So did almost everyone else with White, on a day where the higher-rated player - usually the much higher-rated player - had the white pieces. Nikita Vitiugov broke the hearts of all the fans of his French Defense books by taking it on and winning against a variation he recommended for Black. But fear not, Francophiles, improvements are available to you! In the game, Georg Meier struggled, and didn't manage to show his best defensive abilities. Vitiugov was the only winner in round 1, so the second win guaranteed that he remain in clear first with a 2-0 score.
Three other players won with White, including World Champion Magnus Carlsen. Carlsen didn't get much (read: anything) against Hou Yifan in a Bishop's Opening, but in true Carlsen style kept posing problems and won, bit by bit and step by step. His technique wasn't at its peak, and several times fairly late in the game he gave her the chance to equalize. She missed her chances, though, and after her last serious error - 38...fxe4 - there was no coming back.
Maxime Vachier-Lagrave defeated Viswanathan Anand in a Taimanov Sicilian. Anand had a nice improvement on some earlier games, but perhaps he hadn't prepared the idea deeply enough. MVL was better in the middlegame, and successfully transitioned into an ending where Anand's terrible bishop ultimately cost him the game.
Levon Aronian won his first game since round 4 of the Candidates, defeating Arkadij Naiditsch rather convincingly on the white side of a King's Indian. Aronian enjoyed a massive space advantage, and Naiditsch's bid for counterplay with 16...f5 only served as an invitation to White's pieces to flood in.
Finally, there was one draw. Fabiano Caruana had White again, but couldn't get anything against the considerably lower-rated Matthias Bluebaum and his French. (A bit of consolation for those of you weeping over the Vitiugov game.)
The games are here (some with notes), and the round 3 pairings are Bluebaum-Carlsen, Meier-Caruana, Naiditisch-Vitiugov, Anand-Aronian, and Hou Yifan-Vachier-Lagrave. The five players with White all have half a point each and are the five lowest-rated players in the event (excepting Anand, who is higher-rated than Vitiugov), while all the players with Black are undefeated and have 1.5 points (except for Caruana with 1 and Vitiugov with 2).