Chess Player Strip Searched

[Geoff Chandler]

They will take off his shoes and discover he six webbed toes.

(8) He's an alien.

[Roger de Coverly]

It looks as if Dlugy and ChessBase have found the method.
http://www.chessbase.com/Home/TabId/211 ... 31013.aspx

If you conceal a smart phone in your shoe, you can send and receive moves by vibration. So it's much the same method as the German who had a supposedly switched off phone vibrating in his pocket.

[Sean Hewitt]

It looks as if Dlugy and ChessBase have found the method.
http://www.chessbase.com/Home/TabId/211 ... 31013.aspx

If you conceal a smart phone in your shoe, you can send and receive moves by vibration. So it's much the same method as the German who had a supposedly switched off phone vibrating in his pocket.

I read this, and was still left wondering how the moves actually get transmitted. There's no offer of an explanation for this, but presumably he is supposed to use his toes. But Dlugy says

I watched him very carefully. When he played this move, 32.Nb7 against Saric, he took ten seconds. It was a five to ten minute thing, in my modest opinion, since the knight could take on f5 instead. But when he decided it in ten seconds I was shocked.

If he took 10 seconds over such a complex move, I'm struggling to comprehend how he could input his opponents last move and get the computer response in such a short space of time. Not forgetting, of course, one of our heroes tournament wins was in a strong rapidplay. I suspect this story still has some more legs!

[Chris Rice]

If you scroll right to the bottom of that article ChessBase do show you how you can wiggle your foot to transmit the moves. Doesn't look an easy thing to do but one assumes Ivanov must have practised a lot beforehand.

[Tim Spanton]

This is ChessBase's verdict:

We have done a little research and found that, unfortunately, there is a very low-tech way to cheat in chess: a modern Android or Apple smartphone easily fits into a shoe, and you can use your toes to send signals to the motion detector in the phone. Little wiggles will do it. Or the toe could be used to tap on the LED screen. The response of the phone would be short bursts of vibration. An app could handle the interface to a chess engine running on the device. So it is not really necessary to work out very complicated communication system to explain how a player may be using computer assistance during a chess tournament.

A little early for an April Fools' Day, I would have thought.


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[Sean Hewitt]

This is ChessBase's verdict:

We have done a little research and found that, unfortunately, there is a very low-tech way to cheat in chess: a modern Android or Apple smartphone easily fits into a shoe, and you can use your toes to send signals to the motion detector in the phone. Little wiggles will do it. Or the toe could be used to tap on the LED screen. The response of the phone would be short bursts of vibration. An app could handle the interface to a chess engine running on the device. So it is not really necessary to work out very complicated communication system to explain how a player may be using computer assistance during a chess tournament.

A little early for an April Fools' Day, I would have thought.

Exactly. I'll believe that when they can demonstrate it working effectively in a rapidplay!

[Mick Norris]

Isn't it suggested there was something in his jacket as well as his shoe?

I get more confused the more I read about this

[Tim Spanton]

I certainly hope making chess players expose their socks does not become the norm.

[John McKenna]

He's a twin.

The 'doctored' twin plays in the even numbered rounds.

I'm staring at the final position just copied from the game Borislav lost.

8/8/7k/2P4P/2n4K/p1B5/8/8 b - - 0 51
(Borislav, Black to play, Black resigned.)

After 51...a2 there appears (to me anyway) some chess left in that game.
I can get the White pawn to c7 but cannot the Black Knight just dance
around it when the White King approaches.

The Bishop is tied to a1.

(Edit: In a later post -)

They will take off his shoes and discover six webbed toes.

(8) He's an alien.

Ivanov is obviously from the same planet as Ivanchuk -

Caruana–Ivanchuk 1–0 C11FIDE GP Paris(6)Elancourt FRA 28.09.2013

(Time control: 120 minutes for the first 40 moves, 60 minutes for the next 20 moves, and then each player gets 15 minutes and an increment of 30 seconds per move after the second time control). No draws offers: Sofia rules.)

Clearly the game of the round... The Italian simplified into a superior bishop endgame that seemed to hold many dangers for Black and Ivanchuk... well... he resigned!
Probably out of all the players in this tournament Ivanchuk would be the only one to resign in such a position. He was surely worse, but he wasn't down material yet, he wasn't in a zugzwang and White's path to victory first of all wasn't obvious and second could still be botched up... [Ramirez Alvarez,Alejandro]

Go compare!

[Chris Rice]

I'm finding it hard to understand why this saga is not over but it clearly isn't. Ivanov was given the green light by the organisers to carry on and changed his shoes for round 8. He was Black on Board 12 against FM Kralevski and won a highly interesting game with what looks like superb technique. http://chess-results.com/partieSuche.as ... 08160&rd=8 He is playing a 2100+ player in round 9.

[Kevin Thurlow]

"I certainly hope making chess players expose their socks does not become the norm."

It wouldn't have worked with JC Thompson.

[Ken Norman]

"I certainly hope making chess players expose their socks does not become the norm."

It wouldn't have worked with JC Thompson.

Kevin

Nobody under sixty will understand your reference to J.C.THOMPSON.

[Roger de Coverly]

Nobody under sixty will understand your reference to J.C.THOMPSON.

Here's the cross reference, starting from one of Jack's games.

http://www.ecforum.org.uk/viewtopic.php?f=27&t=553

[Matt Mackenzie]

Dlugy's theory about the "resigned in a drawn position" game is Ivanov deliberately chucked it in the hope he would recieve less scrutiny on the lower boards......

[JustinHadi]

"I certainly hope making chess players expose their socks does not become the norm."

It wouldn't have worked with JC Thompson.

Kevin

Nobody under sixty will understand your reference to J.C.THOMPSON.

Andrew Martin's book on the hippo is another reference.