Agencies

Nice (France), Mar 27: With two draws in the eleventh and final round Levon Aronian has won the 11th Amber Blindfold and Rapid Tournament. The Armenian grandmaster, who also triumphed in last year’s Amber, survived scary moments in his blindfold game against Veselin Topalov and next comfortably drew the rapid game to take the title.

Second place was shared by Vishy Anand and Vladimir Kramnik. The World Champion defeated Wang Yue 1½-½, while his predecessor routed Peter Leko 2-0.

In the blindfold competition three players shared first place. Magnus Carlsen, who had long dominated the competition, lost his last game and this allowed Levon Aronian and Vladimir Kramnik to catch up with him.

The rapid competition also ended in a three-way tie for first. This year the best rapid players were Vishy Anand, Levon Aronian and Gata Kamsky.

 Levon Aronian won the Amber Blindfold and Rapid Tournament for the second time.

Alexander Morozevich didn’t achieve anything tangible from the opening in his blindfold game against Gata Kamsky. However, he got a sizable advantage once they reached a queen and knight ending. The white pieces coordinated much better and soon Morozevich was a pawn up. This passed b-pawn proved unstoppable.

The rapid game ended in a draw after the game had more or less been in balance throughout the game. Perhaps the one moment that deserved attention occurred after 35 moves. Here Black had the possibility of 35...Nc6, with the point 36.Nxc4 Nxd4, but when Morozevich missed that opportunity the game fizzled out to a draw.

Sergey Karjakin was delighted with his win in the blindfold against Vasily Ivanchuk. Apart from a win in a blitz game this was only the first time he defeated his experienced compatriot (remember his resigned reaction after he lost against Ivanchuk in Wijk aan Zee: ‘I always lose against him’). It was also the first time he played 1.d4 against him. Ivanchuk reacted with the double-edged Benoni and a sharp game ensued. Karjakin was clearly better or even winning, until he spoiled his advantage. The ending of queen versus rook and bishop should be a draw, but when Black blundered 68...f4, a move that essentially doomed the pawn, White was winning again. But it took time and while the players worked on their 111 move epic, their colleagues sat waiting for the second session, which started with a 30-minute delay. The final mistake of Ivanchuk (in a lost position) was 111.c6. He believed that at that point his queen was on c1, but he soon found out it was on e1 and resigned.

Karjakin was all smiles after the rapid game, because he won again. Ivanchuk followed the game Topalov-Aronian, but Karjakin deviated with 13...e5, looking for counterplay. Karjakin admitted that in the next phase Ivanchuk, who rattled off his moves, outplayed him, but he kept looking for practical chances. On move 37, Ivanchuk could have dealt a deadly blow with 37.R4c7, but having missed Black reply he played the weak 37.Rd1. Ivanchuk’s last blunder was 49.Be4+. Said Karjakin: ‘He should have put it on f1 and I can never win.’

Vladimir Kramnik started the day with a crushing victory over Peter Leko in the blindfold game. In fact he used quite an important novelty to score this win. ‘I decided to use it as I am still fighting for the top places,’ the Russian grandmaster said. He had analysed it a long time ago, before the San Luis World Championship Tournament, and might have used it for his match against Anand. Fortunately for him he didn’t analyze it during that match as in that case he could not have used it to surprise his former second Leko. In fact Kramnik had already played it in a blitz game, but as that game was published in a corrupted way it must have escaped his colleagues’ attention. The new move was 15.Re1, which according to Kramnik ‘opens a new field for analysis’. Leko reacted in ‘the most natural manner’, but couldn’t prevent that, facing such problems in a blindfold game, he ended up in a lost position. After 27.Ne2 Kramnik saw no defence for Black. His home preparation ended with move 28.Ng3.
After the rapid game Kramnik was happy that he had won the mini-match with Leko, but at the same time he found it difficult to enjoy his second win. ‘He was playing so passively.

There was a point when I considered offering a draw, but when he was going back with all his pieces I was forced to play on.’ Kramnik criticized the tepid 11.Nc4 and 12.Nb6 and suggested 11.a4 with a white edge, and felt that after 23...d5 the position for White was already very difficult. The rest, till the moment he resigned on move 43, was suffering for Leko.

The blindfold game between Veselin Topalov and Levon Aronian was a close shave for the Armenian tournament leader. In a decent position Aronian made a grave mistake with 24...b6 where he should have played 24...Rbc8. Topalov immediately struck with 25.Nxe6 and now Black was lost. But the game wasn’t over yet. Or as Aronian put it: ‘Then he was winning. But he didn’t see it and I escaped, as usual.’

In the rapid game Aronian secured tournament victory with a brief draw in 17 moves. Once Black had equalized Topalov offered a draw, and that was an offer Aronian had no wish to refuse.

Wang Yue seemed well on his way to a major upset when in the blindfold against Vishy Anand he sacrificed a piece for a dangerous initiative. The sacrifice was correct, but Wang Yue was also very low on time (after 24 moves he had less than 2 minutes against 18 for Anand) and in the next phase Anand took over the initiative and got excellent winning chances. His problem was that he ended up in an endgame of two knights against king and pawn. There were two instances that he was winning (as endgame specialist John Nunn pointed out with the help of the tablebases), but these moments came and went without the players really noticing. Anand tried for a long time, but gave up his attempts after 85 moves: ‘I managed to make more than 40 legal moves, I don’t think it’s winning.’ That was right, it wasn’t anymore.
In the rapid game Anand had a nagging edge all through the game and the question was whether it was going to be enough or not. In any case it was very unpleasant to play for Black and in the end Wang Yue indeed succumbed to the pressure.

The blindfold game between Teimour Radjabov and Magnus Carlsen took a dramatic turn when in an approximately equal position the Norwegian erred with 29...Rd6. After White’s answer 30.Ra3 he suddenly realized that his queen was trapped and that she could only be freed at the cost of a piece. Obviously Radjabov was completely winning now, but he slightly complicated his task by dropping his f7 pawn with 43.f7, where 43.f3 would have ended any black resistance. But the position remained winning for White and after 54 moves Carlsen resigned, a couple of moves away from mate. In the rapid game Carlsen had his revenge. Gradually he managed to get a better position and when Radjabov went astray with 35...Nc6, White won a piece and the game.