World Cup 2015 Round 2, Day 3: Most Favorites Advance In Tiebreaks, But Not Aronian

Today (or yesterday, depending on where you are) there were tiebreaks for those round 2 matches that were undecided after a pair of classical games, and after 15 tiebreakers the field at the World Cup has been whittled down to 32 players.

Of those 15 tiebreakers, the higher-rated player won in 13 of them. Success stories include Grand Chess Tour participants Hikaru Nakamura (winning in the second 25' + 10" game against Sam Shankland), Anish Giri (won both 25' + 10" games vs. Alexander Motylev) and Alexander Grischuk (a winner in the second 10' + 10" game against Vladimir Fedoseev). Other high-rated winners include Sergey Karjakin, Dmitry Jakovenko, Evgeny Tomashevsky, Shakhriyar Mamedyarov (who eliminated women's #1 Hou Yifan with a win and a draw in the 25-minute games) and Michael Adams, the latter winning the Armageddon game with White against Viktor Laznicka.

One other favorite who advanced was Wei Yi, who won an incredible match against Yuri Vovk. Pretty much every game they played was spectacular, and almost all of those games were decisive as well. If you only look at one match from the second round, be sure to make this one your choice.

There were two upsets, as noted above. The first was fairly mild, with Le Quang Liem going 1.5-.5 against Nikita Vitiugov in the 25' + 10" games. Le is below 2700 at the moment, but has been over and is a beast at faster time controls, having won the world blitz championship in 2013.

The other upset was a monster result. Alexander Areshchenko defeated Levon Aronian in both 25-minute games to send to send the world's #7 player (and the 5th highest-rated player in the tournament) packing. Aronian had been in poor form for much of the past two years, but having recently won the Sinquefield Cup he seemed to be in great shape. (One wonders...is there any chance that spending an extra 2-3 days in St. Louis interfered with his preparations and with his ability to acclimate to the venue and the time zone? For that matter, one could wonder about Giri's hiccup in the first round against an FM and Grischuk's inability to win a single game so far in either classical chess or at the 25-minute time control. Fedoseev is a very good player, but Grischuk's first round opponent, Yusup Atabayev, isn't someone one would think Grischuk could only defeat in 5-minute chess. Many, many years ago Mikhail Botvinnik suggested going to events of this sort a couple of weeks in advance, and as in so many other matters when it came to training he was probably right or at least on the right track.)

On to round 3, which has the following pairings (given in bracket order):

• Veselin Topalov - Lu Shanglei
• Teimour Radjabov - Peter Svidler
• Alexander Areshchenko - Wei Yi
• Gadir Guseinov - Ding Liren
• Wesley So - Le Quang Liem
• Maxime Vachier-Lagrave - Evgeny Tomashevsky
• Julio Granda Zuniga - Radoslaw Wojtaszek
• Peter Leko - Anish Giri
• Fabiano Caruana - Anton Kovalyov
• Shahkriyar Mamedyarov - S. P. Sethuraman
• Sergey Karjakin - Yu Yangyi
• Dmitry Andreikin - Vladimir Kramnik
• Alexander Grischuk - Pavel Eljanov
• Vassily Ivanchuk - Dmitry Jakovenko
• Michael Adams - Leinier Dominguez
• Ian Nepomniachtchi - Hikaru Nakamura

Aronian Wins Sinquefield Cup, Nakamura Beats Grischuk To Tie For Second

The 2015 Sinquefield Cup has concluded, and with a comfortable last-round draw Levon Aronian has taken clear first. None of his main rivals managed to win their games, so Aronian's draw with Topalov left him a point ahead of his closest competitors. He had Black in a Ragozin System, and despite that was never worse and could have pushed for more if he had needed to. Spotting a moment where he could force a draw (or more precisely, could force Topalov to force a draw) he took it, guaranteeing himself victory in the tournament.

Entering the round Magnus Carlsen, Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, Anish Giri and Alexander Grischuk were all a point behind Aronian and theoretically still in the race for first. As noted above (at least by implication), none of them managed to win. Carlsen had Black against Viswanathan Anand, and went for a Berlin ending. He drew easily, but a win was never going to happen. Vachier-Lagrave and Giri played each other and although Vachier-Lagrave managed to obtain a little pull through much of the game, Giri kept things under control and drew a double rook ending without too much exertion.

The big game of the day was the battle between Grischuk and Hikaru Nakamura. With a win, Nakamura would join the tie for second (and take second in the overall Grand Tour standings and regain second place on the live rating list), and he pushed long and hard, taking plenty of risks along the way. He was better at first, enjoying a normal opening advantage with White. A pair of dubious, related decisions on move 26 and move 27 left him worse, but thanks to Grischuk's mistaken decision to give up his dark squared bishop for White's knight on f2 Nakamura was again in control by the end of the first time control. From there Nakamura played very well and energetically, but with victory in sight made a couple of slips that endangered the win. Fortunately for him he kept pushing and finally managed to break down the Russian's resistance.

The final game was of no relevance to the race for first, but it was an interesting game in its own right. Fabiano Caruana came close to a win against Wesley So, but the wrong capture on d6 on move 21 allowed So to survive, albeit only after a lot of hard work.

(The games, with my comments, are here.)

Here are the final standings, given in tiebreak order. The tiebreakers are in fact very important, because points for the Grand Chess Tour standings are allocated based on those tiebreaks. Carlsen wound up getting second place on tiebreaks with 10 GCT points, putting him in the mix for overall Tour victory, while Giri only received six points for fifth, with the same score. So although Giri went a combined +3 in Norway and St. Louis while Carlsen is still -1 overall, Carlsen has 14 total points while Giri has 13. Brilliant.

1. Aronian 6
2. Carlsen 5
3. Nakamura 5
4. Vachier-Lagrave 5
5. Giri 5
6. Grischuk 4.5
7. Topalov 4.5
8. Caruana 3.5
9. Anand 3.5
10. So 3

And these are the overall Grand Chess Tour Standings, with the points they earned from Norway and St. Louis, respectively:

1. Topalov 17 (13, 4)
2. Nakamura 16 (8, 8)
3. Aronian 15 (2, 13)
4. Carlsen 14 (4, 10)
5. Giri 13 (7, 6)
6. Anand 12 (10, 2)
7. Vachier-Lagrave 12 (5, 7)
8. Caruana 9 (6, 3)
9. Grischuk 8 (3, 5)
10. Hammer 1 (1, N/A)
11. So 1 (N/A, 1)

The last stop for this year's Grand Chess Tour is the London Chess Classic, which begins December 3, while the next major event is the World Cup in Baku. That starts September 10, and practically every player over 2700 (and more besides) except for Carlsen and Anand will be there. The top two finishers qualify for next year's Candidates' event (Carlsen and Anand were the world championship finalists last year and thus needn't play; Carlsen because he's the world champion and Anand because he's automatically seeded into the Candidates').

Unfortunately, even though the World Cup is a colossally important event that eight of the Sinquefield Cup participants are playing in and that could be a career-changer for six of them (Nakamura and Caruana have already qualified for the Candidates' through the Grand Prix, but are still required to play in the World Cup to secure their eligibility), the players are forced to stay in St. Louis through at least tomorrow. Why, when they could be headed to Baku to acclimate, get over jet lag before the tournament starts and to engage in further opening preparation?

The answer: it's for the sake of the so-called Ultimate Moves "competition" and a screening of what will likely be Hollywood's latest "chess players are crazy" offering, a.k.a. "Pawn Sacrifice". The former will consist of rapid and blitz tandem and consultation games that are basically an opportunity for Rex Sinquefield and his son Randy to participate with and against the world's best players; the latter is a movie about Bobby Fischer with Tobey Maguire in the lead role.

The juxtaposition of the two events is fascinating, because Fischer, for better and worse, would quite possibly have balked at the idea of playing in the Ultimate Moves event, refusing to play the clown in exchange for a sponsor's money - especially if it got in the way of performing his best in a real event. But what do you think? Is the Ultimate Moves competition nothing more than a harmless indulgence for a rich and very generous sponsor? Or perhaps it's a demonstration of the power of money, one that takes no account of the players' dignity and schedules? Maybe to some degree it's both, or something in between, or...?

Sinquefield Cup 2015, Round 8: Aronian Leads By A Point Entering the Last Round

For the first time in the tournament, all five games were drawn, leaving Levon Aronian a full point ahead with a round to go. Had he won against Viswanathan Anand he would have guaranteed himself of clear first, and Anand's opening surely gave him hopes of a full point. Garry Kasparov was watching on site, and remarked that Anand's opening choice (on the black side of an English, the reversed Rossolimo) was something he had dismissed many years earlier. In fact, Anand himself admitted after the game that he needed some convincing before he would take the variation seriously! But after some hard work he rehabilitated it to his satisfaction, and at best Aronian might have had some chances for an edge. In the game he was unable to keep an advantage for very long, and Anand achieved a comfortable draw.

Four players came into the round a point behind Aronian, so this was their chance to make up some ground before the final round. Two of them, Alexander Grischuk and Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, played each other, but unfortunately there weren't any fireworks. The game transposed to the same line of the Symmetrical English MVL tried against Magnus Carlsen in round 3. Vachier-Lagrave lost that game, but improved this time and was never in any serious danger. The players called it a day after just 30 moves, one less than was required in Aronian-Anand.

Another player with a chance to gain ground was Anish Giri, who had the white pieces against Fabiano Caruana. Caruana played a Gruenfeld and chose the unusual move 9...e5. He equalized quickly and even won a pawn thanks to some poor play by Giri prior to the time control. Caruana may have had some opportunities to improve, but when they reached a rook and two pawns vs. rook and one pawn ending the draw was inevitable. Caruana played until move 69 before accepting the inevitable.

The big game of the day was Magnus Carlsen vs. Hikaru Nakamura, and after a terrible opening choice by the American and some further inaccuracies after that Carlsen obtained a completely winning advantage. With an 11-0 score against Nakamura in decisive games at a classical time control the point seemed to be in the bag, and with a win Carlsen would close to within half a point of Aronian. Somehow, it wasn't to be. Nakamura defended resourcefully, and when Carlsen played 39.Be3?? ("A moment of insanity" - Carlsen) Black was able to escape to an ending with rook and two pawns vs. two bishops and two pawns, with all the pawns on the same side. Carlsen tried until move 95, but there was no breaching Black's fortress. A second consecutive huge disappointment for Carlsen, and for Nakamura this may just be the confidence-builder he needs to finally get a win against Carlsen in the near future.

Finally, Wesley So and Veselin Topalov went 50 moves, but the only especially noteworthy feature of the game is that So finished with more time than he started with.

The games, with my comments, are here. The final round pairings are as follows:

• Topalov (4) - Aronian (5.5)
• Anand (3) - Carlsen (4.5)
• Vachier-Lagrave (4.5) - Giri (4.5)
• Nakamura (4) - Grischuk (4.5)
• Caruana (3) - So (2.5)

The bottom line is clear: if Aronian scores, he wins the tournament; if he loses and Carlsen, Vachier-Lagrave, Giri (inclusive) or Grischuk win, there will be a playoff.

Sinquefield Cup 2015, Round 7: Aronian Leads By a Point

The antepenultimate round of the 2015 Sinquefield Cup was an eventful one, though the first two games to finish weren't particularly auspicious. Topalov - Giri and Caruana - Vachier-Lagrave were short draws, but the remaining three games were more interesting. Anand - So looked very promising for the young American. Unfortunately for him, but perhaps fortunately for chess aesthetics, he underestimated a brilliant idea of Anand's. After 27.Nc4!? So should have played 27...a4 instead of 27...Bxc5. The latter move was almost irresistible, and that was what Anand was counting on. After 28.Nxe6 Bb4 29.Nxg7!! White gave up material but created a kind of fortress, and the players called it a day just before the time control.

The two remaining games were decisive. Hikaru Nakamura was on a high note, having won brilliantly the day before and enjoying the white pieces against Levon Aronian. Strangely, though, he seemed completely unprepared for Aronian's opening, one which is a regular part of the Armenian's repertoire. Black wound up better, and although he squandered his edge Nakamura's errors in time trouble gave it all back with interest. White's 39th and 40th moves were serious errors, and Aronian had no trouble capitalizing in the second time control.

Aronian started the round tied for first with Magnus Carlsen, so if Carlsen could parlay the white pieces into a win over Alexander Grischuk they would remain tied with two rounds to go. This did not happen. Grischuk, like Aronian, won with Black (a common occurrence in the tournament) to catch up to Carlsen (and Giri and Vachier-Lagrave) at +1, a point behind Aronian. About the Carlsen-Grischuk game: the game was generally even until around move 32, when an inaccuracy followed by an error cost Carlsen a pawn in what was close to a dead-drawn ending. Grischuk's technique in the second time control was terrific at first, but as the players approached six hours of play and started to live off the increment things got sloppy. First Carlsen managed to fight his way back to a drawn ending, and then he almost immediately messed it up and lost. By the time they were finished they had been playing for six hours and 25 minutes, so it's not that surprising that they started to err. (My analyses of the round's games are here.)

Aronian is in great shape with two rounds to go, but with four players just a point behind it's by no means over. Here are the pairings for round 8:

• Grischuk (4) - Vachier-Lagrave (4)
• Giri (4) - Caruana (2.5)
• So (2) - Topalov (3.5)
• Aronian (5) - Anand (2.5)
• Carlsen (4) - Nakamura (3.5)

The last two pairings are especially interesting. For a long time Aronian had great results against Anand, and with White and in much better form in the tournament he has grounds for optimism. On the other hand, Anand has had some good results against Aronian lately, and when they get into theoretical disputes it's often Anand who comes out on top. Aronian shouldn't get too confident, as even a wounded Anand can do some serious damage. Meanwhile, Carlsen is playing his favorite opponent. Can Nakamura hold, or better yet, win his first-ever game against Carlsen at a classical time control? Stay tuned...

Sinquefield Cup 2015, Round 4: Aronian Co-Leads With Topalov After A Beautiful Win Against So

It was a long day, so this will be a short report. There were four draws, all of which, interestingly enough, concluded in opposite-colored bishop endings. Along the way the games were of varying interest, with the battle between Maxime Vachier-Lagrave and Hikaru Nakamura the most colorful of the lot.

The game of the day was between Wesley So and Levon Aronian. This may have been the case even if Aronian had won by prosaic means, by default, but in fact the game was something special. So played provocatively on the white side of a 4.f3 Nimzo-Indian that came to resemble a Modern Benoni, and when he dared to play 13.g4 he reaped the whirlwind after Aronian's 15...Ne5!! Black had fantastic compensation for the piece, and while there was nothing concrete his initiative was practically impossible to quell. With the win, Aronian moved to +2, and is tied for first with Veselin Topalov, half a point ahead of Magnus Carlsen and Anish Giri.

The games, with my notes, are here, and these are the pairings for round 5:

• Aronian (3) - Grischuk (1.5)
• Carlsen (2.5) - So (1.5)
• Nakamura (2) - Giri (2.5)
• Anand (1) - Vachier-Lagrave (2)
• Topalov (3) - Caruana (1)

Norway Chess 2015, Round 5: Topalov Wins Again; Carlsen, Aronian Win Their First

The Norway Chess tournament has passed the halfway point, and Veselin Topalov continues his success. When he's not playing Norwegians, he wins cleanly; when he does, he hangs in there and waits for miracles to happen. And that's what happened in round 5. Topalov was in all kinds of trouble with Black against Jon Ludwig Hammer. Maybe he was never flat out lost, but it was close! Topalov finally took over the advantage from move 42 on, yet Hammer defended well and was on the verge of a draw after 73 moves. All he needed to do was play 74.f5, a move that any club player could find and that requires calculating a grand total of two moves ahead. Instead, Hammer played 74.Kc6?? and had to resign after the obvious 74...Ke6. A blind spot for Hammer?

Yes, but perhaps it was a literal blind spot. It was suggested, very plausibly, that Hammer didn't really look up when Topalov played 73...Ke7 and assumed that Black had played 73...Bb8 instead. In that case, 74.Kc6 would have been the only move. Hammer's haste cost him the game, and completely unnecessarily, especially since he had 15 minutes left on his clock when that happened.

With the win Topalov leads the second-placed Hikaru Nakamura by a point with an impressive score of 4.5/5. Nakamura started the round half a point behind, but after a draw with Viswanathan Anand the gap doubled. Anand is a further half a point back, tied for 3rd-4th with Anish Giri, who in turn drew comfortably with Maxime Vachier-Lagrave.

The other two games finished with a winner, and like Hammer-Topalov those victories had a tinge of the accidental to them. In fact, all three games were decided by hasty moves, though in the two games we haven't yet described that haste was due to time trouble. Levon Aronian had an opening edge against Fabiano Caruana, but Caruana had equalized and the game was headed for a draw as the first time control neared its end. 39...Qg6 would have sealed the deal, giving Caruana full, safe equality and the ability to reach the second time control without any big worries. Instead, he thought he spotted an opportunity and quickly played 39...Qxg3+. It's a nice little tactic, and...it loses. Black wins a pawn for the moment, but White's king achieves maximum activity and ransacks all of Black's queenside pawns. Caruana fought on to move 60, but there was no saving the game.

Finally, Magnus Carlsen had been having a dreadful tournament with only half a point out of four, and despite this he showed his resilience by winning in classic Carlsen style. Alexander Grischuk had managed to equalize, though as usual with Grischuk he didn't manage to do this without getting into time trouble. With the game about to reach the point where a club player could hold Grischuk's position Carlsen tried one last idea: 26.c5! Grischuk could and should have held this, but without time it was far from trivial. Carlsen obtained a very usable edge, though perhaps not yet enough to win the game. On move 40, it was time for another trick: 40.f4. This may not have been the very best move, and had Grischuk replied correctly he probably would have saved the game. Time trouble killed him, though, and 40...exf4?? made it easy for the world champion. (The games, with my notes, are here.)

Carlsen has awakened, and while it's almost impossible for him to contend for first it's not too late for him to do some damage. Next up, he has the white pieces against one of his usual "customers", Hikaru Nakamura. If Nakamura had White it might be a great opportunity for the American to get a '1', but with Black it may be another story. We'll see; meanwhile, here are the pairings for round 6:

• Grischuk (2) - Topalov (4.5)
• Caruana (2) - Hammer (1)
• Giri (3) - Aronian (2)
• Anand (3) - Vachier-Lagrave (2.5)
• Carlsen (1.5) - Nakamura (3.5)

Zurich 2015: Aronian, Caruana and Anand "Win" the Blitz

In fact the blitz event was won only by Levon Aronian, scoring an undefeated 4/5, but as the primary aim in the blitz was to finish in the top 3 and thereby acquire an extra White game in the classical tournament starting tomorrow, Fabiano Caruana and Viswanathan Anand were in that important sense also winners by virtue of their second-place tie with 3.5 points apiece. Hikaru Nakamura finished with 2 points, while Vladimir Kramnik and Sergey Karjakin tied for last with just a single point each to their name.

Pairing numbers were received and pairings were made, and this is what we have to look forward to tomorrow:

• Anand - Kramnik
• Aronian - Karjakin
• Caruana - Nakamura

Tournament site here.

Next Up: Zurich

Despite its brevity, this year's Zurich Chess Challenge will still be a true super-tournament. There are only six players, but the "weakest" of them is rated 2760. Here's the lineup:

• Fabiano Caruana 2810
• Hikaru Nakamura 2792
• Vladimir Kramnik 2783
• Viswanathan Anand 2782
• Levon Aronian 2774
• Sergei Karjakin 2760

If I understand the tournament website correctly, there will be a blitz tournament on Friday the 13th which will determine the pairings for the classical tournament. That will run from the 14th through the 18th, and then there will be a rapid event on the 19th. As I mentioned in an earlier post, octogenarians Viktor Korchnoi and Wolfgang Uhlmann will play also four rapid games with each other (two each on Sunday and Monday), so this should be a very entertaining event.

Grenke Chess Classic, Round 5: Carlsen Catches Naiditsch

As usual, Magnus Carlsen has bounced back from a loss in style and with a vengeance, and after his second straight win in the Grenke Chess Classic he has caught up to Arkadij Naiditsch. Both players have 3.5 points out of five, and lead their closest pursuer by half a point with two rounds to play.

Carlsen was playing the tournament tailender and bottom seed, David Baramidze - with the white pieces, to boot, so his win isn't exactly shocking. Still, it was a nice, typical Carlsen win: he chose a variation (within a mainline opening, it's true) that was slightly off the beaten path, offering a position with plenty of play and no easy way for Black to simplify the position. He maneuvered, increased the tension and created imbalances, and in due course Baramdize erred. 28...Re6 wound up a waste of time, and a further error on move 38 took away all hope.

Naiditsch had White against Fabiano Caruana, and to his credit he did what few super-GMs are willing to do: allow the Marshall Gambit. For once someone seemed better prepared than Caruana in the opening, and although Naiditsch returned the extra pawn his bishop pair looked very strong, and he surely had good winning chances. Caruana defended well, and although he had to suffer for a long time he never broke, and he remains in the hunt for first - especially given his pairing for the next round.

The day's other winner was Levon Aronian, who improved his lot in life by adding to Viswanathan Anand's recent miseries. Anand had outplayed Aronian on the black side of a Ragozin, and was building a promising kingside attack before playing 23...Nh6? I suspect he missed something like 24.e4 Qxf3 (Anand played 24...Bxc5) 25.Qxg5+ Kh7 26.e5+ Bf5 27.Bxf5+ Nxf5 28.Rc3! Aronian wasn't immediately winning, but Anand didn't adapt well to the sudden change, and he was losing just a few moves later and then resigned somewhat prematurely.

Finally, Etienne Bacrot was the only player to make a good case for the black pieces in any of the games, and enjoyed a winning advantage against Mickey Adams. Adams defended well, and like Caruana, saved half a point after a lot of suffering.

The games are here (I've analyzed the two decisive results), and the pairings for the penultimate round are:

• Anand (1.5) - Baramidze (1)
• Caruana (3) - Carlsen (3.5)
• Bacrot (2.5) - Naiditsch (3.5)
• Aronian (2.5) - Adams (2.5)

St. Louis, Final Day: Nakamura Defeats Aronian in Blitz

The "Showdown in St. Louis" between Levon Aronian and Hikaru Nakamura was tied after four classical games, so the winner in tonight's best-of-16 blitz match would win the event and $60,000, while the loser would "only" get $40,000. After a shaky first couple of games, Nakamura felt he got in the zone, while Aronian kept getting into time trouble and all the difficulties it tends to generate. Afterwards Aronian opined that while he's a good blitz player when it's 4'+2", 3'+2" - the time control used in this match - was a bit too fast for him. In the end Nakamura won 9.5-6.5, clinching match victory with two games to spare.

In the GM norm event Sam Sevian drew his last game (a long game, not a quick handshake deal as in his previous game with the black pieces) and finished in clear first with 7.5/9, a ton of rating points and the grandmaster title. He is the youngest U.S. player to achieve the title, and the sixth-youngest of all time.

Congrats to him, to Nakamura, and also to Michael William Brown who made norm in the concurrent IM norm event as well!