Whatever one says, chess is a sport. In a real tournament, apart from chess skills, extremely important are endurance, will power and luck. They (or lack of them) can change the course of events drastically. Who could think that unknown women's team from Kazakhstan can stop powerful China? But it happened. Who could imagine that skilled grandmaster Onischuk, who passed through fire and water, can possibly lose the rook endgame "two pawns against three on one side"? But it also happened.

There are no unbeatable chess players in the world, there never were and never will be. As well as there are no unbeatable teams. Everyone has his unlucky days. Even the great teams of USSR sometimes experienced losses. At this Olympiad Russian team looked like the incarnation of the former power of soviet chess. But the black day came...

They say, that a loss is a small death. And any mistake in an important game often leaves a big wound. So that it does not heal for a long time. In the 8th round the massive fight between Russia and Ukraine took place. In the men's section the match was decided in a game of two...Ukrainian grandmasters. The thing is that one of them became Russian a few years ago.

In life, everything changes very quickly. The black string is followed by white, and vice versa. The heroes become losers to later climb on the pedestal. The day before Movsesian defeated Grischuk, and the mood of the players was the opposite. And today, in round 7, everything changed in another direction. Grischuk brought the winning point to Russia, it cost a match to Armenia.

When the rivals for the medals meet, every small accident (even the flap of the butterfly that flew into the playing hall) can influence the outcome. The pressure is so big and the nerves are so highly strung between the opponents that are close in class. This day was marked with two crucial matches (Russia – Armenia in men's section and Russia – China in women's), they attracted the special attention of the spectators. I just could not put aside the games of the leaders and look at some other matches during the online transmission! And the intrigue was there literally until the last moments of the round.