Biel Rd.4: Carlsen wins again, 3015 performance

by ChessBase
7/22/2011 – After four rounds of the International Chess Festival in Biel, the only question is who will be second. With 3.5/4 and a 3000+ performance, the first place is all but wrapped up. In a way, much like Kasparov in his heyday, Carlsen’s biggest challenge is himself, and one imagines that his next self-challenging goal would be Kasparov’s record 2851 Elo. Express report.

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The 2011 Biel Chess Festival is taking place from July 16 to 29, in a number of groups: the Master Tournament (eleven rounds Swiss); the Main Tournament (nine rounds Swiss); a Rapid and a Blitz tournament; Chess960; Youth, Simultaneous, Chess Tennis, ChessBase training seminars. Of greatest interest is of course the Accentus Grandmaster Tournament with six very strong grandmasters playing a double round robin: Magnus Carlsen, Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, Alexei Shirov, Fabiano Caruana, Alexander Morozevich and Yannick Pelletier.


The participants: Caruana, Pelletier, Shirov, Carlsen, Morozevich, Vachier-Lagrave

The rate of play: 2 hours for 40 moves, then one hour for 20 and 15 min for the rest of the game, with 30 sec increment per move. The scoring system is three points for a win, one for a draw and zero for a loss. No draw offers are permitted before move 30.

Round 4: Friday, July 22, 14:00h
Alexei Shirov 
½-½
 Maxime Vachier
Alex. Morozevich 
½-½
 Yannick Pelletier
Magnus Carlsen 
1-0
 Fabiano Caruana

Shirov and Vachier-Lagrave started out with a Keres Attack with an early 6.h3 before the classic g4 thrust, following theory for thirteen moves. Play was balanced, though not squeezed dry, however they preferred to not push the issue and repeated the position on move 21.

[Event "Biel ACCENTUS GM"] [Site "Biel SUI"] [Date "2011.07.22"] [Round "4"] [White "Shirov, Alexei"] [Black "Vachier-Lagrave, Maxime"] [Result "1/2-1/2"] [WhiteTitle "GM"] [BlackTitle "GM"] [WhiteElo "2714"] [BlackElo "2722"] [ECO "B90"] [Opening "Sicilian"] [Variation "Najdorf, Adams attack"] [WhiteFideId "2209390"] [BlackFideId "623539"] [EventDate "2011.07.18"] 1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 d6 3. d4 cxd4 4. Nxd4 Nf6 5. Nc3 a6 6. h3 e6 7. g4 d5 8. exd5 Nxd5 9. Nde2 Bb4 10. Bg2 O-O 11. O-O Nxc3 12. Nxc3 Qc7 13. Ne4 Nc6 14. c3 Be7 15. f4 f5 16. gxf5 Rxf5 17. Be3 Bd7 18. Qd3 Rd8 19. b4 Be8 20. Qc4 Bf7 21. Ng3 Rf6 22. Ne4 Rf5 23. Ng3 Rf6 24. Ne4 1/2-1/2

Morozevich chose an offbeat 7.g3 in reply to Pelletier’s French Rubinstein, however neither player was able to create any play away from the central d-file, which led to heavy exchanges and a draw.

[Event "Biel ACCENTUS GM"] [Site "Biel SUI"] [Date "2011.07.22"] [Round "4"] [White "Morozevich, Alexander"] [Black "Pelletier, Yannick"] [Result "1/2-1/2"] [WhiteTitle "GM"] [BlackTitle "GM"] [WhiteElo "2694"] [BlackElo "2590"] [ECO "C10"] [Opening "French"] [Variation "Rubinstein variation"] [WhiteFideId "4116992"] [BlackFideId "1301837"] [EventDate "2011.07.18"] 1. e4 e6 2. d4 d5 3. Nc3 dxe4 4. Nxe4 Nd7 5. Nf3 Ngf6 6. Nxf6+ Nxf6 7. g3 b6 8. Bb5+ Bd7 9. a4 a6 10. Be2 Bc6 11. O-O Bd6 12. Ne5 Bxe5 13. dxe5 Qd5 14. Qxd5 Nxd5 15. a5 b5 16. Bd2 O-O-O 17. Rfd1 Rd7 18. f3 Rhd8 19. Kf2 Ne7 20. Bg5 Rxd1 21. Rxd1 Rxd1 22. Bxd1 Ng6 23. f4 h6 24. Bh4 Nxh4 25. gxh4 f5 26. Ke3 Be8 27. Kd4 c6 28. Kc5 Kc7 29. Bf3 h5 30. c4 g6 31. b4 1/2-1/2

Carlsen played a great game against Caruana, and while it would be easy to just label it as a great ‘positional’ game, but it was a game that would have made Lasker or Korchnoi proud. The reason is that it was far more a psychological victory than pure chess. The Norwegian played his former mentor’s favorite Scotch, though truth be told, he had achieved little to nothing after nineteen moves other than a better pawn structure. He then opted for an inspired exchange sacrifice with 19.Nd4!?, which left the position balanced, but seriously changed the character of the battle. It was as much a positional choice as a psychological one in which his comfort zone was far greater than the Italian’s. One could argue that prior to Fabiano’s blunder 25…Re6?, no one had any big edge, but it is very likely that the circumstances played a big role in provoking the blunder in the first place.

[Event "Biel ACCENTUS GM"] [Site "Biel SUI"] [Date "2011.07.22"] [Round "4"] [White "Carlsen, Magnus"] [Black "Caruana, Fabiano"] [Result "1-0"] [ECO "C45"] [WhiteElo "2821"] [BlackElo "2711"] [PlyCount "53"] [EventDate "2011.07.18"] [EventType "tourn"] 1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. d4 exd4 4. Nxd4 Bc5 5. Nxc6 bxc6 6. Bd3 Qh4 7. Qe2 Ne7 8. Nc3 O-O 9. Be3 Bb6 10. O-O d5 11. exd5 Nxd5 12. Bd2 Bd4 13. Rae1 Nb4 14. Qe4 Qxe4 15. Bxe4 Ba6 16. Ne2 Bc5 17. a3 Nd5 18. b4 Bd6 19. Nd4 Bxf1 20. Kxf1 Nb6 21. Nxc6 Rfe8 22. a4 Kf8 23. a5 Nc4 24. Bc1 a6 {[#]} 25. f4 {Black is doing fine, except for his precariously placed knight which is running out of flight squares.} Re6 $4 (25... Ne3+ $1 26. Rxe3 Bxf4 27. Rf3 Bxc1 28. Bd5 f6 {and Black has no difficulty holding.}) 26. Bd5 Rf6 (26... Rxe1+ 27. Kxe1 Bxb4+ 28. Nxb4 Re8+ 29. Kf2 Nxa5 30. Nxa6 Rc8) 27. Re4 {The knight is lost.} 1-0

Standings

Scoring system: a win counts as three points, a draw as one and a loss zero


Live GM commentary on Playchess

There is live audio and video commentary on the chess server Playchess. The English commentary starts at 3:30 p.m., and German commentary directly from the playing site begins at 4:00 p.m. In addition Daniel King is doing round-up shows at 8:00 p.m. on the days he is commenting.


GM Daniel King commenting on the games in round one

Commentary schedule

Monday 18/07/2011 Miso Cebalo Daniel King
Tuesday 19/07/2011 Miso Cebalo Daniel King
Wednesday 20/07/2011 Miso Cebalo Jan Smeets
Friday 22/07/2011 Miso Cebalo Daniel King
Saturday 23/07/2011 Miso Cebalo Jan Gustafsson
Monday 25/07/2011 Miso Cebalo Jan Gustafsson
Tuesday 26/07/2011 Miso Cebalo Jan Gustafsson
Wednesday 27/07/2011 Miso Cebalo Daniel King
Thursday 28/07/2011 Miso Cebalo Daniel King
Friday 29/07/2011 Miso Cebalo to be announced

As a special treat the multimedia commentary live from Biel is also available on our live browser coverage. This also includes the players analysing after their games.


Overview: schedule and results

Round 1: Monday, July 18, 14:00h
Fabiano Caruana 
½-½
 Maxime Vachier
Yannick Pelletier 
0-1
 Magnus Carlsen
Alexei Shirov 
½-½
 Alex. Morozevich 
Round 2: Tuesday, July 19, 14:00h
Maxime Vachier 
0-1
 Alex. Morozevich
Magnus Carlsen 
1-0
 Alexei Shirov
Yannick Pelletier 
½-½
 Fabiano Caruana
Round 3: Wednesday, July 20, 14:00h
Yannick Pelletier 
½-½
 Maxime Vachier
Alexei Shirov 
1-0
 Fabiano Caruana
Alex. Morozevich 
½-½
 Magnus Carlsen 
Round 4: Friday, July 22, 14:00h
Alexei Shirov 
½-½
 Maxime Vachier
Alex. Morozevich 
½-½
 Yannick Pelletier
Magnus Carlsen 
1-0
 Fabiano Caruana
Round 5: Saturday, July 23, 14:00h
Maxime Vachier 
   Magnus Carlsen 
Fabiano Caruana 
   Alex. Morozevich
Yannick Pelletier 
   Alexei Shirov
Round 6: Monday, July 25, 14:00h
Maxime Vachier 
   Fabiano Caruana
Magnus Carlsen 
   Yannick Pelletier
Alex. Morozevich 
   Alexei Shirov
Round 7: Tuesday, July 26, 14:00h
Alex. Morozevich 
   Maxime Vachier
Alexei Shirov 
   Magnus Carlsen 
Yannick Pelletier 
   Fabiano Caruana
Round 8: Wednesday, July 27, 14:00h
Maxime Vachier  
   Yannick Pelletier
Fabiano Caruana 
   Alexei Shirov
Magnus Carlsen 
   Alex. Morozevich
Round 9: Thursday, July 28, 14:00h
Magnus Carlsen 
   Maxime Vachier
Alex. Morozevich 
   Fabiano Caruana
Alexei Shirov 
   Yannick Pelletier
Round 10: Friday, July 29, 11:00h
Maxime Vachier 
   Alexei Shirov
Yannick Pelletier 
   Alex. Morozevich
Fabiano Caruana 
   Magnus Carlsen 

Links

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 11 or any of our Fritz compatible chess programs.

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