June
14 marks the end of the FIDE Candidates
Matches 2007 in Elista, Russia. This tournament
is being played by 16 Grandmasters, with
the top four finishers qualifying for the
world championship next September in Mexico.
Next week, we will inform you about the
result of this very important event.
Today,
we will tell you about another interesting
match played in Elista during the Candidates
Matches. The players this time were not
humans, but computer programs. Their names
are Deep Fritz and Deep Junior. They were
to play six games in all, but in the 5th
round a winner was declared: Deep Junior.
Deep
Junior was created by Amir Ban and Shay
Bushinsky, both born in Israel. Grandmaster
Boris Alterman, also from Israel, cooperated
with them. Their program has an impressive
track record, taking the World Computer
Chess Championship in 1997, 2001, 2002,
2004 and 2006, and in 2003 drawing in a
six‑game match with Garry Kasparov.
Deep
Fritz also has a very good curriculum. Created
by the Dutch programmer Frans Morsch along
with Mathias Feist from Germany, Fritz in
2003 drew in an eight‑game match against
Vladimir Kramnik, in 2003 drew in a four‑game
match against Garry Kasparov, and in 2006
beat world champion Vladimir Kramnik by
4‑2 in a six‑game match played
in Bonn, Germany.
In
this match, Junior’s superiority was evident.
Fritz did not win a single game and Junior
won twice. Today we present you Junior’s
2nd win. It sacrificed two pawns in order
to gain mobility for its rooks. Until the
end, Fritz’s analysis said that it was winning
while its position became more and more
tenuous. We can say that Junior taught a
tough lesson to Fritz’s programmers, who
couldn’t help but watch their lithium prodigy
commit a fatal blunder on the 33rd move.
