Bazna, Last Round: Carlsen, Karjakin Draw, Tie for First
Tuesday, June 21, 2011 at 1:24PM
Dennis Monokroussos in Bazna 2011

In the battle of the 1990ers vs. the field, it was a rout. Magnus Carlsen and Sergey Karjakin, both born 11 years before the new millennium*, drew their game, tied for first, made progress on the rating list and left the rest of the field in their dust.

Their game was a fairly uneventful Rubinstein Nimzo-Indian. Karjakin equalized as Black without much trouble, and the game was drawn at move 30. Carlsen was declared the official first-place winner on tiebreaks, which seems silly to me, given that it was a double round-robin, but with only one first-place trophy it has to be decided one way or another. Their +3 scores gained them rating points, and now Carlsen is back atop the live ratings while Karjakin has moved into fourth place. They dominated the event, finishing two points clear of the field; in fact, no one else even managed a 50% score.

Hikaru Nakamura entered the round on 50%, and if he had been able to take advantage of Vassily Ivanchuk's bad form he could have finished on +1 and moved up to #5 on the rating list. Instead, Ivanchuk ground him down on the white side of an Exchange Slav, completing the odd bookends for both players. Ivanchuk won only his first and last games while Nakamura lost only in the first and last rounds. Nakamura finished at -1, Ivanchuk at -2.

Teimour Radjabov and Liviu-Dieter Nisipeanu also finished at -1 and -2, respectively, after their draw. Radjabov played a sideline in the Classical Caro-Kann that's considered harmless, and it was harmless today as well - at least against Nisipeanu's accurate, active play.

Final Standings:

1-2. Carlsen (first on tiebreak), Karjakin 6.5

3-4. Radjabov, Nakamura 4.5

5-6. Nisipeanu, Ivanchuk 4

Tournament site here, games (with my comments) here.

 

* Yes, I know I'll regret bringing this up. Someday I'll learn my lesson - maybe at the start of the next decade, on January 1, 2021?

Article originally appeared on The Chess Mind (http://www.thechessmind.net/).
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