Well, that was embarrassing. Sam Shankland lost by resigning to Anish Giri in a theoretically drawn position. What's worse is that he didn't have to find anything. All he had to do was retreat the king, and the job would be done. It's remarkable that so studious a player as Shankland was unfamiliar with this particular fortress - it's a bit like Viktor Korchnoi once asking an arbiter if castling queenside was legal if the rook passed over an attacked square. That's chess for you: there's so much to know that it's possible for a 2700 not to know an elementary draw known to many club players.
It was a big gift for Anish Giri, who thereby caught up with Magnus Carlsen in first place with two rounds to go after the latter drew quickly and easily with Black in a Sveshnikov against Teimour Radjabov. They are half a point ahead of Ian Nepomniachtchi, who bounced back from yesterday's loss by defeating Vladimir Fedoseev. Nepo had a serious, evening winning advantage early on in an Advance Caro-Kann, let it slip, and then won the game a second time when Fedoseev faltered just before (and after) the time control.
Ding Liren and Viswanathan Anand are a further half a point behind. Ding drew with Richard Rapport in all of 16 moves, while Anand came close to achieving something with White against Jan-Krzysztof Duda. Close, but Duda had the one tempo he needed to equalize.
The last two games were decisive. Santosh Vidit Gujrathi defeated the plummeting Shakhriyar Mamedyarov with Black, and pretty easily, too. Meanwhile, Vladimir Kramnik finally won a game - with great difficulty - against Jorden Van Foreest. Kramnik was winning smoothly early on, and was on the way to what would have been an attractive attacking game. He missed his best opportunity, and after further inaccuracies Van Foreest equalized. But Kramnik started grinding and kept on grinding, and in the second time control Black made several errors to lose in a double bishop ending. Even with the win Kramnik is still alone in last place, half a point behind Van Foreest and Mamedyarov. Both Kramnik and Mamedyarov have lost 23 points in what has proved to be a disastrous event for them. (Tournament site here, games here, with notes to Kramnik's and Giri's games.)
But enough about their woes. The race for first is where the action is, and five players are still in the hunt. Better still, the pairing for the last round is Giri-Carlsen. First we have round 12, and here are the pairings:
Just think: if Carlsen and Giri draw, Nepomniachtchi wins, and either Ding or Anand wins, there will be a four-way tie for first entering the last round. And if we add to that a draw between Van Foreest and Mamedyarov and a Kramnik win there will be a five-way tie for last. It's impossible to happen in this event, but has a tournament ever finished with half the players tied for first and the other half tied for last? My favorite oddball super-GM tournament result was Linares 2001, when Kasparov finished in first with a +5 score while the other five players (Polgar, Karpov, Leko, Shirov, and Grischuk) tied for second=last place with -1 scores.