queen Caroline Street. Who was Queen Caroline? Kasparov's mother, his constant companion fifteen to twenty years ago, is Klara. Klara - Caroline? Or is it the Russian musical tongue-twister: Karl u Klari ukral klarina, a Klara u Karli ukrala klarnyet. Or was she the Carolina of Raleigh and Charleston fame? When you arrive at Caroline House, you turn left, and there it is, a proud and squat but grimy building, not exactly what you might expect for a $2 million event. Don't mistake me, the conditions are excellent, the Riverside Studios was a practical choice. But, apart from the river setting, it lacks, hmm, elegance.

For example, the setup on the stage is striking (also somewhat less so as they add www.braingames.net in several places, hoping to catch a camera lens or two). But the player hideaways are not grand. Just a chair, a small table, a glass of mineral water, the game monitor, not in a room, but more of an alcove next to the emergency exit. The decor is matte black. This is a studio, after all, and if no rays of light impinge from backstage, so much the better.

39.Rb6+ Ke7

As we went down the staircase to snake our way back to the playing hall for the press conference, I told GM Jonathan Speelman that this fulfilled Mark Crowther's prediction of at least one major blunder in the match. Speelman replied not really, as Black was losing anyway.

I don't know. It is a blunder if, sitting in front of the last unopened bottle of wine in the press analysis room, you identify the response and then figure, out loud, Black's various fates, before White's 40th move appears on the demo screen.

40.Bd5

"If he takes the a5-pawn, you win the pawn ending. If he plays Re2, you check and advance the a-pawn." Kasparov in fact resigned almost instantly. It was a shock, as just a move or two earlier we were expecting a drawn-out struggle.

1-0

The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner is a British movie about a bright boy from the wrong side of the tracks. On one adventure, he finds some money and "nicks" it. The local constable is very suspicious and searches the house. The boy's ingenious hiding place for the money (in the downspout) fails when the inevitable British weather rears its ugly head.

The boy gets sent to a reform school where he undergoes, let's be kind and call it tough love. He finds that he enjoys running, and is very good at it. Of course his handlers are delighted and challenge an upper-crust school to a meet. Our boy opens up a huge lead. The finish of the race is the climax of the movie. I won't ruin it for you by telling you what happens.

The parallel here is the loneliness of the chess player on stage, even though hundreds are watching on site and thousands via the 'net. Kasparov has, to many observers, been a bad boy. The question of who has stolen what in the world of chess is a long one that is better discussed in another article (or perhaps not at all). At this point the analogy breaks down because none of the putative chess miscreants has been sent to anything like a reform school, and not one of them has done, or will do, what the boy in the movie does!