The 6th round of the 2008 North American Open was quite an adventure. The day started off with 10 players within half-point of the overnight leader, GM Giorgi Kacheishvili. After the round had finished only 2 players stayed within that range as Kacheishvili won an entertaining game on board 1 against GM Varuzhan Akobian.
Position after 19.Ke2
In this position Kacheishvili played 19…c3! (The immediate 20.Ra7 may have been better but it is complicated) 20.Bxf7+ Kxf7 21.Ra7 (White wins the black queen but those pawns are hard to stop.) 21…Rxc8 22.Rxc7+ Rxc7 23.Qb3 Nd5 24.e4 Nf4+ 25.Ke3 Nxg2+ 26.Ke2 Nf4+ 27.Ke3 Bd6 28.Qc2 Be5 29.Rd1 Ng6 30.h3 Bf4+ 31.Ke2 Bc1 32.Rxc1 bxc1Q 33.Qxc1 c2
Position after 33…c2
In this position white’s queen is tied down to stopping the pawn, effectively leaving white down a piece. The game finished quickly after 34.Ke3 Ne5 35.Kd4 Rc4+ 36.Ke3 Rc3+ 37.Kd4 Rc4+ 38.Ke3 Nc6 39.Kd3 Rc5 40.Qxh6 0-1
There are two GMs in the chase to catch Kacheishvili. GM Zviad Izoria had a comfortable victory over IM Sam Shankland on board 4 while GM Melikset Khachiyan beat GM Slavko Cicak on board 3 in the following fashion.
Position after 19…Nxf6
20.Rxf6! gxf6 21.Qg4+ Kh8 22.Qf3 and black has a choice of getting mated or giving up material. Cicak played on in a hopeless position until move 49.
The final round starts at 4:30 pm PST and since Izoria and Kacheishvili have already played it looks like it should be Kacheishvili and Khachiyan on board 1 while Izoria will play one of many people on 4½.
For those who haven’t noticed I have uploaded a video of some action from the end of round 4 in the 3-day schedule. It is just a few minutes from the ending of GM Shabalov vs GM Mitkov and GM Izoria vs IM Sevillano. Hopefully I’ll have time to add more videos later on today depending on when the final round finishes.