The first day of the World Women Chess Championship started without many surprises. The favorites won their opening games and despite the age difference and experience of the players, the ELO logic was reflected onto the results.

The first one to finish was the young Chinese prodigy WGM Yifan Hou. After a few opening errors from her opponent, Hou was unstoppable and achieved victory in less than 30 moves.

Several of the players talked to the editor-in-chief of Chessdom.com - Goran Urosevic. IM Harika, who won her game against Vera Nebolsina, shared tha twhite made a couple of bad moves that allowed her to activate the pieces. The exchange of d4 pawn for c6 allowed her to advance to d4 and block white pawn on e2 which became very weak and a burden on white's legs. Anna Ushenina said for Chessdom that after the regular opening, her opponent made a few inaccuracies which allowed White to gain a strong initiative. Anna was already significantly better when Black blundered and ran into checkmate.

Anna has a birthday today, August 30th. The Chessdom.com team wishes her all the best!

Photos from the first day in Nalchik can be found at the day 1 photo gallery. There you will find Svetlana Mateeva, Harika Dronavalli, Georgios Makropoulos, and many photos from Nalchik.

From day 1 there are only two games that can be counted as real upsets. Draws were few as well.

Kadimova, Ilaha - Paehtz, Elisabeth 1-0
Zhukova, Natalia - Rohonyan, Katerina 0-1
Mkrtchian, Lilit - Moser, Eva ½-½
Kachiani-Gersinska, Ketino - Shen Yang ½-½
Zhang Jilin - Gaponenko, Inna ½-½
Foisor, Sabina-Francesca - Socko, Monika ½-½
Tan Zhongyi - Sachdev, Tania ½-½
Bojkovic, Natasa - Ju Wenjun ½-½

All results are available on the official website and besides the Chessdom.com coverage, you can also find out more from http://nalchik2008.fide.com