2010 Chess Olympiad r8: Bulgaria vs Philippines

Our regular 8-5 job and those threats imposed of beating deadlines made it close to impossible to update this blog in the past week but we're back on blogging. Though quite inactive from blogging, we still have some time to check in the results of the ongoing chess olympiad happening in Khanty-Manyisks, Russia. Giant chess websites like Chessbase, Chessdom and Chessvibes, each provides and showcase different angle of covering the event is enough to keep everyone informed about the olympiad while other chess blogs gives the Olympiad a fair and balanced observation.

So far, the progress of the RP men's team remains a drag. The level of competition is getting tougher and tougher as years goes by and lower seeded team is pulling off surprises here there. The RP men's team is currently placed 40th and landing in the top 20 seems bleak and is facing the Vaselin Topalov led Bulgarian team in the 8th round. Topalov was shocked by Mark Bluvshtein of Canada in the previous round. The rest of the Canadian team got inspired by the win and pulls off the biggest surprise of the day by holding their ground against the 8th seed Bulgarian team 2:2. The loss by Topalov is the biggest upsets so far in the ongoing olympiad.

The 52nd seeded Philippine women team on the other hand is placed 32 on the standings of the Women's section with Russia, Georgia and India on top of the leader board.

Ukraine, (thanks to amazing Ivanchuk) is on top of the standings, with Russia 1, Hungary and Azerbaijan is very much still there to stop Ukraine.


Important links:

Rank after 7 rounds (Open)

Round 8 team pairings (Open)

Rank after 7 rounds (Women)

Round 8 team pairings (Women)

Live/replays of games through chessdom-chessbomb