Chessville News - 2006 Women's World Chess Cup

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2006 Women's World Chess Cup
Reported by, and photos courtesy of, Paul Truong

Susan Polgar has just won the Women's World Chess Cup for the United States in Dresden, Germany. 32 players from 32 nations were invited.

The format is exactly like the Soccer World Cup, with the same 8 groups and the top 2 finishers of each group advance to knockout match play.

Susan easily made it out of the preliminary group.

In match play, she score 7/8 points, winning 6 and drawing 2. She won all 4 games with the White pieces and 2 games with Black while drawing 2 in match play. Final score: 7 wins - 4 draws - 0 loss = 9/11

The strategy was to make it through the group into the knockout stage. Therefore, after she won her first game, she made sure to play safe in the next 2 games to conserve energy since she had to play 11 games in 2 days.

In the round of 16, she defeated WIM Macek of Croatia 2-0. In the quarterfinal, she defeated WGM Ushenina of the Ukraine 2-0. In the semifinal, she defeated WGM Lujan of Argentina 1.5 - .5. Both Lujan and Ushenina are very tough rapid players. In the final, she defeated IM Pahtz, a player who was on a hot streak. The score was also 1.5 - .5.

The top three finishers, left to right: IM Marie Sebag, GM Susan Polgar, IM Elizabeth Pahtz

This is the first ever World Cup victory for the United States! The games were broadcast live on playchess.com.

This event got incredible media coverage in Germany, especially Dresden. Thousands of spectators came to see the event to cheer for their local favorites IM Elizabeth Pahtz. Dresden will be the site for the 2007 European Championship and 2008 World Chess Olympiad.