The top 20:
1 Carlsen, Magnus NOR 2821
2 Anand, Viswanathan IND 2817
3 Aronian, Levon ARM 2805
4 Karjakin, Sergey RUS 2788
5 Kramnik, Vladimir RUS 2781
6 Ivanchuk, Vassily UKR 2768
7 Ponomariov, Ruslan UKR 2768
8 Topalov, Veselin BUL 2768
9 Nakamura, Hikaru USA 2766
10 Mamedyarov, Shakhriyar AZE 2765
11 Gashimov, Vugar AZE 2760
12 Gelfand, Boris ISR 2746
13 Grischuk, Alexander RUS 2746
14 Radjabov, Teimour AZE 2744
15 Kamsky, Gata USA 2741
16 Svidler, Peter RUS 2739
17 Jakovenko, Dmitry RUS 2736
18 Vitiugov, Nikita RUS 2733
19 Almasi, Zoltan HUN 2726
20 Vallejo Pons, Francisco ESP 2724
Former boy wonder, Sergey Karjakin, is surging toward the summit. He is now the top Russian player, edging former world champ Kramnik.
In a recent interview, Karjakin was asked the following question: “Two years ago, when you moved from Simferopol [Ukraine] to Moscow and changed both your citizenship and federation, you were 23rd on the rating list. Now you’re fourth in the world. Did you expect to make such quick progress?”
Karjakin replied: “That’s the result of productive work with my coaches — Yury Rafailovich Dohoyan and Alexander Motylev. In two years I’ve managed to achieve a lot and now I need to consolidate at the new level.”
Game of the week. In our featured partie, described by our annotator IM Malcolm Pein as a “Karjacking,” the world’s former number 2 played a dubious line of the Pirc — a very risky choice if one’s in a bad shape as Ivanchuk was in this tournament — and was crushed in just 22 moves.
Says Pein: “I was surprised to see Black’s eighth move as I had thought it refuted over 30 years ago. 8…Bg4 and 8…Rb8, keeping the option of Na6-b4 are better plans.”
GM Kevin Spraggett weighs in:
“Opening theory may change a lot through the years but there are some truths that can never really be challenged. It has been known since the 1960’s that the Yugoslav line against the…Pirc…is the strongest attacking line at White’s disposal.
“The Yugoslav line is characterized by White playing f4 early on. Not only does this strengthen his grip on the center squares, but White often threatens to push forward with f5 or e5, making Black’s life very uncomfortable. Black has a large number of counter-attacking options at his disposal, but things are not as simple as that: great precision and alertness are required of Black at his every move…
“Fischer, when he was younger, experimented with a number of attacking systems against the modern line , but once he discovered the Yugoslav line he stuck with it and scored a number of crushing wins with it. His games did much to popularize the variation. I personally have played this line from both sides of the board and I can tell you that one slip from Black and you not just lose, but you get crushed horribly!
“This is what happened to…Ivanchuk…who did not come to the game very well prepared.”
White: S. Karjakin (2776)
Black: V. Ivanchuk (2776)
Pirc Defense, Austrian Attack
Medias 2011
1.e4 d6 2.d4 Nf6 3.Nc3 g6 4.f4 Bg7 5.Nf3 0-0 6.Bd3 Na6 7.0-0 c5 8.d5 Nc7 9.a4 b6 10.Qe1 e6?! (10…Ba6 exchanging pieces looks a better plan and if 11.Qh4 Bxd3 12.cxd3 e6) 11.dxe6 fxe6 12.e5 Nfd5 13.Ne4 (Possibly Ivanchuk intended to improve on an old game which went 13.Ng5 dxe5 14.Qh4 h6 15.Bxg6 and now Ba6 is playable) 13…dxe5 14.fxe5 Bb7? (This probably loses 14…Nb4 15.Bg5 Nxd3 16.Qh4 Qd5 17.cxd3 is good for White) 15.Bg5 Qd7 16.Qh4 Nb4 17.Rad1 Qc6 18.Nf6+ Bxf6 19.exf6 Nxd3 20.Rxd3 Rf7 21.Qg3 is winning but there is a quicker win, see if you can find it. Answer: The game ended 19.Bxg6! hxg6 20.Bxf6 Rxf6 21.exf6 Rf8 22.Qg5 1-0.
Puzzler.
White: Ka5, Nb5, Qc1, Bd3, pawn on d4
Black: Kd5, Ne5, pawns on a6 and f3
White to play and mate in three moves.
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