Magnus Carlsen recovered from a bizarre experience on the first day of the world blitz championship in Riyadh, scored 9/10 in the concluding rounds and stormed clear of the field to capture the $200,000 first prize. Sergey Karjakin, who won in 2016, was second while Vishy Anand took bronze. The 48-year-old Indian lost only one game out of 38 in five days of rapid and blitz speed chess.
In the opening round Carlsen won a pawn against Ernesto Inarkiev, the 2016 European champion, and his rook was checking his opponent’s king. Inarkiev illegally replied with a knight check of his own and, when Carlsen in reflex mode moved his own king, the Russian claimed the game! The world body Fide has Byzantine rules on illegal moves and the deputy arbiter declared a win for Inarkiev. On successive appeals the ruling changed to a draw, then for play to resume from the last legal position, which Inarkiev refused.
Garry Kasparov declared the incident “a disgrace” and Inarkiev’s imaginative chutzpah may permanently blight his career. The stress took its toll on Carlsen who after the first day had only 7/11, two points behind Karjakin. Next day Norway’s 27-year-old world champion was revitalised and won game after game, including an impressive attack against Karjakin.
It was not quite as magical as it sounds. Blitz is three minutes for all a player’s moves, plus two seconds’ increment after each move. Carlsen has perfected the art of using offbeat openings, taking his opponents out of autopilot, gaining a time edge and posing a long series of tricky decisions until his rival cracks.
When Karjakin chose the Berlin 3...Nf6, Carlsen’s 4 d3 dodged 5 4 0-0 Nxe4 and its queenless endgame. He got on top after the passive 13...Nd7?! (c4!) and was ready to meet 19...g5 by 20 Rh4! gxh4 21 Bxh6 Bd7 22 Bg7! Kxg7 23 Ng5. Karjakin could have resisted longer by 21...Bf7 or 22...h5, since as played Carlsen’s 24 Ne5! set up his queen, rooks and bishop to crush the black king.
Magnus Carlsen v Sergey Karjakin
1 e4 e5 2 Nf3 Nc6 3 Bb5 Nf6 4 d3 Bc5 5 Bxc6 dxc6 6 Nc3 O-O 7 Be3 Bd6 8 Bg5 Re8 9 h3 c5 10 Nd5 Be7 11 Nxe7+ Qxe7 12 O-O h6 13 Be3 Nd7? 14 Nd2 Nb8 15 f4 exf4 16 Rxf4 Nc6 17 Qh5 b6 18 Raf1 Rf8 19 Nf3 Be6 20 Rh4! f6 21 Qg6 Qf7?! 22 Qg3 Nb4?! 23 Bxh6 Nxc2 24 Ne5! fxe5 25 Rxf7 Rxf7 26 Qg6 Bxa2 27 Bg5 Rff8 28 Rh7 Rf7 29 Bf6 1-0
Four days after his triumph in Riyadh Carlsen was in action again, this time in the final of the chess.com internet speed championship, where he met his old rival Hikaru Nakamura, who stayed away from Saudi Arabia. Carlsen won the marathon four-hour blitz match 18-9. The world champion also made a rare political statement in an interview where he said that Saudi Arabia should not host the rapid/blitz in 2018 and 2019 if it continued to bar Israelis.
3528 1...Rh1! 2 Rxa2 Rxh2+ 3 Kf3 Rxe2! 4 Kxe2 c1N+! and Nxa2 wins.
