5/14/2013 – Trying to sum up the incredible action of the day in a few lines is nearly impossible. The games were sharp, exciting, dramatic, and Playchess commentator GM Daniel King even said “My brain is hurting”. Aronian beat Hammer in an explosive game, and Carlsen ground down Radjabov in his vintage endgame play. Anand nearly beat Karjakin after a virtuoso performance. Report with GM commentary.
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Chess Festival Prague 2025 with analyses by Aravindh, Giri, Gurel, Navara and others. ‘Special’: 27 highly entertaining miniatures. Opening videos by Werle, King and Ris. 10 opening articles with new repertoire ideas and much more. ChessBase Magazine offers first-class training material for club players and professionals! World-class players analyse their brilliant games and explain the ideas behind the moves. Opening specialists present the latest trends in opening theory and exciting ideas for your repertoire. Master trainers in tactics, strategy and endgames show you the tricks and techniques you need to be a successful tournament player! Available as a direct download (incl. booklet as pdf file) or booklet with download key by post. Included in delivery: ChessBase Magazine #225 as “ChessBase Book” for iPad, tablet, Mac etc.!
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The Norway Chess 2013 Super Tournament is one of the strongest super tournaments ever and is held from May 7th to 18th 2013 in several different locations in the Stavanger-region of Norway: Quality Residence Hotel, Sandnes (six rounds); Stavanger Konserthus, Stavanger (one round); Fabrikkhallen til Aarbakke AS, Bryne (one round); Flor & Fjære, Sør-Hidle (one round).
Tourney structure: nine-round round robin Time control: 100 minutes/40 moves + 50 minutes/20 moves + 15 minutes + 30 seconds/move starting with the first move Game start: daily 15:00 (server time), last round 12:00 Rest day: 11th May and 16th May Rules & Tiebreak Rules: The “Sofia rules” will apply. A tie for first place will be decided by a blitz match.
Round six
Round 6: Tuesday, May 14, 2013 in Sandnes
Magnus Carlsen
1-0
Teimour Radjabov
Veselin Topalov
½-½
Wang Hao
Viswanathan Anand
½-½
Sergey Karjakin
Levon Aronian
1-0
Jon Ludvig Hammer
Hikaru Nakamura
½-½
Peter Svidler
The spectators enjoy a very intimate view of the elite event
If the sixth round could be summed up in a word, it would be ‘intense’, but to try and define it with one word, would be a slight of no small proportions to the players who gave it their all. They took risks, poured their inspiration and perspiration on the board, and essentially held nothing back. The poor commentators usually have only a game or two to center their focus on, giving brief highlights of the others as they progress, had no such luck today. GM Daniel King trying to make sense of so many sharp positions quailed jokingly “My brain is hurting.”
The first game to end was not a draw as one might expect, but an explosive Gruenfeld between Levon Aronian and Jon Hammer in which the Norwegian entered a line considered dubious, and paid the price for his temerity. Usually the price in such situations is significant suffering, but the Armenian took it on himself to get an early rest as he brought his d-pawn to the seventh rank by move 23 forcing resignation the move after.
A representative of the sponsor Lyse makes the first move
[Event "?"] [Site "?"] [Date "2013.05.14"] [Round "?"] [White "Aronian, Levon"] [Black "Hammer, Jon"] [Result "1-0"] [ECO "D85"] [Annotator "GM Gilberto Milos"] [PlyCount "47"] 1. d4 Nf6 2. c4 g6 3. Nc3 d5 4. Nf3 Bg7 5. cxd5 Nxd5 6. e4 Nxc3 7. bxc3 c5 8. Rb1 O-O 9. Be2 cxd4 10. cxd4 Qa5+ 11. Bd2 Qxa2 12. O-O Bg4 13. Rxb7 Nc6 { Theory considers this move a mistake.} ({Correct was} 13... Bxf3 14. Bxf3 Bxd4 {and the position is about equal.}) 14. d5 Bxf3 15. Bxf3 Nd4 16. Rxe7 {Now we have a fight between central pawn against a distant pawn. Here the central pawn is much more advanced and we can affirm that White is much better.} a5 17. d6 a4 18. e5 {White has to advance his central pawns because the a-pawn supported by the bishop on g7 is too strong.} Nxf3+ 19. gxf3 Qb2 {Probably the decisive mistake.} ({Black should have played} 19... a3 20. Bc3 Qc4 21. Qd4 $14 {and White is clearly better but the win is far from clear. A possible continuation could be} Qxd4 22. Bxd4 a2 23. Ra1 Rfb8 24. Kg2) 20. Be3 $1 {Very strong! Hammer probably missed this move in his analyses.} a3 ({The point is that Black can not capture the e-pawn.} 20... Bxe5 21. Qd5 Bg7 22. Rxf7 Rxf7 23. Qxa8+ Bf8 24. Rd1 {with an easy win because the advance of the d-pawn is supported and the a-pawn is under control.}) 21. Qd5 {Now it's over.} Rae8 ( 21... Rab8 {was suggested by Levon in the post-mortem analysis as a better defense but White still wins after} 22. e6 fxe6 23. Qxe6+ Kh8 24. Ra7 {and again the black pawn is under control. A possible continution could be} Qf6 25. Qd5 Qxf3 26. Qxf3 Rxf3 27. d7 Kg8 28. Rd1 Bf6 29. Rxa3) 22. Rxe8 Rxe8 23. d7 Rd8 24. Bg5 1-0
Veselin Topalov and Wang Hao played the only game that did not require warnings to people with heart conditions and played a main line Queen’s Gambit Accepted that led to nothing for either side. This ended in a draw after they had exhausted their options.
The soft-spoken Veselin Topalov and Wang Hao
Although Hikaru Nakamura and Peter Svidler played a draw that lasted one move less than the aforementioned game, it was an entirely different story. The American sprang the very rare grandmaster guest: the Ponziani, which although he has played before in 2007, and was even essayed by Carlsen this year at Wijk, could not have been the prime focus of Svidler’s preparation.
Hikaru Nakamura shows his support of his football team
As it turned out, the Russian was quite familiar with it, but was alarmed at the way his opponent was blitzing out his moves and kept trying to find a way to break away from theory without actually doing anything suicidal. His choice was 9…Bg4, which looked decidedly odd, but the result was an extremely sharp game that had ‘anything can happen’ written all over it. With both kings highly exposed, it was no shock to see it end in a forced repetition after a sacrifice.
The game by Viswanathan Anand and Sergey Karjakin was one of both beauty and tragedy. After his loss yesterday, a big question mark was how the Russian would respond to the setback. In a sense this seemed to presume he was calling the shots, and ignored his illustrious opponent, but the world champion quickly stamped his authority and who was who. Karjakin played the Ruy Lopez Berlin, usually synonymous of exchanged queens and a lot of maneuvering, but Anand was having none of it, and 4.d3 said the queens were invited to stay at the party.
It was an inspired game by Vishy Anand, who came 'oh so close' to drubbing Sergey Karjakin
The position was nevertheless quite controlled for the first twenty moves, and Vishy was the first to show his hand with a none-too-subtle 22.g4 followed by 23.Rg1, and the Russian responded well with Kf7 and g5 taking his king out of the line of fire, trying to blockade the belligerent intentions of the Indian. It was an inspired performance by Anand as he worked the position with great verve, and seemed headed towards a small masterpiece. Many of the threatened lines, as well as those supporting the moves played, were of great beauty, but a tragic oversight with 48.Rh1 allowed the one tempo Sergey needed to get his balance and after 48…Qb5 threatening …Qb3, the win was no more. A bittersweet moment for Anand who has been showing his brilliance but was unable to close the deal, and a huge relief for Karjakin who had been staring at a second defeat in a row, which he might not have recovered from.
Magnus Carlsen played a game against Teimour Radjabov that can easily be recognized as Classic Carlsen. He played an opening, a Tarrasch, and middlegame that garnered him little to nothing, and entered an endgame where he had a microscopic pull to work with and from there began to brew his potion. It took him no fewer than 40 moves to squeeze blood from a stone, but in the end he moved forward within just a half-point behind Sergey Karjakin and three rounds to go.
Magnus Carlsen has nearly caught up with Sergey Karjakin
GM Daniel King provides video analysis of Carlsen vs Radjabov
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.
GM Blohberger presents a complete two-part repertoire for Black: practical, clear, and flexible – instead of endless theory, you’ll get straightforward concepts and strategies that are easy to learn and apply.
GM Blohberger presents a complete two-part repertoire for Black: practical, clear, and flexible – instead of endless theory, you’ll get straightforward concepts and strategies that are easy to learn and apply.
GM Blohberger presents a complete two-part repertoire for Black: practical, clear, and flexible – instead of endless theory, you’ll get straightforward concepts and strategies that are easy to learn and apply.
Opening videos: Sipke Ernst brings the Ulvestad Variation up to date + Part II of ‘Mikhalchishin's Miniatures’. Special: Jan Werle shows highlights from the FIDE Grand Swiss 2025 in the video. ‘Lucky bag’ with 40 analyses by Ganguly, Illingworth et al.
In this video course, Grandmaster Ivan Sokolov explores the fascinating world of King’s Indian and Pirc structures with colours reversed, often arising from the French or Sicilian.
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