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Game of the Week
With Analysis by IM Greg Shahade

May 20th, 2003

There were four GM’s competing for the top prize in this week’s event. Pavel Blatny had JUST landed in NY, from a vacation in Maui. He took no time to rest, and sprinted off to the Marshall Chess Club to make it in time for the first round. However he understood his limitations after such a long trip, and requested a final round half point bye. The other GM’s were in much better condition, as Grandmasters Jan Ehlvest, Leonid Yudasin and Alex Wojtkiewicz were going to duke it out this week!

Participant List for 57th NY Masters

(3) Yudasin,L (2666) - Wojtkiewicz,A (2617) [B50]
57th New York Masters New York (3), 20.05.2003

[Click here for an interactive JavaScript board]
 

Blatny moved to 2.5 out of 3, finally putting a stop to Dubinsky’s hot streak. In other action, Ehlvest was knocked out of the picture by Justin Sarkar, who atoned for his second round tragedy in fantastic style! Now would Yudasin be able to keep pace with Blatny, or would Wojo knock off Yudasin and take possession of clear first with 3/3?

A HUGE 3rd round matchup here, as Yudasin has the white pieces, but is a half point back on Wojtkiewicz. Thus Yudasin will do whatever it takes to chalk up the W.

Now we have a typical position where white is bearing down upon the e5 pawn and black hopes to gain some pressure against white’s pawn on d3…

14.a5 b5 15.axb6 axb6 16.g3 b5 17.Ne3 Be6 18.Nxd5 Bxd5 19.Be3 Qd6

Blacks plan of attack is f5-f4….

A great move! Now 20….f5 is weak because white has the strong counterblow 21.Ne4, exploiting the position of the undefended queen on d6.

Wojo has gotten it down to an endgame, and the crowd thought the position was perhaps slightly better for white, but not really enough to win the game….however Yudasin plays a series of hyper-accurate moves, to put some major pressure on Wojtkiewicz.

25.Bh3!

With the idea of Bd7, attacking the b5 pawn from the other side of the board!

All part of white’s plan! White was hoping to entice b4 because now the pawn on c4 is impossible to defend. One example variation is 26.Bf1 bc3 27.bc3 Rb3 28.Rd6 Na5 29.Rd8 (Idea of kicking the king away from the f7 pawn) Kh7 30.Bc4 Rc3 31. Bxf7.

Whoa! Wojtkiewicz realizes that the time has come for desperation. Wojo hopes that his wave of pawns on the 4th rank will cause some serious problems for Yudasin.

An interesting idea that Yudasin seemed proud of. The idea is that after white plays e5, white can keep the bishop shut down by nestling the bishop on g3, after black kicks it away with …g5.

30...Ra8 31.e5 g5 32.Bg3 Ra3

32….Rc8 looked interesting, but white could play 33.Rc1 c2 34.f3 to respond to Rc3 with 35.Be1!, giving white the advantage, as black will win the b-f pawns, but white will capture the important c-pawn.

The threat of Bd6 is too much to handle, and black’s pawns simply aren’t fast enough.

35...fxe6 36.Bd6 Rb1

36….c2 fails to 37.Rxf8 Kg7 38.Rc8 Rc3 39.Rxc3 bxc3 40.Ba3, stopping the c2 pawn just in the nick of time!

Return to the New York Masters Index

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