HYDERABAD, JULY 26: Kazakh Grandmaster Evegeny Vladimirov won the Wipro International Grand Master's chess title, defeating Asian under-14 champion Pendyala Harikrishna in the 11th round here on Wednesday.Vladimirov, the highest rated player of the tournament, would get a prize money of $ 2,500 for achieving an unassailable lead of eight points with two more rounds to go.The Kazakh GM, who was a coach to former World Champion Garry Kasparov, outplayed P Harikrishna in a marathon 76 moves to clinch the title and also shatter the drams of a GM norm for his opponent who now has 5 points to his credit.Displaying a rich visual of knight power, he manouevered the pieces with unpredictable and swift strides to inflict a resounding defeat on Harikrishna in a Reti opening game with a bookish rook and three pawn ending. Vladimirov, with an Elo rating of 2598, showed class and precision where he palyed just five moves of pawns and unleashed the knights to prowl his oppenents field in the first 25 moves to baffle Harikrishna who had to sacrifice his pawn with absolutely no advantage.Vladimirov, a product of Soviet system, played on the mistake of Hari, who went in for opposite colour bishop ending the Kazakh genius, who has a 26-year standing in competitive chess, employed a flawless end-game technique where his passed `b' pawn ensured a win after 78 moves.In the other matches, WGM Subburaman Vijayalakshmi (Ind) shocked Krishnan Sasikiran (Ind) in a marathon rook and pawn ending and is now just one point away from her second IM norm from the last two games where she is paired with out-of-form Aarthie and DV Prasad (both from India).Bengal's sensation Surya Sekhar Ganguly scored a facile win over Argentine Grandmaster Maxim Sorokin while his team mate Sandipan Chanda played a protracted and perplexing 99 move game against Russian GM Alexander Fominyh to split point. Results (Round eleven): Abhijit Kunte (Ind) bt Aarthie Ramaswamy (Ind), S Vijayalakshmi (Ind) bt K Sasikiran (Ind), A Fominyh (Rus) drew with Sandipan Chanda (Ind), Vladimirov (Kaz) bt Harikrishna (Ind), Sergey Ionov (Rus) rest day, SS Ganguly (Ind) bt Maxim Sorokin (Arg), DV Prasad (Ind) bye.Standings after 11 rounds: Vladimirov (8 pts), K Sasikiran, A Fominyh (5.5 each), Abhijit Kunte and Harikrishna (5 each), DV Prasad, S Vijayalakshmi, Sandipan Chanda, SS Gangly and Maxim Sorokin (4.5 each), Sergey Ionov (3.5), Aarathie Ramasway (1).
