Magnus Carlsen

After a well deserved and needed break of a month, the 1st quarter of 2008 will be busy for Magnus with Corus, Morelia-Linares and Amber Rapid & Blindfold like in 2007.

Travelling to Holland was a delight. (5,5 hours from door to hour, and the KLM flight was in a new airplane with better seats, nice food, on time and low cost!)
Magnus (and I) arrived Thursday for the traditional "meet & greet". After changing hotel every year from 2004, we're this time in the same Zeeduin (A-group hotel) as last year. Lets hope this becomes a tradition!
 
Yesterdays opening ceremony was as last year on the Corus premises in Ilmuijden near by.
The opening remarks of organising committee chairman Dolf Vos and Corus top management representatives was warm, brief and to the point as usual.
The Indian Tata group is owning Corus, and the great news this year was the decision to continue the Corus tradition at least 5 more years. Thank You! 

The Corus field is as strong as ever despite the progress on January 2008 FIDE rating of the only top 13 players missing (Morozevish, Svidler and Shirov).
Magnus is ranked 10 in the tournament with an expected score of 6.3 points. 

This year also the B-group is very strong (with Cheparinov, Bacrot, Short etc).  

In the drawing of lots statistics keep on catching up with Magnus. His early affinity to white is fading, and he got start number 12 this time.
              



In the first round Magnus is black against Mamedyarov. Both are considered exciting players but their first 4 tournament encounters have all ended draw.

The sun is shining in Wijk, lets hope we get lots of exciting games today and in the days to come! 

Henrik Carlsen
Wijk aan Zee, January 12^th, 2008