Abidjan (Ivory Coast) Rapid Completed (Blitz to Come); Carlsen Crushing
What's especially remarkable is that Magnus Carlsen isn't even playing his best chess, and he still managed to win the rapid portion of the first Grand Chess Tour event of the year by a point and a half, scoring 7.5/9 (or rather, 15/18, as the rapid games count double compared to the blitz, which transpire on Saturday and Sunday). He went undefeated, went 2.5/3 every day, and never seemed to face any particular challenge.
Hikaru Nakamura is his closest pursuer with 6/9 (12/18). He was somewhat unfortunate in that his one loss was to the bottom seed and tournament tailender Bassem Amin, especially since he enjoyed a serious to winning advantage for significant chunks of the game, and should have managed at least a draw up until almost the very end. Had he won that game, it's very possible that he would have trailed by just a single point (on the double scoring).
Wesley So and Maxime Vachier-Lagrave are a further half (full) point behind. Both lost to Carlsen, and MVL also lost to Nakamura, but both were efficient against the lower half of the table.
Ding Liren also performed well, finishing on +1 despite a loss to his countryman Wei Yi. Speaking of the latter, he is on 50%. He started well with 2.5/3, but went winless the rest of the way, losing to MVL in round 4 and to Carlsen in the last round.
Veselin Topalov and Sergey Karjakin were well back, finishing on -3, while Amin and - very surprisingly - Ian Nepomniachtchi were both -4.
The next two days are all blitz: nine rounds (a full round-robin) tomorrow and another nine rounds (with colors reversed) on Sunday. Those games will count for a point each, meaning there will be a total of 36 points available. Here are the current standings (based on 2-1-0 scoring):
- 1. Carlsen 15 (of 18)
- 2. Nakamura 12
- 3-4. So, Vachier-Lagrave 11
- 5. Ding Liren 10
- 6. Wei Yi 9
- 7-8. Topalov, Karjakin 6
- 9-10. Amin, Nepomniachtchi 5
The event website is here, and if you want to watch the video replays you can find them here, here, and here.
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