Wonderful Wesley

The second leg of the Grand Chess Tour was held in Leuven, Belgium, sponsored by the “Your Next Move” Foundation, an organization dedicated to promoting chess to schoolchildren. It had the same format as in the first leg in Paris:

The first two days feature nine rounds of rapid chess, with 25 minutes for all moves and a 10-second increment from move 1. A win is worth two points, with one point for a draw.

The final two days see 18 rounds of blitz, with five minutes for all moves and a two-second increment. Normal scoring of one point for a win and half a point for a draw applies.

Then, by totaling up all your points we get the overall winner. Take note that maximum total points from the rapid section is 18 pointts (9 rounds x 2 points for a win) and from the blitz it is the same, 18 pts (18 rds x 1 pt for a win). In other words the rapid and blitz sections contribute 50% of your total score. Let me show you what happened: RAPID PORTION Final Standings Note: I used the normal point scoring here of 1 pt for the win and ½ point for the loss. We will multiply by two for the combined final standings. 1. Magnus Carlsen NOR 2878, 6.0/9 2. Wesley So USA 2652, 5.5/9 3-4. Viswanathan Anand IND 2795, Levon Aronian ARM 2739, 5.0/9 5. Fabiano Caruana USA 2829, 4.5/9 6-8. Maxime Vachier Lagrave F RA 2784, Anish Giri NED 2738, Veselin Topalov BUL 2771, 4.0/9

9-10. Hikaru Nakamura USA 2846, Vladimir Kramnik RUS 2799, 3.5/9 BOBBY ANG BLITZ PORTION Final Standings 1. Magnus Carlsen NOR 2915, 11.0/18 2. Levon Aronian ARM 2798, 10.0/18 3-5. Viswanathan Anand IND 2764, Hikaru Nakamura USA 2883, Wesley So USA 2726, 9.5/18

6-7. Vladimir Kramnik RUS 2841, Maxime Vachier- Lagrave F RA 2871, 9.0/18 8. Fabiano Caruana USA 2665, 9.5/18

9. Anish Giri NED 2822 8.0/18

10. Veselin Topalov BUL 2644, 6.0/18

COMBINED FINAL CHESS PIECE STANDINGS Magnus Carlsen, 23.0/36 ($37,500) Wesley So, 20.5/36 ($30,000) Levon Aronian, 20.0/36 ($15,000) Viswanathan Anand, 19.5/ 36 ($15,000) Fabiano Caruana, 17.5/36 ($5,000) Maxime Vachier Lagrave, 17.0/ 36 ($7,500) Hikaru Nakamura, 16.5/36 ($7,500) Vladimir Kramnik, 16.0/36 ($7,500) Anish Giri, 16.0/36 ($7,500) Veselin Topalov, 14.0/36 ($7,500) ***

The first day (rounds 1-5 of the rapid portion) was a triumph for Vishy Anand who brought back memories of his glory days with powerful wins over Vachier-Lagrave and Topalov and 3 draws.

Vachier-Lagrave, Maxime (2789) - Anand, Viswanathan (2770) [C65] Your Next Move GCT Rapid Leuven (1.3), 17.06.2016 1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. Bb5 Nf6 4.d3 Bc5 5.c3 0–0 6.0–0 d6 7.Nbd2 Ne7 8. d4 exd4 9. cxd4 Bb6 10. Re1 Bg4 11.h3 Bh5 12.Qb3 d5 13.e5 Nd7 14.Qd1

Clearly White wanted to execute the standard kingside attack plan in the Ruy Lopez with 14. g4 Bg6 15. Nf1, but he can’t do it right away because of 15... Be4, so first he defends the d4– pawn with 14.Qd1.

Anand saw that White has Bh6 but already worked out what his reply would be.

The point of this move is not easy to see.

POSITION AFTER 26.NXG7

Plays into Anand’s hands. 26... Nxf2! 27. Kxf2 Qh2+ 28. Ke3 Qg2 29.Qe2

[29.Rf1 Ne5! 30.Qe2 (30.Nxe5 Rxf1) 30...Rxf3+ 31.Rxf3 Bxd4+! 32.Kd2 Nxf3+ 33.Kd1 Qxe2+ 34.Kxe2 Ng1+ 35.Kf1 Bxg7 36.Bxg7 Kxg7 37.Kxg1 this endgame is easy to win]

Imagine that — Anand had to see on move 24 that he had this shot on move 30. Very impressive!

***

Come the second day of action though Magnus Carlsen hit his stride and won all his games (4/4 against Giri and his three predecessors as world champion: Topalov, Kramnik and Anand) to finish the Rapid portion of the event one whole point (remember, 2 pts for a win 1 pt for a draw) ahead of Wesley So. He was not to give up his leader position up to the end.

There is a big difference between standard chess and quickplay, of course. Less mistakes in standard and more time to contemplate your moves and come up with deep stratagem which hopefully will link your opening, middlegame and endgame play into one cohesive production.

Quickly though also has its advantages — you tend to play more aggressively especially in familiar positions, counting on your opponent’s lack of time to think things through. I will show you two beautiful games which anybody can be proud of at any time control. *** Caruana, Fabiano (2804) - Kramnik, Vladimir (2812) [C65] Your Next Move GCT Rapid Leuven BEL (8.4), 18.06.2016 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 Nf6 4.d3 Bc5 5.c3 0–0 6.0–0 d6 7.Nbd2 Ne7 8. d4 exd4 9. cxd4 Bb6 10. Re1 Bg4 11.h3 Bh5 12.a4 a6 Not 12...Bxd4? 13.g4.

It is already possible to take the d4– pawn. However 14...Bxd4 15.g4 Bg6 16.Nxd4 Nxd4 17.f4 h6 18.f5 Bh7 19.Nf3 Nxf3+ 20. Qxf3 Black’s bishop is completely shut out of play and White has the two bishops and open lines to work with.

The solid alternative, of course, is 22... f6. Remember the rule in quickplay: always choose active counterplay rather than passive defense. The mistakes will come anyway and when they do you have more chances if your pieces are active.

[25.exd5?? Rxe1+] Threatening mate. [32...gxh6?? 33.Qh8#] Even stronger than taking the queen.

[ 34... Bxf5 35. Bxf5+ Kg8 36. dxe6 f6 (36...fxe6 37.Bxe6+ Kf8 38.Rf4+) 37.Rc7 Qd6 38. Rxg7+ Kxg7 39. Qxf6+ Kg8 40.Qf7#]

35. Rh4+ Kg8 36. Nh6+! Kf8 37.Ba3+ Nc5 38.Bxc5+ Bxc5 39.Qxc5+ Qe7 40.Nf5! [ With the idea of Rh8 checkmate!] 1–0

*** Caruana, Fabiano (2804) - Vachier-Lagrave, Maxime (2789) [A04] Your Next Move GCT Blitz Leuven

(16.2), 19.06.2016 1.Nf3 c5 2.g3 g6 3.Bg2 Bg7 4.0–0 Nc6 5. c3 d5 6. d4 cxd4 7. cxd4 Nh6 8. Nc3 Nf5 9. e3 0– 0 10. b3 Re8 11. Bb2 e6 12. Rc1 Bd7 13. Ne1 Rc8 14. Nd3 b6 15. Qe2 a6 16. Na4 Nd6 17. Rc2 Na7 18. Rfc1 Bxa4 19. bxa4 Nc4 20.Ne5 b5 21.axb5 axb5 22.Bc3 Qd6 23. Nd3 Nc6 24. h4 h5 25. Be1 Ra8 26.Rc3 Ra4

White’s two bishops are ineffective while the two knights with Black has good outposts to work from. Black is much better.

The attacking idea behind this move is much deeper than 28.exd4 Nxd4 forking rook and queen. Take note that this game is played under blitz time control. This is the real point. Now 33.Kxg2+ cannot be played because of 33...Ne3+.

Black has 6 pawns for the rook!

This pawn cannot be taken because of ...Qg3+

[40.Ng2 Ng4 41.Kf1 (else ...Qg3– h2+ – h1) 41...d3 42.Qd2 Nh2+ 43.Kg1 Nf3+]

Magnus Carlsen deservedly won first prize and the big battle was for second place. Filipino-American GM Wesley So covered himself in glory by finishing ahead of Anand and Aronian for runner-up honors. We will discuss that on Tuesday.