London R1 – Carlsen beats Kramnik

Round one report

A full report on the games will be provided on Wednesday morning. For now we provide you with visual impressions of the first round of the 2009 London Chess Classic.

A full theatre at the start of the London Chess Classic 2009, with the players in the front row
waiting to be introduced (Nakamura, McShane, Carlsen, Howell, Adams, Kramnik, Short, Ni Hua)

Waiting for the opponent – Magnus on the stage

British Champion David Howell, who caused Michael Adams some anxious moments

The start of what would turn out to be the longest battle of the day

The games under way on the stage of the Olympia Conference Center

The commentary room, where the games were commented by experts for the public

The audience follows the commentary in London

GM Steven Gordon and IM Lawrence Trent broadcast their analysis live on Playchess

Frederic Friedel and Daniel King working on the live broadcast for the official site

Meanwhile in the theatre Carlsen kibitzes in the game Adams vs Howell

US GM Hikaru Nakamura got a very promising position against Ni Hua

Inner British battle between Nigel Short and Luke McShane

Magnus Carlsen ponders his 43rd move...

...which he plays at 7:21 p.m., after which the young Norwegian...

... waits on the stage for his opponent to return from the rest area

Photos by Frederic Friedel and Pascal Simon in London

From Magnus Carlsen's Arctic Securities blog

The game against Kramnik today was quite important as we’re ranked one and two in this tournament. A couple of hundred spectators followed the games in the auditorium. I played 1.c4 and the English opening. The ambition was to obtain a complicated position but not necessarily an advantage out of the opening. Kramnik seems slightly uncomfortable in the kind of position that arose. I won a pawn after a tense middle game, but black had considerable compensation. At this point he made several inaccuracies and around the first time control his position went from being difficult to being lost. He resigned a few moves after the time control in face of mate or big material losses. That evens our internal score in classical chess (two victories each) and I’ve got a wonderful start to this tournament!

7th ranked Luke McShane won a marathon endgame against Nigel Short while the other two games ended with draw. I commented on the game for a large audience and press after the game. I'm impressed by the interest in the tournament so far. Wednesday I’m playing white against co-leader McShane. Magnus Carlsen, London December 8th 2009.

Courtesy of the Arctic Securities web site

Schedule and results

Tournament Schedule

Links Official tournament site Full details in our previous report All games in PGN The games will be broadcast live on the official web site and on the chess server Playchess.com. If you are not a member you can download the free PGN reader ChessBase Light, which gives you immediate access. You can also use the program to read, replay and analyse PGN games. New and enhanced: CB Light 2009!