Badminton News -
At $5K Austrian International Championships 2008, Vorchdorf

[R1] Anand Pawar (IND,124) bt Magnus Sahlberg (SWE,75) 21-14 21-13
[R2] Anand Pawar (IND,124) bt Juergen Koch (AUT,66) 22-20 Retired
[QF] Anand Pawar (IND,124) bt Ville Lang (FIN,89) 21-12 21-11
[SF] Anand Pawar (IND,124) bt (Q) Nathan Rice (ENG,151) 21-14 21-8

[Final] Anand Pawar (IND,124) bt (7) Vladislav Druzchenko (UKR,60) 21-16 21-15

Anand Pawar used this opportunity as many Asian players were missing due to Thomas Cup ... He won Austrian Internationals beating 3 top-75 players ... This was his first international title.

This was also only second occurrence when Indian player wins Austrian Internationals ... Last time 24 yrs back Syed Modi won this title in 1984.
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Chess News -
At Morelia-Linares 2008, Mexico & Spain

Round 7 - Saturday, February 23rd

Anand ½-½ Vassily Ivanchuk
Alexei Shirov 1-0 Teimour Radjabov
Magnus Carlsen 1-0 Levon Aronian
Peter Leko 0-1 Veselin Topalov

Anand agreed to quick draw against Ivanchuk in 31 moves ... Other 3 games were decesive but
Aronian lost his match so Anand managed to keep his slender ½ pt lead over his opponents after end of Morelia leg ... Now Linares leg will began on 28th February.

Standing after 7th Round -

1 Vishwanathan Anand IND 4½ pts
T2 Alexei Shirov ESP 4 pts
T2 Veselin Topalov BUL 4 pts
T4 Levon Aronian ARM 3½ pts
T4 Magnus Carlsen NOR 3½ pts
T6 Teimour Radjabov AZE 3 pts
T6 Vassily Ivanchuk UKR 3 pts
8 Peter Leko HUN 2½ pts