Airthings Masters, Day 1: Five players share the lead, Carlsen starts with four draws

Airthings Masters, Day 1

The Airthings Masters starts with a preliminary round robin tournament, in which the eight best players qualify for the knock-out stage. This may explain why the players were rather careful on day 1 – after all, finishing among the first eight is more important than half a point more or less.

Round 1

The only winner in round 1 was Hikaru Nakamura who defeated Alexander Grischuk with Black in a theoretically interesting game.

The rapid games of the world's best players often have an astonishingly high quality, but occasionally they are also marred by grave mistakes. In round 1 Magnus Carlsen and Levon Aronian both suffered from a mutual and sudden attack of chess blindness (or Amaurosis scachistica, as Dr. Tarrasch, a medical practitioner by profession, called it): 

In this position Aronian, who had less than a minute on the clock, played 42...Rd4??, which throws the game away. Immediately after making his move, Aronian realized what he had done but Carlsen missed his chance to win the game and returned the compliment. 43.f4+! wins immediately but Carlsen played 43.Rxd4?? and after Kxd4 44.Rb3 Rh2+ 45.Kb1 Rh3 46.Ka2 Kc4 47.Rc3+ Kb5 48.Kb3 d4 49.Rd3 Kc5 50.Kc2 Rg3 51.a4 Rg2+ 52.Rd2 Rg3 53.Rf2 Kb4 54.b3 g4 55.fxg4 d3+ 56.Kd2 Rxg4 57.Kxd3 Rg3+ 58.Kc2 Rc3+ 59.Kb1 Rxb3+ 60.Rb2 Rxb2+ 61.Kxb2 Kxa4 the game ended in a draw. ½–½

Round 2

His lucky escape in round 1 might have inspired Aronian and in round 2 he won a fine game against Anish Giri. After the opening Aronian was in trouble but in a complicated and double-edged position he then made better use of his chances.

Round 3

After the defeat against Aronian in round 2 Giri suffered another setback in round 3 when he fell victim to a textbook attack by Wesley So.

Round 4

Daniil Dubov started the tournament with three draws but in round 4 he played a typical Dubov-game:

After day 1 of the Airthings Masters five players share the lead but as there are still seven rounds to play, nothing is decided yet, and all twelve players can still qualify for the knock-out stage. 

Standings after round 4

Rk.		Name	Rtg.	Nt.	Pts.	n	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	TB	Perf.
1		Nakamura,H	2736		2.5	4		½				1			½	½			2.00	2877
2		Aronian,L	2781		2.5	4	½					½	½				1		1.50	2880
3		So,W	2770		2.5	4						½	½				1	½	1.00	2865
4		Radjabov,T	2765		2.5	4					½		½				½	1	1.00	2845
5		Dubov,D	2699		2.5	4				½				½		½		1	1.00	2834
6		Grischuk,A	2777		2.0	4	0	½	½						1				2.00	2768
7		Carlsen,M	2862		2.0	4		½	½	½				½					2.00	2762
8		Harikrishna,P	2732		2.0	4					½		½			½		½	1.00	2755
9		Nepomniachtchi,I	2784		2.0	4	½					0				1	½		0.50	2765
10		Vachier-Lagrave,M	2784		1.5	4	½				½			½	0				1.50	2651
11		Giri,A	2764		1.0	4		0	0	½					½				1.00	2582
12		Anton Guijarro,D	2675		1.0	4			½	0	0			½					1.00	2549
TBs: Koya, Wins with black, Wins

Games

Links

• Official website
• All reports on the Skilling Open