tag: Biel 2013 - Page 1

Tiebreaks: Vachier -Lagrave wins Biel 2013

8/2/2013 – With four players finishing equal in the Biel GM tournament, tiebreaks were required. The semi-finals blitz games were won by Alexander Moiseenko and Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, who knocked out Etienne Bacrot and Ding Liren respectively. In the rapid chess final Vachier-Lagrave won the first game and drew the second to take the title. Final report with an interview with the winner.

Biel R10: Tiebreak with four players!

8/2/2013 – "Note that if Maxime Vachier-Lagrave beats Ding Liren and Etienne Bacrot draws Alexander Moiseenko, there will be tiebreaks with four players on Friday!" That is what we wrote in our previous report, and that is exactly what happened in the final round. The four will meet on Friday, with blitz knockout games in the semi-finals and rapid in the final. The action starts at 12:00 noon CEST.

Biel R09: Moiseenko wins, Ding Liren leads

7/31/2013 – The Biel scoring system awards three points for a win, one for a draw and zero for a loss. In the penultimate round Alexander Moiseenko beat Maxime Vachier-Lagrave in an impressive game and advanced to equal second with Etienne Bacrot. Ding Liren drew Ian Nepomniachtchi and is in the lead. With one round to go there are four players in contention for the title. Round nine report.

Biel R08: two wins, Ding catches Bacrot

7/31/2013 – "If you want to study endgames you should look at some of the games from this event," says commentator Danny King. In the French duel Bacrot vs Vachier-Lagrave the former hung on by the skin of his teeth, while Moiseenko went down to Nepomniachtchi – both in difficult rook and pawn endings. The most remarkable game, Rapport vs Ding Liren, is extensively commented by King and Ding.

Biel R07: A long and grueling day

7/29/2013 – That's what our commentator Daniel King calls round seven. The first game to end was Ding Liren vs Etienne Bacrot, a precarious draw in 57. Maxime Vachier-Lagrave almost blew it against Ian Nepomniachtchi, but finally sunk the putt after 66 moves. And Alexander Moiseenko needed 75 moves to bring down youngster Richard Rapport, who surprised him with a flashy defence. Round seven report.

Biel free day: Blitz and Youth tournaments

7/29/2013 – Sunday was a free day at the Chess Festival – the GM tournament continues on Monday with round seven. The day was spent with a giant blitz tournament, with 141 participants, and was duely won by 17-year-old GM Richard Rapport. Enchanting the youth chess tournaments, sponsored by the Swiss foundation Vinetum, played in three groups: U18, U13 and U10. As we said: enchanting.

Biel R06: Ding Liren beats, overtakes Moiseenko

7/27/2013 – Yesterday the Ukrainian GM Alexander Moiseenko was in second place, half a point behind Etienne Bacrot. Today he played an inaccuracy on move 31 against Chinese GM Ding Liren, who won the game after further errors in 40 moves. Now Ding has overtaken Moiseenko and his half a point behind the leader. You will find video analysis, postmortems and pictures our round six report.

Biel R05: Bacrot beat Rapport – narrowly

7/26/2013 – And Alexander Moiseenko narrowly avoided losing to the other Frenchman, Maxime Vachier-Lagrave. Etienne Bacrot played a super-sharp Botvinnik Variation against Richard Rapport, but the Hungarian's 17th move took the French GM by surprise. Bacrot fought for an advantage, relinquished it on move 23, and then got it back when Rapport blundered on the next move. Round five report.

Biel R04: Ding Liren beats Vachier-Lagrave

7/25/2013 – The other two games were each drawn in 35 moves, whild this game of the day lasted just 28 moves. It came to a head on move 18, when the French GM Maxime Vachier-Lagrave played an incautious knight move, which was thoroughly punished by his Chinese opponent. We have the games, results and video postmortems with the players in our round four report.

Biel R03: Three draws again

7/24/2013 – "In round three of the Biel GM tournament we saw caution, blunders and brilliance!" says Daniel King in his marvelous 3½-minute video summary of the day's events. This is a special service by the ChessBase team in Biel and is delivered just hours after the round has ended. In addition there are videos of the analysis sessions with the players, recorded immediately after the games. Round three report.

Biel R02: 3-0! All games decisive

7/23/2013 – Yesterday all the games were drawn, today all brought decisions: Etienne Bacrot beat Ding Linren with white, while Alexander Moiseenko and Maxime Vachier-Lagrave overcame Richard Rapport and Ian Nepomniachtchi with the black pieces. Our full report is now up, with pictures and video interviews with the players, and a video summary of the round by GM Daniel King.

Biel R01: All games fighting draws

7/22/2013 – One of today's games, Maxime Vachier-Lagrave vs Richard Rapport, ended after a repetition on move 22. A quick draw, right? Wrong, it was in fact a very interesting game that deserves to be looked at quite carefully. The other two draws are similarly not uninteresting by any standard. We bring you games, pictures, video analysis and interviews in big round one report.
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