Gibraltar Rd10: Almighty Hikaru

Photos by John Saunders and Sophie Triay

Tradewise Gibraltar Chess Festival 2017

The Tradewise Gibraltar Open is one of the strongest and best organised events of its kind in the world. Anyone who knows the moves (and pays the entry fee) can take part, and perhaps face top participants like Fabiano Caruana, Maxime Vachier-Lagrave or Hikaru Nakamura. The tournament lasts from January 23 (opening) to February 4. The location is very balmy: ten hours of daylight, average day temperature 16° C, warm sea temperatures, beautiful scenery. Paradise!

Gibraltar 10: Almighty Hikaru

The final round of the Tradewise Gibraltar Masters had everything you could ask for from the climax of an Oscar-winning movie. A 21-year-old Spaniard was the sole leader, but one look at the pack of heavyweights pursuing him and you would have known that you are in for a thriller.

Uneasy lies the head that wears the crown.

Unlike other Opens where, often in such scenarios, the players just shake hands, share the prizes and go home, Tradewise Gibraltar has a speed chess playoff that makes things curious and exciting. The first prize was the mouth-watering 23,000 pounds, the second was 18,000 pounds and the third and fourth places mean 14,000 and 10,000 pounds respectively.

If two or four players tied for first place, there would be a speed knock-out play-off, while if three players tie then the player with the highest total performance rating would be seeded directly in the finals, while the other two play a semi-final to determine the other finalist. If more than four players tied for the first place, the top-four according to the TPR will play the knock-out speed play-off.

And with a list as strong as this in contention, it was anybody’s tournament.

However, one among these players was a hot-favorite, even though he was not leading and only had the black pieces in the final round!

But even before most games would be out of the openings, there was already a ‘scandal’ on the 17^th board when Hou Yifan chose a unique form of protest to express her dissatisfaction with the pairings.

What do we call this one? Pairingsgate? Read everything here.

We must also note that an appeal was lodged by Hikaru Nakamura's stepfather, Sunil Weeramantry who stated that the tournament leader Guijarro had received six whites in the ten-round event. The arbiters soon explained that if David wasn’t given white in the last round, it would have messed up the average of whites and blacks for the 8 player group which was tied for the second place.

Michael Adams was in a must-win situation with the black pieces.

He opened with 4…a6 against a Queen’s Gambit Declined — a relative sideline that must’ve surprised David Anton Guijarro. Nevertheless, if anybody ever had an edge, it was White. While David maneuvered his knight to c5 to put pressure on Black, Adams rerouted his knight from h6-f7-g5 to e4, negating the rival on c5.

A draw was agreed, knocking Adams out of the contention for the first place.

David, who had reached 8.0/10, was glued to the other boards, nervously. Who will challenge his lead?

Boris Gelfand

Boris Gelfand and Maxime Vacher-Lagrave discussed a Symmetrical-English where MVL equalized effortlessly with black. Sadly, for both the titans, there was almost no way to press for a victory. They stopped for the day and stepped out of contention.

Romain Edouard beat Nigel Short in the previous game, but was unable to resist Hikaru Nakamura

He started with a 4.Nf3 Nimzo-Indian with white against Hikaru Nakamura. Edouard had to take the pawn but afterwards couldn't find a way to castle. Hikaru brought his pieces into the game, and then attacked and won with characteristic ruthlessness. Romain Edouard explained, "I forgot about the opening, then had to accept a pawn sacrifice and a difficult position. It was anyway unclear until I played 20.h3? (instead of 20.Nf5) after which I got crushed." In the process, Hikaru joined David Anton at the top with 8.0/10 and sealed his place in the playoffs.

Ju Wenjun had had a terrific time at 2017 Gibraltar.

She has already crossed the 2600-mark and sealed the first prize for women, no matter the result. On top of it, she was in with a chance to qualify for the play-offs if she beat compatriot Yu Yangyi.

Ju defended with the French Defence and Yu chose the Advanced Variation. Black was obviously cramped for space and Yu confidently broke on c4, developed all his pieces and steamrolled his opponent into submission.

Yu Yangyi

What was supposed to an interesting Chinese derby turned out to be a walk in the park for Yu Yangyi. He joined David and Hikaru in the playoffs with 8.0/10.

However, there still was one last place up for grabs and the only contender was Bulgaria’s Ivan Cheparinov who had 7.0/10. He had the black pieces against Russia’s Maxim Matlakov and had to win the game to qualify.

Ivan Cheparinov

But no side really had any advantage whatsoever and the game petered out to a repetition. Cheparinov was out of contention.

Veselin Topalov in conversation with the legendary Spanish chess journalist Leontxo García

And then there were three…

A Spaniard, an American, and a Chinese remained at the top of the heap. The speed play-off was a two-game rapid match with a 10 mins.+5 sec. time-control. In the event of a tie, there would be a blitz tiebreaker with 3 mins.+2 sec. control. And if this did not yield a result, there would be an Armageddon.

One has to note that most people were vehemently against breaking ties with faster time controls just a few months back in the 2016 World Championship. Meanwhile, most fans generally accept it as the best way to resolve a tie in an Open.

And since this was a three-way tie for first place, David Anton Guijarro, who had the best TPR, was seeded directly into the finals. He took the opportunity to gain some sage advice from two legends of the sport.

Yu and Hikaru began with the rapid games.

The Chinese barely put any pressure on Black when he had the white pieces. In the return game, Nakamura maneuvered his queen from d1-d2-c1-a1 to put pressure on the long diagonal and almost netted a win. But the Chinese defended tenaciously and saved the point.

Yu Yangyi feeling the heat

In the blitz tiebreaker, Nakamura grabbed space on the kingside and squeezed the life out of Yu. Nakamura kept finding the right maneuvers, never mind the ticking clock, and won the game. Meanwhile, with black, he defended calmly against a Scotch and was holding a draw, which would have been enough. However, a frustrated Yu overpressed and lost anyway.

And then there were two…

It's a full house!

In the 2016 edition, David Anton had been beaten by Hikaru in the final round to qualify for the playoffs where he went on to beat MVL to win the tourney. Life had come full circle in a year for the young Spaniard who took on the same opponent once again, this time in a playoff.

The H-Bomb explodes!

David achieved a pleasant position with white in the first rapid game and was in cruise control but Hikaru defended actively and held a draw. In the second rapid game, Hikaru built up a huge advantage with white and was toying with David's position. He finished with a cute tactic to win the Gibraltar Masters for the fourth time, the third time in succession.

2008, 2015, 2016, 2017: Hikaru Nakamura — the King of Gibraltar.

The @GibraltarChess open was superb as usual. Despite my own doubts about some pairings, everything was done 100% correctly and by the book

— Hikaru Nakamura (@GMHikaru) February 3, 2017

Hikaru speaks about his performance

Hilarious Out-takes from Gibraltar Masters — Premature Attackulation:

The term 'Premature' was all the rage among the top-players of Gibraltar.

Pairings and results of Round 10

Top final ranking (after ten rounds)

Games round 1 - 10