23rd April, 2003

OFFICIALLY, the Hunguest Hotels "Talent and Courage" event was staged to
celebrate the 130th anniversary of the Hungarian capital. In 1873 Buda,
Obuda and Pest were unified, forming Budapest. Unofficially, the event
was intended as a major showcase for the homegrown talents, with one of
the strongest tournaments to be held in Budapest in 75 years.

In 1928 Cuba's Jose Raul Capablanca, by far the strongest player of his
day despite the title loss the year previous to Alekhine, dominated the
Budapest tournament with a +5, 7/9 score to win ahead of Marshall, Kmoch
and Spielman - the five Hungarians also in the field proving to be out
of their league among such august company. This time it was supposed to
be the other way around, with the field being made up of some has-beens
and the winner emerging from the five-strong young Hungarian Olympiad
squad that so nearly snatched gold from the Russians - specifically
world title challenger Peter Leko, fresh from his Linares victory, or
even world's top female player Judit Polgar.

Unfortunately for the chess-mad Budapest fans who anticipated a victory
for local heroes Peter Leko or Judit Polgar, forgotten man Nigel Short,
a decade after being pummeled in a bruising world championship match by
Garry Kasparov, decided to reign on Hungary's parade with a superb
virtuoso performance to take first place ahead of Polgar and Leko.

Their only consolation was the performance of Polgar, playing the best
chess of her career, who had her second clear second place of the year.
Her undefeated finish behind Anand at Corus Wijk aan Zee in January was
her best-ever result and after she won her first three games in Budapest
it looked like it was going to go her way.

After losing to Leko, she showed great resilience by immediately
bouncing back with a spectacular win over Berkes, only to go on to lose
the decisive game of the tournament to her favourite "customer" Short.
Still, she added even more rating points to her career peak of 2715 and
finished ahead of Leko as a bonus.

J Polgar - F Berkes
Hunguest Hotels, (7)
French Defence
1 e4 e6 2 d4 d5 3 Nc3 Nf6 4 Bg5 dxe4 5 Nxe4 Be7 6 Bxf6 Bxf6 7 Nf3 0-0 8
Qd2 Nd7 9 0-0-0 Be7 10 Bd3 b6 11 Neg5 h6 12 Bh7+ Kh8 13 Be4 hxg5 14 g4
Rb8 15 h4 g6 16 hxg5+ Kg7 17 Qf4 Bb7 18 Rh7+ Kxh7 19 Qh2+ Kg8 20 Rh1
Bxg5+ 21 Nxg5 Qxg5+ 22 f4 Qxf4+ 23 Qxf4 Bxe4 24 Qxe4 1-0

JOHN B HENDERSON