6/15/2018 – Wesley So survived the third day of the Grand Chess Tour in Leuven, Belgium, without a loss and won the tournament confidently with 14 out of 18 possible points. Three points behind are Levon Aronian and Maxime Vachier-Lagrave. Tomorrow, the first nine of 18 rounds of blitz are on the program, and So must defend his lead against some legendary blitz specialists like Vachier-Lagrave, Karjakin, Nakamura and Grischuk. | Photo: Lennart Ootes, tournament page
new: Fritz 20
Your personal chess trainer. Your toughest opponent. Your strongest ally. FRITZ 20 is more than just a chess engine – it is a training revolution for ambitious players and professionals. Whether you are taking your first steps into the world of serious chess training, or already playing at tournament level, FRITZ 20 will help you train more efficiently, intelligently and individually than ever before.
Wesley So published two new opening DVDs: 1.b3, the so called Nimzo-Larsen-Attack, for White and his black secrets in the modern Italian. Get them in a package and save money!
For the first two days of the Leuven rapid tournament, Wesley So kept a firm grip on the top spot on the standings. He won four of his six games, with two draws and no losses. On the third day, one win and two draws were enough to keep him well ahead of his rivals.
Round 7
The seventh round brought So an additional '1' in the crosstable (worth 2 points in the standings). Wesley played with the black pieces against Hikaru Nakamura, who was in trouble right out of the opening: after only nine moves, Black was clearly better, and it wasn't long before So had a decisive advantage.
Not the way Nakamura hoped to start his afternoon | Photo: Lennart Ootes / Grand Chess Tour
So's closest rival after the seventh round was Levon Aronian, who had to play with White against Karjakin. In this important game, Aronian was too impatient and Karjakin capitalised.
With two rounds to go, So was now three points clear of Karjakin and four points clear of Aronian, Maxime Vachier-Lagrave and Shakhriyar Mamedyarov, and managed to secure his place in the standings for the third day already in round 8.
The Italian Game is considered a sound but quiet opening without early trades, giving rise to rich positions where plans are more important than forced variations. So shows black's plans on this DVD.
Round 8
So played with White against Karjakin and just needed a draw. With a well-known variant in the Catalan, he avoided any risk and easily succeeded. So he was three points ahead of Karjakin before the last round and had thus won the rapid portion. The rapid tournament in Leuven is just part of the story, however, as on Friday and Saturday, we will witness the blitz tournament which will determine the overall winner. The players will partake in a further double round-robin, this time with traditional scoring — one point for every win and a half point for a draw. Theoretically, each of the participants can score up to 18 points, and thus anyone has a chance of making up ground in the overall standings.
Round 9
Therefore, the ninth round remained contested as players jostled for position going into the blitz. Viswanathan Anand, with white against So decided that after two painful losses, a trouble-free draw was just fine. The pair played an exchange variation in the French and quickly exchanged off all the pieces until only opposite coloured bishops remained and they shook hands.
Aronian won with White against Maxime Vachier-Lagrave and Nakamura outplayed Mamedyarov with Black, bringing him up to 10 points.
This DVD offers a complete repertoire for handling this solid opening, often featuring a dynamic approach to pose the opponent more practical problems. Both of the main continuations 3...Nf6 and 3...Be7 are covered in two separate parts.
Mamedyarov is squarely in the middle of the pack | Photo: Lennart Ootes / Grand Chess Tour
Karjakin, however, suffered a setback against an old rival. He lost to Fabiano Caruana, who was already better after the opening and later in the game missed a flashy win, but in the end still managed to safely convert.
The great popularity of the Petroff Defence at the highest level has attracted general attention as strong players employ this opening with great success and with both colours. Unfortunately, the opinion of the Petroff as a sterile drawish opening seems to be firmly implanted in many minds. The author tries to dispel these myths and examines the most popular lines and provides a large number of ideas that will enable you to play Petroff successfully, with either colour.
On Friday, So will start with three points ahead of Aronian and Vachier-Lagrave in the blitz tournament. He has a good chance of winning overall in Leuven, not least considering that he has performed well in blitz of late, finishing first in the Norway Chess blitz opener. But at least Nakamura still believes in his chances to go in Leuven as the overall winner of the field and said confidently in the interview after his final round game:
"He's is not the best blitz here, simply put. There are several of us that are much better blitz players than Wesley."
Nakamura chats with Maurice Ashley at the conclusion of day three | StLChessClub YouTube
Round-up show
Rapid tournament final standings (with double point scoring)
All games
Commentary webcast
Commentary by Yasser Seirawan, Jovanka Houska, Alejandro Ramirez (St. Louis) Maurice Ashley and Nigel Short (Leuven)
Translation from German: Macauley Peterson
Correction: The headline initially misstated the number of points So leads by after round nine. It is three.
Johannes FischerJohannes Fischer was born in 1963 in Hamburg and studied English and German literature in Frankfurt. He now lives as a writer and translator in Nürnberg. He is a FIDE-Master and regularly writes for KARL, a German chess magazine focusing on the links between culture and chess. On his own blog he regularly publishes notes on "Film, Literature and Chess".
Throughout the video course, Sasikran shows various examples from his career to explain sacrifices for initiative, an attack, a better pawn structure and much more.
In this insightful video course, Grandmaster David Navara shares practical advice on when to calculate deeply in a position — and just as importantly, when not to.
The Trompowsky is especially suited for faster time controls as you don‘t have to memorise endless lines of theory, and you push your opponent out of their comfort zone after your second move.
Trompowsky Powerbook 2025 is based on 53,000 computer games from the engine room of playchess.com as well as 49,000 games from Mega and correspondence chess.
Trompowsky Powerbase 2025 is a database and contains a total of 8727 games from Mega 2025 and the Correspondence Database 2024, of which 316 are annotated.
2025 European Championship with a German double victory and analyses by Bluebaum, Svane, Rodshtein, Yuffa, Navara and many more. Opening videos by Engel, King and Marin. Training sections “The Fortress”, “The Trap” and “Fundamental Endgame Knowledge" etc.
Powerbook based on more than 618 000 games in which White already sidesteps the main variations of the Sicilian on move 2.
€9.90
We use cookies and comparable technologies to provide certain functions, to improve the user experience and to offer interest-oriented content. Depending on their intended use, analysis cookies and marketing cookies may be used in addition to technically required cookies. Here you can make detailed settings or revoke your consent (if necessary partially) with effect for the future. Further information can be found in our data protection declaration.
Pop-up for detailed settings
We use cookies and comparable technologies to provide certain functions, to improve the user experience and to offer interest-oriented content. Depending on their intended use, cookies may be used in addition to technically required cookies, analysis cookies and marketing cookies. You can decide which cookies to use by selecting the appropriate options below. Please note that your selection may affect the functionality of the service. Further information can be found in our privacy policy.
Technically required cookies
Technically required cookies: so that you can navigate and use the basic functions and store preferences.
Analysis Cookies
To help us determine how visitors interact with our website to improve the user experience.
Marketing-Cookies
To help us offer and evaluate relevant content and interesting and appropriate advertisement.