The Chess Mind

Having mentioned both a completed and an upcoming (ok, freshly started) event, let's return to an actually ongoing contest, the annual rapid & blindfold super-tournament in Nice. Yesterday's round saw a paucity of decisive results, but a bit more blood was spilled in today's action. In the blindfold games, Anand defeated Carlsen while Morozevich beat Ivanchuk, and in the rapid games Carlsen took his revenge while Aronian beat Topalov. Those rapid results were quite important in the battle for first. Anand's blindfold win put him in a tie for first with Aronian in the combined standings, but after the rapid Aronian retook the sole lead, and by a full point.

All the games can be replayed on the tournament site, while the Anand-Carlsen games and the rapid draw between van Wely and Kramnik are here, with my brief comments.



Leading Blindfold Standings:

1. Morozevich 5
2-5. Kramnik, Anand, Topalov, Carlsen 4

Leading Rapid Standings:

1. Aronian 5.5
2-3. Leko, Anand 4

Overall Standings:

1. Aronian 9
2. Anand 8
3-5. Leko, Kramnik, Carlsen 7.5
6-8. Topalov, Ivanchuk, Morozevich 7
9. Karjakin 6.5
10. Mamedyarov 6
11-12. Gelfand, van Wely 5.5

Day 8 Pairings: (Surprisingly, they're playing on Easter. Eric Liddell is turning over in heaven.)

Aronian - Anand
Carlsen - Mamedyarov
Karjakin - Topalov
van Wely - Leko
Gelfand - Morozevich
Ivanchuk - Kramnik

(The first-named player has White in the blindfold game and Black in the rapid.)