'Alles muss raus!'

In a perfect world this is the time of year I would be reporting on the chess960 events at Chess Classic Mainz (CCM). Unfortunately, the world we live in is far from perfect, and as I reported six months ago in No Place for Chess960, CCM is no more.

My first ever post on CCM was Chess Classic Mainz 2008 (CCM8), written a few months after I started playing chess960. I followed this up with an overview of all previous CCMs in Chess960 @ Chess Classic Mainz, a post that I frequently consult for detailed information on the different events.

In early 2009, I wondered if the Mainz event would survive the global economic slowdown that smacked our imperfect world in 2008, but was soon reassured that the organization was on track: Chess960 @ CCM9. As things turned out, the report on the 2009 event, CCM9: Nakamura, Grischuk, and Rybka, was my last. The chess960 events at CCM 2010 were severely curtailed to a single simul (see Rare Bird Sightings) and six months later the entire CCM 2011 extravaganza was cancelled for lack of sponsorship. The global slowdown had taken two years to exact its toll.

A few months ago I posted about one of the early events, CCM 2003,
and I plan to go back to the other early events -- 2004 through 2007 -- that I've never looked at in any depth. I would rather work with new material, but there just isn't any.

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This year, at what should be CCM11, the only sign of life is a fire sale on CCM memorabilia, including t-shirts and caps: Alles muss raus! ('Everything must go!'). Get 'em while they last.