The 5th tournament of the FIDE Women’s Grand-Prix 2013-2014 is taking place from 18th June to 2nd July in Lopota, Georgia.
Twelve players compete in the round robin tournament. The event is organized by the Georgian Ministry of Sport and Youth, FIDE and Georgian Chess Federation, and sponsored by SOCAR.
The high fighting spirit animating the 8th round was not reflected on the score table. All the games ended in draws with the exception of Stefanova-Muminova, won by the former Women World Champion.
For the first time in the tournament, Hou Yifan seemed to be under pressure when Harika made an original pawn sacrifice for the initiative.
There are no big shakes in the classification, Hou Yifan keeps her one and a half points advantage over her trailers, Ju Wenjun and Dzagnidze.
So this may be a good moment to learn something about the players’ secret dreams and aspirations, if they had not been chess players.
Dzagnidze and Danielian are confident they would have been sportives anyway, with an inclination for basketball for the former and tennis for the latter. The most exotic option belongs to Ju Wenjun, who would have chosen to be a cooking teacher.
The others tend to keep chess on the top position, Hou Yifan would have been happy to play chess with her idol, Bobby Fischer, while Kosteniuk and others would have been delighted to play with other great players from the past.
Round 8 results:
GM Stefanova Antoaneta 2488 – WGM Muminova Nafisa 2332 1 – 0
GM Khotenashvili Bela 2518 – GM Danielian Elina 2460 ½ – ½
GM Koneru Humpy 2613 – GM Kosteniuk Alexandra 2532 ½ – ½
GM Zhao Xue 2538 – GM Muzychuk Anna 2561 ½ – ½
GM Hou Yifan 2629 – GM Dronavalli Harika 2503 ½ – ½
WGM Ju Wenjun 2532 – GM Dzagnidze Nana 2541 ½ – ½
Round 8 standings:
1. GM Hou Yifan 2629 CHN – 7
2-3. WGM Ju Wenjun 2532 CHN and GM Dzagnidze Nana 2541 GEO – 5½
4. GM Muzychuk Anna 2561 UKR – 5
5-7. GM Koneru Humpy 2613 IND, GM Danielian Elina 2460 ARM and GM Dronavalli Harika 2503 IND – 4½
8. GM Stefanova Antoaneta 2488 BUL – 4
9. GM Kosteniuk Alexandra 2532 RUS – 3½
10. GM Zhao Xue 2538 CHN – 2
11. GM Khotenashvili Bela 2518 GEO – 1½
12. WGM Muminova Nafisa 2332 UZB – ½
Round 9 pairings:
GM Dzagnidze Nana 2541 – GM Stefanova Antoaneta 2488
GM Dronavalli Harika 2503 – WGM Ju Wenjun 2532
GM Muzychuk Anna 2561 – GM Hou Yifan 2629
GM Kosteniuk Alexandra 2532 – GM Zhao Xue 2538
GM Danielian Elina 2460 – GM Koneru Humpy 2613
WGM Muminova Nafisa 2332 – GM Khotenashvili Bela 2518
