Bled 2002 - Round 2

The Great Book of Chess Olympiads

35th Chess Olympiad - Bled 2002

Edition 1

Completed 3/16 of the work.

Number of pages: 360.

Number of games: 532.

Round 2 was a real challenge! A large number of games either have incorrect scores in chess databases (e.g. OlimpBase.org) with pieces hanging under capture, etc., while the sensational match Netherlands (2616) - Chile (2364) - in the databases we only have the first few opening moves (6 and not much more). Fortunately, thanks to the paper Olympiad bulletin - we will see everything correctly and in full.

This time the game of the day is a wild encounter, mutual queen sacrifices and other piece sacrifices (!) - the game GM Winants 2504 - Mamedyarov 2580. This is not a mistake - the now-famous Mamedyarov did not even hold the FM title at the time, but his rating was enormous for that era! The game was so crazy that in the databases you will only find the first few opening moves. Grandmaster Winants annotated it in the Yugoslav Informator - so we will see the complete game, which ended in a draw, played in the style of the old masters!

Poland (2554) did not disappoint and defeated Italy (2450) 3 - 1.

After Round 2, Bulgaria and Cuba were in the lead with 7.5 points each. Poland was in 9th place, while Russia, after Morozevich's upset loss to Ramirez (today the famous chess commentator Alejandro Ramirez, then a 14-year-old junior from Costa Rica, now USA), were only in 9th place.

Istanbul 2000 - correction progress 61%.