Picture by GM Fontaine of Europe Echecs
IM Sebag of France and WGM Hou of China, two of the top female players in the world with ratings over 2500, are on pace for a GM norm after 7 rounds at Aeroflot in Moscow. Sebag is performing at 2601 at the moment with 2 rounds to go while Hou is performing at 2648.
Here are the tournament leaders after 7 rounds:
Rank Name Title Nationality Rating Score Performance
1-3 Dreev, Alexey GM RUS 2633 5.5 2822
1-3 Rodshtein, Maxim GM ISR 2614 5.5 2811
1-3 Nepomniachtchi, Ian GM RUS 2600 5.5 2831
4-6 Motylev, Alexander GM RUS 2644 5 2745
4-6 Guseinov, Gadir GM AZE 2617 5 2754
4-6 Le, Quang Liem GM VIE 2540 5 2760
Official website: www.aeroflotchess.com
Chess Daily News from Susan Polgar
They’re the future of women’s chess.
I hope they both make it.
It is very important to break down the prejudice against women. I am a guy with a daughter and grand daughter. I am upset with the discrimination against Hillary Clinton as a woman. There is no hiding the discrimination with all the male unions going against her. Those union guys do not want a woman as president. So the big male unions are going for Obama.
I am not saying anything negative against Obama. He is also a good man. But the discrimination is definitely strongly showing against women in our society.
I am glad to see that the discrimination against other racial groups is disolving away. It is good to see all groups voting for Obama. I want to see the same for Hillary.
I want to see women play chess just as good as the men. Judit is one of my favorite players. Susan is simply one of the very best people in all of chess. Go Susan. Chess needs you.
IMO there is no reason for separate women chess titles, events etc. at all.
In physical sports like track&fields, tennis, volleyball etc. the division in mens and womens competitions are of course -physically- justified. Men are in average bigger and stronger than women. But Chess is a mental sport. Separating men and women in chess (and having separate womens’ titles, events etc like we have today) boils down to admitting that women are also mentally not equal to men.
Would make a good discussion topic on the chessdiscussion.com forum…
Susan do you know if Hou has any IM norms or any other norms for that matter?