The guy is world champion for a reason, it seems. Despite having a seemingly lackluster tournament while Veselin Topalov has generated most of the excitement, Magnus Carlsen's win in round 7 of the Gashimov Memorial has put him in clear first with two rounds to go, half a point ahead of Topalov, Anish Giri, and Ding Liren. Topalov was doing fine out of the opening and through the early middlegame, but 22...dxc5 and 25...Rd8 were pieces in a dubious plan that led him astray. After Carlsen's 27.Be4 serious accuracy was required from Topalov, and when he played 27...Bxc4 rather than the necessary 27...Kf8 he was lost. There were glitches in Carlsen's technique prior to the time control, but after Topalov's 38...Bxh5 Carlsen was winning again, and made no further errors.
Giri drew with Black against Rauf Mamedov to remain half a point out of first, and Ding made it a three-way tie in second by defeating tournament punching bag David Navara. Everyone experiences bad form at times, and in this tournament it's his turn.
The Carlsen-Topalov game (with some commentary) can be replayed here. Here are the pairings for round 8: