Magnus Carlsen, the highest-ranked player in history, retained his World Rapid crown in Samarkand on Thursday, leading the 202-player field almost all the way to an unbeaten total of 10/13, seven wins and six draws.
It was the fifth Rapid title for the 33-year-old Norwegian, who relinquished his classic title last year in favor of faster time limits. In speed chess, each player has 15 minutes for all moves and an additional 10 seconds for each move, starting with move one.
Leading scores in the final were Carlsen (Norway) 10/13, Vladimir Fedoseev (Slovenia) 9.5, Yu Yangyi (China) and 11 other players on 9, including world No. 2 Fabiano Caruana and juniors Volodar Murzin (17), Rameshbabu Praggnanandhaa. 18 and Nodirbek Abdusattorov, 19.
A direct encounter between Fedoseev and Carlsen proved that the Quick decision was made as the No.1 player persuaded the white king on the board to make a mating attack.
Carlsen said: “It’s a great feeling. I thought the most important moment was against Fedoseev. He’s the only one who can catch me. “I was playing my games a little too safe sometimes, but I don’t think I ever really got into trouble.”
Playing under the neutral Fide flag, 31-year-old Russian Anastasia Bodnaruk became the surprise champion of the Women’s World Rapid after winning the blitz play-off 2.5-1.5 against Indian Humpy Koneru. Le Tingjie (China) finished third. All three received 8.5/11 points. Koneru lost in time decisive play-off match.
On Friday and Saturday, Carlsen will aim for his seventh world blitz title over 21 rounds; each player will have only three minutes plus two seconds per move for the entire game. Games will be streamed live online (starting at 10am).
Earlier, Carlsen had destroyed Tigran L. Petrosian (no relation to the former world champion) by taking advantage of the Armenians’ weakened king defense. Creator Daniil Dubov and rising talent Murzin won cameos. While under-8 world champion Roman Shogdzhiev defeated two grandmasters, the final stages of one of his victories were recorded on video. There were mistakes too. This game is the closest you can get to a grandmaster who is in love with Scholar’s Mate.
Off the ship, the main controversy concerned Fide’s new detailed dress code for World Rapid/Blitz and its first victim, the Dutch WIM, and broadcaster Anna-Maja Kazarian, who was fined €100 for wearing what she denied were sneakers.
Meanwhile, the race for the last two places in the 2023 Candidates, which will determine the person who will rival China’s Ding Liren, continued. India’s Dommaraju Gukesh is confident of a place on the Fide Circuit, but the question of who will take the ratings position will escalate on Friday morning and possibly even beyond that.
Alireza Firouzja, who needed to make up for the rating points of USA’s Wesley So, received help from the French federation, which organized a series of mini-matches against hand-picked senior grandmasters in Firouzja’s hometown of Chartres. The former Iran player needed to win all six matches to get past So, but he failed at the final hurdle, bidding for a draw in a losing position against Sergey Fedorchuk. Following protests from the US federation and others, Fide will likely refuse to consider the Chartres event as an artificially staged event for Firouzja’s benefit.
Firouzja then made a very late entry into the Rouen Open, which started on 26 December and ended on Friday, the deadline by which he could be included in Fide’s 1 January rating list.
Simultaneously, Firouzja’s clubmate from Chartres, Gata Kamsky, who competed for the Fide world title in 1996, also entered Rouen. This time everything went well for Firouzja. He won his first five matches in good style, then triumphed in the important match against Kamsky on Thursday evening. Excluding the Chartres matches, Firouzja’s live rating increased to 2758 against So’s 2757.
Firouzja still has one final hurdle to overcome in round seven in Rouen on Friday morning. In a strange twist of fate, his opponent will be 71-year-old Kamran Shirazi, a former Iranian champion who also lost the shortest game in the history of the US Championship while competing in the United States. Shirazi – John Peters, Berkeley, California 1984: one e4 c5 2 b4 cxb4 3 a3 d5 4 exd5 Qxd5 5 axb4?? Ve5+ 0-1)
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This week’s case still has the potential to end up at the Court of Arbitration for Sport in Lausanne, but less than before Rouen. Whatever the final outcome, Firouzja is only 20 years old and in the prime of his career and will make at least four more attempts at the world title, which has a two-year cycle.
The 97th edition of the Caplin Hastings Masters, the world’s longest-running annual convention, kicked off on Thursday and all eyes are on 14-year-old Shreyas Royal from Greenwich, South London, as he attempts to catch up with his third and final grandmaster norm. he will also need to reach 2500 Fide ratings (currently 2438) to receive the title.
The late Tony Miles was 20 when he became Britain’s first grandmaster in 1976. Nigel Short became GM in 1984 at 19, followed by Adams at 17 in 1989, McShane at 16 years and seven months in 2000, and David Howell at 16 years and one month. Having achieved his first GM norm in a record time of 13 years and nine months and won his second at the recent London Classic, Royal is well placed to set a new milestone at Hastings or later.
Royal started Thursday’s opening round well, holding off 1907-rated amateur opponent Luke Honey.
3600 1 Qh6 Qxe5 2 Qxh7+! Kxh7 3 Kg2 my friend.