LCC R9: Carlsen first, Kramnik second, both with big wins

The 2012 London Chess Classic took place in the Olympia Conference Centre from Saturday, December 1st until Monday, December 10th. A win was counted as three points, a draw as one, and a loss zero.

Round nine report

By GM Alejandro Ramirez

The tournament doesn’t end with a bang, but to be fair the entire event was very exciting and hard fought. This was my favorite tournament to follow this year.

Judit Polgar-Levon Aronian ½-½
The Marshall has always been a hot topic in the Spanish Opening. Aronian has used it time and time again to defend successfully with the black pieces, and today was no exception. The pawn sacrifice led to too much activity for Black, who eventually equalized, and the game ended in a draw.

Michael Adams-Vladimir Kramnik ½-½
In another Spanish Opening, Michael Adams employed a variation that Kasimdzhanov has been fancying lately against the Berlin setup. I’m very skeptical about the entire variation, and Kramnik showed one of probably many ways to equalize easily. Neither side had a decent winning chance in the entire game.

Hikaru Nakamura-Luke McShane 1-0
A very interesting a6 Slav turned into a fighting game when Luke sacrificed the exchange for a pawn and a powerful knight on e5. However, soon afterwards he committed an atrocious blunder, and Hikaru simply scooped up an extra piece, forcing instant resignation. The American finishes the tournament on a high note and regains some valuable rating points which he had lost in the previous tournament.

Magnus Carlsen-Vishy Anand ½-½
Carlsen tried and tried and tried, despite only needing a draw. The third Ruy Lopez of the day gave the Norwegian little, and although Anand had some difficulties here and there, he was never in any serious danger. Eventually the game was drawn as Anand showed good defensive skill.

The winner with a 2994 performance: Magnus Carlsen, who now leads on the live ratings

Top ten Live Chess Ratings [10 December 2012, 18:54 GMT]

#	Name	Rating	+/–	Games	Chart	Age
1	Carlsen	2861.4	+13.4	6		22 (30.11.1990)
2	Kramnik	2809.7	+14.7	6		37 (25.06.1975)
3	Aronian	2802.2	-12.8	5		30 (06.10.1982)
4	Radjabov	2793.0	0.0	0		25 (12.03.1987)
5	Caruana	2780.6	-1.4	11		20 (30.07.1992)
6	Karjakin	2780.3	+5.3	11		22 (12.01.1990)
7	Anand	2772.1	-2.9	5		42 (11.12.1969)
8	Topalov	2771.0	0.0	0		37 (15.03.1975)
9	Mamedyarov	2766.4	+2.4	11		27 (12.04.1985)
10	Ivanchuk	2766.0	0.0	0		43 (18.03.1969

Pictures by Ray Morris-Hill, Frederic Friedel and Pascal Simon

Replay all the games of the round

Standings (London scoring)

Standings (traditional scoring)

Live commentary

Live commentary during the games was provided by experts – above Malcolm Pein, Danny
King and Stephen Gordon – for the audience in London, the official broadcast and on Playchess

Postgame analysis of the games by the players

Immediately after the games the players would appear in the commentary room to analyse (above Michael Adams and Vladimir Kramnik, with Stephen Gordon and David Howell). This too was broadcast on the official site and on Playchess.

Postgame analysis Judit Polgar vs Levon Aronian

Postgame analysis Hikaru Nakamura vs Luke McShane

Postgame analysis Magnus Carlsen vs Vishy Anand

Daniel King: Play of the day

Andrew Martin Play of the Day (Nakamura vs McShane)

Live video coverage and commentary

Pairings and results

The games – except for rounds four and nine – start at 2 p.m. or 14:00h British time = 15:00h CET, 17:00h Moscow, 7:30 p.m. Chennai, 22:00h Beijing, 01:00 a.m. Melbourne, 03:00 a.m. Auckland, 6 a.m. San José, 9 a.m. New York. You can check your location here. Naturally the games will be covered live on the official web site (below) and on Playchess. The games of round four begin two hours later, those of the final round two hours earlier.

Watch the live stream from the London Chess classic here.

Links Official tournament site All games in PGN All ChessBase reports on the LCC 2012 (+ 2011, 2010 and 2009) 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 a free Playchess client and get immediate access. Or you can get our latest Fritz 13 program, which includes six months free premium membership to Playchess.