Stockfish Wins TCEC DFRC1, Leads CCC18 Rapid Final

Another two weeks have passed since the previous report on the world's leading, ongoing engine vs. engine competitions. Titled Stockfish Wins TCEC FRC5, Leads CCC18 Rapid Semifinal (August 2022), the post can be summarized as follows:-

TCEC: The site is currently conducting 'DFRC 1'. I'll cover the event on my chess960 blog, where I post twice a month. • CCC: Leading the 'CCC18 Rapid' Semifinal stage are Stockfish, Dragon, and LC0, already by a comfortable margin over the other three engines

What's the current status? The TCEC is transitioning from S22 to S23, while the CCC is finishing the first main event of CCC18.

TCEC: In DFRC1 ('Double Fischer Random Chess: (960*960) possible starting positions'), Stockfish and LCZero finished tied for 1st/2nd places with 16.0/22, 1.5 points ahead of KomodoDragon, which was 2.0 points ahead of Stoofvlees. In the 50 game final match, Stockfish beat LCZero 29.5-20.5 (+18-9=23). For more discussion of the event, see the next post on my chess960 blog, linked on the right sidebar.

After DFRC1, the site launched 'S23 - Chess Bonus', the first event of season 23. I couldn't find much info about this event, which seems to be VSOB-style. What I did find was on the TCEC Discord platform, especially under #bonus-arena. For the previous VSOB (''Viewer Submitted Openings Bonus') event, see TCEC Testing Cup 9; CCC C960 Blitz Semifinal (October 2021), and its chain of links to earlier posts.

CCC: Stockfish won the 'CCC18 Rapid' Semifinal stage, well ahead of LC0, which was a half point ahead of Dragon. The other three engines finished with minus scores.

For some reason, the site skipped the Challenger stage, which was a mainstay of the CCC17 Rapid, Bullet, and Blitz tournaments, and which pitted the 2nd & 3rd engines in the Semifinal stage against each other. The idea was to determine the opponent for the 1st engine in the Semifinal stage, which was Stockfish each time.

Stockfish is currently clobbering LC0 in the Final stage. Between the Semifinal and the Final, the site ran an event called 'Romantic Openings: Wing Gambit' (1.e4 c5 2.b4) with the six Semifinal engines. Stockfish won the event although there were only three decisive games in the 90 played.

[For further information from the various stakeholders in the engine-to-engine events, see the tab 'TCEC/CCC Links' at the top of this page. • NB: Leela = LC0 = LCzero; Dragon = KomodoDragon]