Grenke Chess Classic 2018
Karlsruhe/Baden-Baden, Germany
March 31-April 9, 2018
Final Standings (8 of 9)
1. Fabiano Caruana USA 2784, 5.5/8
2-3. Magnus Carlsen NOR 2843, Nikita Vitiugov RUS 2735, 5.0/9
4-5. Levon Aronian ARM 2794, Maxime Vachier-Lagrave FRA 2789, 4.5/8
6. Matthias Bluebaum GER 2631, 4.0/8
7-9. Hou Yifan CHN 2654, Viswanathan Anand IND 2776, Arkadij Naiditsch AZE 2701, 3.0/8
10. Georg Meier GER 2648, 2.5/8
Average ELO 2736 Category 20
Time Control: 100 minutes for the first 40 moves, then 50 minutes for the next 20 moves then 15 minutes play-to-finish with 30 seconds added after every move starting move 1
Fabiano Caruana won the Berlin Candidates’ tournament last March to line himself up for a 12-game world chess championship match against defending titleholder Magnus Carlsen in London this November.
The Candidates’ tournament ended in March 27. He then went directly from Berlin to Karlsruhe to play in the Grenke Chess Classic tournament which started March 31. This is a category 209 event (average ELO of participants is 2736, making it among the strongest tournaments of the year. Magnus Carlsen was also there eager to play and crush this new pretender to the crown. They met in the first round and Carlsen as Black got a huge advantage out of the opening. Caruana put up maximum resistance and somehow managed to draw. Let me show you the game.
Caruana, Fabiano (2784) — Carlsen, Magnus (2843) [E61]
Grenke Chess Classic 2018 Karlsruhe/Baden-Baden, GER (1.1), 31.03.2018
1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 g6 3.Nf3 Bg7 4.e3 0–0 5.Be2 d6 6.Nc3 Nc6 7.d5 Nb4 8.a3 Na6 9.Nd4
[9.b4? Nxd5]
9…e5 10.dxe6 fxe6 11.0–0 e5 12.Nb3 c6 13.e4 Nc7
Heading for d4.
14.f4 Ne6!
Carlsen has to make this move now as otherwise f4–f5 will prevent it forever.
15.f5 Nd4 16.Be3
[16.Nxd4 exd4 17.Qxd4 Ng4 18.Qd2 Qb6+ Black is better.]
16…Nxe2+!
A surprise as the usual follow-up to Nd4 would be support it with c6–c5. However, Magnus is an original thinker and he is reckoning that the two bishops and better control of the center means that Black is better.
17.Qxe2 gxf5! 18.exf5 d5 19.cxd5 cxd5 20.Rad1 d4 21.Bg5 Qb6 22.Qc4+ Rf7 23.Na4 Qc7 24.Qxc7 Rxc7 25.Nac5 b6 26.Bxf6 bxc5!
[26…Bxf6 27.Ne4 Bg7 28.g4 it is White who has the more threatening pawns]
27.Bxg7 Kxg7 28.Nd2 Bb7 29.f6+ Kf8!
Putting the king on f7 would make it susceptible to knight checks on either d6 or e5. For example: 29…Kf7 30.Rde1 Re8 31.Nc4! etc.
30.Rde1 Re8 31.Ne4 Bxe4 32.Rxe4 c4 33.g4 Rb8 34.Rxe5
Caruana has to play actively. Passive defense by 34.Rf2? Rcb7 Black is clearly winning.
34…Rxb2 35.Rd5 c3 36.Rd8+!
[36.Rxd4 c2 the pawn will queen]
36…Kf7 37.Rh8 <D>
POSITION AFTER 37.RH8
37…Rbb7?
The correct way to win is 37…Rcb7 38.Rxh7+ Kg6 39.f7 Rb8 40.Rh5 (40.f8Q Rxf8 41.Rxf8 Kxh7 is an easy win for White) 40…c2 41.h4! R2b6!! (There is an incredible reason why this move is necessary. After the “obvious” 41…Rb1 42.f8Q! Rxf8 43.Rg5+ there is perpetual check. Putting the rook on b6 ensures that this does not happen) 42.f8Q Rxf8 43.Rg5+ Kh7 44.Rh5+ Rh6 and Black wins.
38.Rxh7+ Kg6
Talking to the chess press after the game Carlsen revealed that he thought he was winning after 38…Kg8 39.Rxc7 Rxc7 40.Kf2 Rd7 but looking at the position some more, once again incredibly, White can still put up resistance here. 41.g5! Kf7 (41…d3? 42.g6 d2 even loses to 43.Ke2 c2 44.f7+ Kf8 45.g7+) 42.h4 d3 43.h5 d2 44.g6+! Kxf6 45.Ke2+ Kg5 46.Rg1+ and the draw is the most likely result.
39.Rxc7 Rxc7
Black is still winning but Caruana is still fighting.
40.Kf2 c2 41.Rc1 d3 42.Ke3 Rd7 43.Kd2 Kxf6 44.h4 Ke5 45.Rf1 Kd4 46.h5 Re7 47.Rf4+ Kd5 48.Rf1 Kc4 49.Rf4+ Kd5 50.Rf1 Kc4 51.Rf4+ Kb3 52.Rb4+ Kxa3 53.Rc4 Kb3 54.Rc8 a5
Carlsen thought that there was nothing better than a draw here but, doubly incredibly, it is here where Black can win: 54…Rh7!! stopping the white pawns 55.Rb8+ Ka2 56.Rc8 a5 and 57.Kxd3 is met with 57…Kb1! 58.Rb8+ Kc1 59.Rc8 Kd1 White has to give up his rook.
55.h6!
White’s pawns become threatening so Magnus now forces the draw.
55…Re2+ 56.Kxd3 Rh2 57.g5 Rh3+ 58.Kd2 Rh2+ 59.Kd3 ½–½
Caruana himself says that he was lucky to draw this game, but it seems to me he made his own luck.
The early leader in the tournament was Nikita Vitiugov, perhaps one of the least known 2700+ players in the world. His “iron” year was in 2009 in the Khanty-Mansiysk World Cup where he beat Abhijeet Gupta, Gilberto Milos and Konstantin Sakaev in 2-game mini-matches to reach the Final 16 before being eliminated by Sergey Karjakin. He then subsequently qualified for and finished 3rd in the Russian SuperFinals. GM Nikita is known for his theoretical preparedness and has written two books on the French Defense. He acted as Peter Svidler’s second (or assistant) in the Candidates Tournaments of 2013 and 2014. He is quiet and does not have any spectacular superGM tournament victories, but you will also notice that he always finishes high in these very strong events.
In Karlsruhe he started the tournament with a brilliant victory.
Bluebaum, Matthias (2631) — Vitiugov, Nikita (2735) [D12]
Grenke Chess Classic 2018 Karlsruhe/Baden-Baden, GER (1.5), 31.03.2018
1.d4 d5 2.c4 c6 3.Nf3 Nf6 4.e3 Bf5 5.Nc3 e6 6.Nh4 Bg6
Provoking White with 6…Be4 first and only after 7.f3 then Bg6 is another possibility and this is currently a popular way of continuing.
7.Bd2 Nbd7 8.Nxg6 hxg6 9.c5
I have never liked this move in such formations. First of all White has the two bishops and he should be opening up the position, not closing it. Second of all with 9…e5 I always feel like Black has already equalized.
9…e5 10.b4 Be7 11.b5 0–0 12.Qa4?
White should have looked after his king safety with 12.bxc6 bxc6 13.Be2 followed by kingside castling. The queen excursion gives Black just enough time to break through in the center.
12…Re8
Another way is 12…exd4 13.exd4 Bxc5! 14.dxc5 Nxc5 15.Qd4 Re8+ 16.Be2 Ne6 17.Qa4 d4 White’s position looks extremely uncomfortable.
13.bxc6 bxc6 14.Be2
[14.Qxc6? is too reckless: 14…Rc8 15.Qa4 exd4 is a lot of fun to play for Black. The game might continue 16.exd4 Bxc5+ 17.Be2 Nb6 18.Qb3 Bxd4 19.Kf1 Nc4 20.Bxc4 dxc4 21.Qc2 Ng4 you get the drift]
14…exd4 15.exd4 Nxc5! 16.dxc5 d4 17.0–0 dxc3 18.Bxc3 Bxc5 19.Bf3 Rc8 20.Bxc6?
White is playing as if nothing can happen to him.
20…Re2! 21.Bf3 Rxf2! 22.Rxf2 Bxf2+ 23.Kxf2 Rxc3 24.Qxa7?
This position will make a good puzzle. Black to play and win.
24…Ne4+!!
Black took more than 20 minutes on this, and it works.
25.Kg1
There is a story behind this. After the game Vitiugov was approached by one of the chess journalists, Eric van Reem, who complimented him on the beautiful combination. GM Nikita’s reply was that “It was quite a decent game, but I was very lucky, because until the very end it was balanced. Then he just missed this quite nice move 25…Ra3, but instead of 25.Kg1 of course he had to take on e4 and it must be a draw.”
So it turned out that Vitiugov had not seen all the lines! You see, one of the main points was that 25.Bxe4 is refuted by 25…Rc7! (Black is threatening a double check on either d4 or f6, winning the white rook in the corner) 26.Qa8 Rc8 27.Qa6 (27.Qa7 Qf6+) 27…Qd4+ 28.Kg3 Rc3+ 29.Bf3 g5! 30.h3 Qe5+ 31.Kf2 Rc2+ and the rook on a1 hangs.
Anyway, I am pretty sure that if White had played 25.Bxe4 in the game Vitiugov would have dug in and found the finishing touch over the board.
25…Ra3! 26.Qxa3 Qd4+ 0–1
The Philippines has a new International Master! FEU’s John Miciano won the Under-18 Asian Youth Championship and was automatically awarded the title. Through the kindness of his coach GM Jayson Gonzales, he has graciously agreed to annotate all his games in the championship for us. We will present them to the BW readers starting Tuesday.
Bobby Ang is a founding member of the National Chess Federation of the Philippines and its first Executive Director. A Certified Public Accountant, he taught accounting in the University of Santo Tomas for 25 years and is currently Chief Audit Executive of the Equicom Group of Companies.
bobby@cpamd.net
