Over the weekend I took part in a Chess and Education conference at Olympia, where the London Chess Classic is taking place over the coming week. During the weekend there was a rapidplay tournament taking place, involving some of the world's top players.
It was the first time that I have seen quite a few of these players in action. Fabiana Caruana is the World no. 2 in longplay rating, behind Magnus Carlsen, who was not playing at the weekend. I have never seen such a dainty man. I would estimate that he was scarcely more than 5'2" and weighed considerably less than 9 stone. I watched him lose the penultimate round to Hikaru Nakamura, the tournament winner.
I had played quite a few of the top players years ago with mixed results. I used to pick Lawrence Trent for Essex when he was a junior and taught him quite a bit of chess in that time, but I don't think I ever played him in a tournament game. I've played Sadler and McShane (both draws) and lost to David Howell. I think I have a plus score against Nick Pert, former World u-20 champion, but it's hard to be sure: he has an identical twin brother and I have played them both over the years. It was quite gratifying to see Sadler draw with former World Champion Anand and Nakamura in consecutive rounds and McShane draw with another World Championship finalist Nigel Short in one of those rounds.
