MARK RUBERY CHESS
During the 1998 Chess Olympiad in Elista a most unusual, or rather, bizarre game was contested between two strong grandmasters that in the space of 20 moves managed to violate all the basic rules that are instilled in us as we emerge from the beginner phase.
1 Do not bring your queen out too soon.
2. Do not move your pieces more than once during the opening
3. Do not grab pawns in the opening 4 Do not bring your rooks out too early
Miles,Anthony J (2590) - Vaisser,Anatoli (2575) [A80]
Elista ol (Men) Elista (10) 1998
1.d4 e6 2.Nf3 f5 3.d5 exd5 4.Qxd5 d6 5.Ng5 Qe7 6.Nxh7 c6 7.Qb3 Rxh7 8.Qxg8 Rh4 9.Qb3 Na6 10.Qe3 Re4 11.Qd2 Nb4 12.Qd1 (The computer prefers White after the less novel 12 a3) SEE DIAGRAM
(Almost a problem-like position. White’s pieces are set out exactly as they were before the game commenced except the g1 N and d2 pawn are missing…) … Rd4! 13.Nd2 f4
14.a3 Nd5 15.c3 Ne3 (Shades of the shortest recorded master loss: 1 d4 Nf6 2 Nd2 e5 3 dxe5 Ng4 4 h3 Ne3! 0-1) 16.fxe3 Qh4+ 17.g3 fxg3 18.Bg2 gxh2+ 19.Kf1 Qf6+ 20.Ke1 Qh4+ (After some tremendously original play from both players the game ends in a perpetual check) 21.Kf1 0,5-0,5
Geometric progression is one of the foundational principles of mathematics, helping to advance understanding of everything in nature that grows or spreads, from human population, to financial investments to nuclear fission. Its manifestation in chess, is one of the characteristics that make the game so fascinating to mathematicians.
Chess starts out quite simply: White has twenty options for the first move, and Black has the same twenty moves at his disposal that can thus lead to 400 distinct positions. On move two the number increases at an incredible rate with both players having 27 moves, thus after Black’s second move is completed there are 71,852 possible positions that could be reached. Here it starts to get a bit chaotic as after three complete moves the players could have settled on approximately nine million board positions. After four moves the number of possible positions that could be attained is more than 315 billion. The game has barely begun and we are dealing with numbers more appropriate to the realm of astronomy-no wonder it is so frustratingly difficult!