World Rapid: All about Carlsen

The FIDE World Rapid and Blitz Championships take place in Dubai, from June 15th (opening ceremony) to June 21st, 2014. The Rapid event will be played from June 16th-18th over 15 rounds, at a time control of 15m+10s. The Blitz runs from June 19th-20th and lasts 21 rounds at 3m+2s. The total prize fund for the tournament is US$400 thousand with $40 thousand for the winner of each championship. There are 122 entries with nearly every elite player playing such as leading players: Magnus Carlsen, Aronian Levon, Alexander Grischuk, Viswanathan Anand, Fabiano Caruana, Nakamura Hikaru, Sergey Karjakin, Shakhriyar Mamedyarov, Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, Peter Svidler, etc. Rounds are at 1pm Paris time each day or 8am New York time.

Rounds six to ten

The press is ready to cover an important day in Dubai

This tournament is definitely action packed. Nepomniachtchi was the leader going into round six, but the fireworks truly started with the duel between Karjakin and Carlsen:

Despite this missed chance by Carlsen, which to be fair was almost impossible to see without computer assistance, he continued with an implacable pace in the next few rounds. Caruana meanwhile dispatched Nepomniachtchi with black to make the tournament wide open.

Alexander Morozevich played a very creative game to smash Judit Polgar

The seventh round was a little slower than the sixth. With the top draws drawing most of the games it allowed lots of players to catch up with the leaders. An important game was the game Carlsen-Fressinet, Anand-Movsesian, Caruana-Karjakin and Grischuk-Morozevich all ended in draws at the top.

The frenchman did not go down this time against Carlsen

The sevent round was particularly long for one specific game: Matlakov-Vakhidov. The game was a rook and knight vs. rook endgame that Matlakov tried to win for a long, long time. Eventually the game was drawn and the tournament resumed.

The tournament waiting on Matlakov-Vakhidov

Nakamura beat Loek Van Wely to move to 5.0/7

The eight round saw more draws at hte top which allowed even more players to inch closer to Caruana, the sole leader. Nakamura dispatched Morozevich and joined Nepomniachtchi, Karjakin and Carlsen.

After the eight round there was a 45 minute break due to prayer. Players used this time in different ways, Carlsen went bowling:

A little relaxation from chess! Taken from his Facebook page.

Round nine saw Caruana and Grischuk draw in the top board which gave Carlsen the chance to catch up with the Italian. He did this precisely by beating Movsesian. The game was probably drawn at some point but the Armenian player cracked under pressure.

Grischuk drew in round nine with Caruana on the top board

In another important result Aronian beat Karjakin with Black in a tricky Berlin endgame.

Caruana was leading for most of the day

Round ten then saw the clash between the leaders. Carlsen defeated Caruana very convincingly with this finishing touch:

With this victory Carlsen is the leader with 8.0/10. He is also now the #1 rated player in rapids according to the live rating list, but that of course can still change as there are five crucial rounds tomorrow. On second place is Aronian who defeated Nakamura after the American confused his plans.

The American is tied for 10th with many people, while the pack of players with 7.0/10 is impressive: Nepomniachtchi, Caruana, Tomashevsky, Grischuk, Yu Yangyi, Anand and Svidler.

Video impressions by Vijay Kumar

Vijay Kumar's traveling camera captures the action in today's round!

Standings after ten rounds

Replay rounds six to ten

Select games from the dropdown menu above the board

Pictures from the official site by Anastasiya Karlovich

Links Official tournament site All Rapid games in PGN The games are being 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 there and get immediate access. You can also use ChessBase 12 or any of our Fritz compatible chess programs.