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On Thursday, the first rest day in Wijk aan Zee, several of the players decided to get some exercise indoors, rather than brave a cold January day at a football pitch. Fortunately, there were some folks with cameras tagging along for the ride.
Keep your day jobs fellas!
Back at the board on Friday, both Magnus Carlsen and Jorden van Foreest scored their second wins of the week. The latter turned in a flashy but necessary move shortly before the time control at move 40:
"I wasn't even sure if it was a good move. I just played it because I didn't see anything else", van Foreest remarked after the game.
GM Daniel Fernandez looks at this and all the highlights of the day below.
Click or tap any result to jump to that game at live.chessbase.com
Carlsen's win against van Foreest in round five broke Magnus' streak of 21 draws in a row (in classical games) and seems to have inspired him to press for a win against the world number four (in the live ratings list), Shakhriyar Mamedyarov. He did get a little help from his opponent, it should be said. First of all, Carlsen arrived at the board about 11 minutes late, reportedly to avoid an annoying photographer. But after Carlsen made his first move with White, Mamedyarov deliberately waited a similar amount of time, equalising the clocks! An interesting, albeit bizarre, footnote to this game.
More critical to the outcome was what happened on the board. In a largely balanced game, Carlsen had two pieces for a rook in the ending but probably could not have won with accurate play. But Mamedyarov faltered, and Carlsen converted without difficulty.
Master Class Vol.8: Magnus Carlsen
Scarcely any world champion has managed to captivate chess lovers to the extent Carlsen has. The enormously talented Norwegian hasn't been systematically trained within the structures of a major chess-playing nation such as Russia, the Ukraine or China.
With this victory, Carlsen also strengthened his position as number one in the live world rankings, which had been in danger. Now at 2837.9 points, he is almost ten points ahead of Fabiano Caruana, who is on the sidelines with 2828. At the same time, he moved to the top of the standings, now sharing the lead with Ding Liren, Ian Nepomniachtchi and Anish Giri.
Nepomniachtchi's game against Vishy Anand was over quickly. After 22 moves the draw was signed.
Ding Liren was slightly better with White the whole game against Teimour Radjabov and tried tenaciously to develop this advantage. But Radjabov was able to even things out and after 75 moves a draw was agreed.
Anish Giri's victory in Round 6 is already his third (he lost in the first round to Nepomniachtchi) and remarkably all three wins have come with the black pieces. Duda went astray as early as the opening phase and underestimated the danger. After less than twenty moves, he had practically reached a lost position. The game continued for a while but Giri was eventually able to close the deal.
How many times have you been caught off guard by a seemingly inferior and unusual opening system that later turns out to be an especially strong one? Unorthodox openings can be a real asset to anyone’s opening repertoire and they often do not contain much theory, making them easy to master for your next important tournament.
Tactically and strategically rich was the game between Richard Rapport and Vladimir Kramnik. Kramnik took over the initiative quickly after the opening and had a promising position, but Rapport imaginatively defended himself. After numerous twists that lasted until the endgame, Kramnik finally tested Rapport in a king and rook against king and knight ending for 30 moves, forcing the Hungarian to demonstrate the correct defence. After 94 moves, Kramnik — who would badly like to score his first win of the tournament — nevertheless abandoned his attempts.
Jorden van Foreest versus Vladimir Fedoseev was the true highlight of the day. Fedoseev was aiming for a fraught game with Black judging from the opening and was within a few precise moves of a win in the middlegame. But Van Foreest hung tough and at a key moment, with little time left on the clock to boot, he found the strong tactical resource mentioned at the start that gave him an edge and, soon after, his second victory.
Play the Pirc like a Grandmaster Vol. 1: Positional lines
In the positional systems White does not try to refute the Pirc from the very first moves, but aims for a long strategic battle to prove that his space advantage and better development will finally give him the better position.
Vidit, who had two long and exhausting games against Carlsen and Fedoseev made it a short day against Sam Shankland, who also suffered a devastating defeat against Ding in Round 5. Just 18 moves were played in their draw.
IM Merijn van Delft covers the Round 6 highlights
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Commentary by Anna Rudolf and Lawrence Trent
In the Challengers, Vladislav Kovalev took over the sole lead with a win against Dinara Saduakassova. Now on 4½ out of 6, Kovalev is half a point ahead of Anton Korobov, who played to a draw with Evgeny Bareev. Tied with Korobov is Maksim Chigaev who converted a pawn-up endgame against Parham Maghsoodloo for his second win of the tournament.
Translation from German and additional reporting: Macauley Peterson
