Magnus Carlsen

The Madrid visit started yesterday with a radio interview at the Circulo De Bellas Artes (Institute of Fine Arts) in the centre of Madrid followed by an excellent classic Spanish lunch.  

Today we visited the Bernabeu stadium for a sight-seeing through the impressive complex which houses museums, restaurants, a separate mall and a three store Real Madrid shop.
A (somewhat depressing) sign of the times is that the Real Madrid museum supposedly is visited by more people than the extraordinary Prado museum down the street (which features a special Goya exhibition this week). 


Anyhow, Magnus enjoyed both the Bernabeu visit as well as the subsequent lunch at Mexican "Si Senor" close by. 

Simultaneous displays may take the form an exhibition event or a tough match against challenging opponents. Today's simul hosted by, and at, the Institute of Fine Arts in cooperation with the Madrid Chess Federation was certainly of the second category.
Magnus faced "just" 20 opponents, but hardly any was easy prey and the first player did not yield until an hour had passed. Among the opponents, which included the Madrid U12, U14, U16 and U18 champions, there were several 2200+ as well as many players around 2000 rating strength.  



Based on the serious look in his face, maybe Magnus had a premonition of the opponent's true strength. After Magnus overpressed slightly in a rook ending, the opponent declined a draw offer (!) but a few moves later a draw was the result anyhow.  

Magnus generally adapted to the strong opposition and played somewhat slower than usual.
After more than 2,5 hours, the result was 18 wins and 2 draws, and Magnus was well satisified with the result.
(In addition one opponent had created an easily drawn position but seemed confused at the time and resigned instead of performing the necessary additional four checks needed to claim a draw.) 

The organiser had planned to broadcast some 6 games live on internet but due to technical problems the games will probably be uploaded later instead. (I will update this blog entry with a link as soon as I know if and where it can be found.)  Link; http://www.ajedrezfma.com/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=308

Anyhow the conclusion was; a well organised and interesting simul!
Many thanks to the Institute of Fine Arts, the Madrid Chess Federation as well as event coordinator and owner of Jaque magazine, E.Morejon. 

Tomorrow we are off to Hungary and will arrive in Miscolc on Monday for the Leko-Carlsen match. The opening ceremony takes place on Tuesday and the match starts Wednesday 28th. 

Henrik Carlsen,

Madrid, May 24th 2008