Metropolitan International Final Weekend

The second half of the Metropolitan FIDE Invitational, held at the Metropolitan Chess Club in downtown Los Angeles, will be played this Saturday and Sunday, November 20-21. The tournament is sponsored by Chess.com, LawyerFy, Fashion Business, Inc, and Hippie Chips. Games will be broadcast on chess.com's live server for rounds 6, 7, 8, and 9. Rounds are at 11 and 4:30 pacific each day. Additionally, there will be live chess.com/tv coverage during round 9, featuring Grandmaster Melik Khachiyan and members of the tournament.

IM Amanov leads, while FM Yankovsky has the best chance at a coveted IM norm. Here are the current standings:

In addition to watching the games live on chess.com, you can get a better flavor of the tournament through the excellent photographs of Chris Roberts here.  Here is a small selection of pictures I really appreciated:

Garush Manukyan stepped in at the last minute when one player failed to show up. I love this action shot!

Joel Banawa is a tough competitor, but you can see that he's also a nice guy in this shot.

Kostya Kavutskiy is serious at the start of his game with Sevillano. He also provides the following annotations to his upset win against IM Taylor, which was followed with great interest last week:

One of the best things about chess tournaments: post-game analysis. Here four players and one arbiter gather around the board to learn and have fun!

The club also attracts chess players not participating in the event. In this photo, you can catch a glimpse of a Great chess player.

Next FMs Yankovsky and Banawa have given us the chance to see notes on a very intense game by both the winner:

and by the loser:

Come watch and discuss the games live, and don't miss out on GM Khachiyan's commentary Sunday, which will be open to basic members.