Sinquefield Cup, Round 9: Three Draws; Missed Opportunities for Caruana & Carlsen
The Sinquefield Cup is winding down and the players are perhaps starting to run out of gas. Fabiano Caruana played 38 very good moves against Hikaru Nakamura on the white side of a Berlin ending and had him at death's door. Fatigue and moderate time trouble struck, and he made an inaccuracy on move 39 and a big oversight on move 40. Even after the time control he still had some winning chances, but he failed to make anything of them and Nakamura drew comfortably by the end.
Likewise, Magnus Carlsen seemed to be grinding his way to a win against Levon Aronian, but shortly before cashing in he saw the right idea but talked himself into a different move (or at least a different move order), one which didn't work. Aronian escaped.
Veselin Topalov could have caught up with Carlsen in second place with a win over Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, but although he obtained an advantage with Black he couldn't turn it into a win, so he remains in clear third.
The tournament ends tomorrow (though there will be some other events following it), and these are the pairings: Aronian - Caruana, Topalov - Carlsen, Nakamura - Vachier-Lagrave.
Games here (the Caruana & Carlsen games are annotated), tournament site here.
Reader Comments (3)
In Carlsen-Aronian, after 41 g4 (!) , if 41...Ra3+ 42.Ke4 Rxh3 43.Kd5 looks winning, so 41,,,h5 is desperate, but worked !
The All Time Best Tournament Performance?
Karpov's undefeated 11/13 performance at Linares 1994 equals 84.6%.
[DM: It can't just be percentages, because then my occasional 4-0 and 5-0 successes at local club tournaments would have to go into the record books. TPRs and/or the opponents' average rating is more relevant.]
With a round ten draw, Caruana goes to 8.5/10 for 85%. To clearly best Karpov's stellar result at Linares 1994, Caruana should win his round ten game versus Aronian. But a win to order with the black pieces versus Aronian is no easy task.
What was the average rating of Karpov's opponents at Linares 1994? Of course we need to adjust the 1994 ratings to allow for the "ratings inflation" (if any) of 2014.
[DM: Emphasis on "if any", per Ken Regan. We can also wait for his IPR figures, though Caruana's numbers probably dropped significantly after the last game.]
Nigel Short's comment on Caruana's draws:
"@FabianoCaruana 's technique is terrible. He has only been able to convert 7 of those 9 completely winning positions #SinqCup"