Moscow Grand Prix R02: Chinese lead

The time control in the GP tournaments is 100 minutes for the first 40 moves, 50 minutes for the next 20 moves and then 15 minutes for the rest of the game plus an additional 30 seconds per move starting from move one.

The Grand Prix returns to the Telegraph Building in central Moscow, which previously hosted the 2016 Candidates Tournament won by Sergey Karjakin of Russia.

The tournament, a nine round Swiss contest, is the second of four Grand Prix in 2017 and follow’s the Sharjah Grand Prix in February which was won by Alexander Grischuk, Maxime Vachier-Lagrave and Shakhriyar Mamedyarov in a three way tie.

The Moscow Grand Prix is sponsored by Kaspersky Lab, PhosAgro and EG Capital Partners.

Each round starts at 2PM (GMT +3).

Round 2 on 2017/05/13 at 14:00

All photos by Max Avdeev

Let's start with the bad:

Sutovsky, ACP President, maybe has hit the nail on the head: A virus is going around and it follows the players around the Grand Prix series. This is, at least for me, more comforting than so many players simply lacking fighting spirit.

Grischuk and Tomashevsky agreed to draw in 12 moves for no discernible reason. Svidler offered a draw on move 16 with White against a lower rated opponent, Salem Saleh, presumably because he felt his position was already slightly worse. He might've been right, but Salem didn't give declining the offer a second thought. Nakamura put no pressure at all on Radjabov who sealed their draw on move 18.

Salem starts with two quick draws in Moscow, arguably better than starting with two losses as he did in Sharjah.
Arguably because at least the losses were learning experiences...

Even Gelfand, a great chess fighter, seems to have been infected:

Gelfand didn't torture his opponent with the two bishops

Of course, not every game was boring. Hou Yifan playing against MVL on the top board was only marginally more exciting, though. MVL might have come under just a bit of pressure out of the opening, but once he solved his problems he forced liquidation into a drawn endgame.

Yifan tried to put some pressure, but MVL equalized almost immediately.
It is unclear who made the first move, unfortunately.

Adams and Giri played an exciting game, in which Giri's pawn sacrifice to open up his light squared bishop gave him a good position. The battle was tense and it culminated in an unusual perpetual check.

One of the most interesting games today

Next we have the two decisive games. Nepomniachtchi used a Pirc Defense to play for the win against Jon Ludvig Hammer, trying to recover from yesterday's loss. He did so very successfully, and he simply proved that he was the better player. Hammer lacked ideas from the opening and once Black stabilized his position, he went on the offensive and won easily.

Another interesting game was the duel between Ding Liren and Ernesto Inarkiev, all of which spawned from a curious opening idea:

Ding Liren played a fine game today to tie Yifan for the lead

The other super long game of the day featured another opposite colored bishop endgame with rooks. Spain's Vallejo Pons was on the offensive, while India's Harikrishna was again fighting for his life. Again, Hari was able to pull it off, as the Spaniard was unable to find the correct winning plan after a grueling battle.

As a curious side note, Harikrishna has played seven (!) times more moves than Grischuk has after only two rounds of chess (23 by Grischuk and 174 by Harikrishna).

Vallejo missed a big chance today to play his first decisive game
in the Grand Prix series (he scored nine draws in Sharjah)

Grischuk was interviewed yesterday about his game, and he admitted to being under the weather (due to bad weather!) and the reason for his draw. Presumably, it is the same reason today:

Naturally, since this is a Swiss tournament, the two leaders will face each other on board one. Yifan will repeat White in a crucial round three for both players.

Round two games

Standings after two rounds

Round Three Pairings

Live Commentary

AGON is offering exclusive pay-per-view video of the games and live commentary. It comes in three packages: a one-time $10 fee just for Moscow GP, a full package of all the events in the World Championship cycle for $30, and a $250 package, which is the same as the $30 Base but comes with signed posters from each event.

For more information, see the widget on the main page.

Links Official tournament site Replay all games 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 14 or any of our Fritz compatible chess programs.