Cover Story / Nakamura, Krush are champs
exposed, so it is difficult to make progress. 26. Ng4 Bg7 27. Nd5 Rc2 28. Qe3
White’s best defense is 28. Qd1 Nxb2 29. Ne7+ Kh8 30. Qxd6.
28. ... Nc5 29. h5 Qxe3 30. Ngxe3 Rd2 31. Nc4 Rd4 32. Nxd6 Rd8 33. b4
No better is 33. Rec1 Nxe4 34. Nxe4 Rxe4 35. Rc5.
33. ... Nd3 34. Nxb7 Nxe1+ 35. Rxe1 Ra8 36. f3
Despite being down the Exchange, Kamsky still has good drawing chances. But White must retain activity, even at the cost of a pawn. 36. Nc5 Bf8 37. Rc1.
36. ... Bf8 37. Rc1 Bxb4 38. Rc7 White could also have taken 38. hxg6
before playing Rc7. The advantage of waiting is that the move h5-h6 can lock up the black king in some variations, and after ... gxh5 White now has the f5- square for the knight.
38. ... gxh5 39. Kh3 Kg7 40. Kh4? The dreaded 40th move strikes again.
Now Black is winning thanks to the pin on the seventh rank. 40. Nxb4 Rxb4 41. Nd6 Now Black has a tough choice of either losing the f7- or a6-pawn. In either case White should have good drawing chances.
40. ... Ra7! 41. Kxh5 Four-time U.S. Women’s Champion IM Irina Krush
41. ... Rxd5! Nakamura correctly removes White’s
best piece and simplifies into a clear win. 42. exd5 Bxa5 43. Re7 Also losing is 43. d6!? Bxc7 44. dxc7
Ra8 45. Nd6 a5 46. c8=Q Rxc8 47. Nxc8 a4 48. Nd6 a3 49. Nf5+ Kf6 50. Ne3 a2 51. Nc2 Ke6 52. Kh6 Kd6! (Amazingly the black king has more than enough time to march all the way to c3 before White can generate a passed pawn.) 53. Kxh7 Kc5 54. Kg7 Kc4 55. Kxf7 Kc3 56. Na1 Kb2. Immediately losing is 43. Rc5?? Bb6.
43. ... Bb6 44. d6 a5 45. Kg5 45. Nd8 There are some tricks here, but
Nakamura figured everything out. 45. ... Kf8! (45. ... a4 46. Nc6!) 46. Rxa7 Bxa7 47. Nc6 Bb6 Knights are terrible defenders against rook pawns, and Black will even- tually walk the king towards the queenside. For example 48. Nxe5 a4 49. Nc4 Bc5 50. d7 Ke7 51. Kh6 Kxd7 52. Kxh7 Ke6 53. Kg7 Kd5 and Black wins.
45. ... a4 46. Kf5 a3 47. Nd8 a2 48. Ne6+ Kh6 49. Ng5 a1=Q 50. Nxf7+ Kg7, White resigned.
With no more good checks available, White resigned. Nakamura shook Kamsky’s hand and
offered his first glimpse of satisfaction with a wry smile to his second, Kris Lit- tlejohn. Kamsky, who always comes to the press room to offer his post-game com- mentary (he did after the loss to Kaidanov too), instead stayed upstairs. The sight of a lugubrious Kamsky in public is a rar- ity. He walked toward the arbiter’s table, turned his back to the crowd, and looked vulnerable, pinching his nose at his tear
ducts while standing motionless with his head down. “A lot of moves Gata played in this
game surprised me,” Nakamura said. “I wasn’t really sure what was going on. I was trying to keep the position compli- cated.” Nakamura claimed that he did not have all the variations worked out, but he was sure he was not losing at any point. “Optically the knights are very strong, but at the same time, they don’t have any squares.” He said that he was unlucky in several previous contests where he was held to a draw, and that the tournament perhaps owed him a bit of for- tune. “I’ve been pressing pretty much every game. Yury [Shulman] defends like a genius. To get a break today when I thought I was drawing ...” The frustration of not overcoming stingy defense must have been fresh on Naka- mura’s conscience, as the previous day he came up just short of beating GM Alex Lenderman in the longest game of the
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