8/14/2019 – Levon Aronian won the Saint Louis Rapid & Blitz tournament despite losing his last round game against former leader Maxime Vachier-Lagrave. The French grandmaster ended up sharing second place with Yu Yangyi and Ding Liren — the Chinese duo had a strong showing at the blitz, as they got the best scores in the last two days of action (11½ out of 18, the same score obtained by Sergey Karjakin). World champion Magnus Carlsen finished in sixth place but still leads the overall GCT standings. Express report. | Photo: Austin Fuller / Grand Chess Tour
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Aronian outlasts Vachier-Lagrave
Back in 2017, at the semi-finals of the World Cup in Tbilisi, Levon Aronian eliminated Maxime Vachier-Lagrave in a thrilling Armageddon finale, thus stopping the Frenchman from reaching the Candidates Tournament. In Saint Louis, the Armenian also surpassed his colleague (and friend) in the final day of Blitz. Aronian caught up with the then-leader in round twelve and took advantage of Vachier-Lagrave's three straight losses in rounds 14-16 to take the lead.
The eventual winner of the event reached the final round a point ahead of Yu Yangyi and 1½ points ahead of Vachier-Lagrave and Ding Liren. 'MVL' in fact defeated Aronian, but Yu Yangyi only drew tail-ender Shakhriyar Mamedyarov, which meant the Armenian finished in first place half a point ahead of Vachier-Lagrave and the two Chinese players (Ding Liren also won in round eighteen).
Sergey Karjakin finished in fifth place, after scoring 11½/18 in the Blitz.
Games and commentary
The blitz tournament is a double round-robin with players receiving 5 minutes per player per game, with a time delay of 3 seconds per move.
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Live commentary by GM Yasser Seirawan, GM Maurice Ashley and WGM Jennifer Shahade from 18:00 UTC (20:00 CEST, 14:00 EDT)
Results of Rounds 9-18
Click or tap any result to open the game via Live.ChessBase.com.
Final standings
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Final rapid standings
The rapid tournament scoring system is 2 points for a win and 1 point for a draw.
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