Tal Memorial Rd9 – Carlsen takes title in record event

Seventh Tal Memorial in Moscow The event is a ten-player round robin event, is taking place from June 8th to 18th in the Pashkov House (Vozdvizhenka Street 3/5, p.1), Moscow, Russia. Rest days are June 11 and 15. Time control: 100 minutes for the first 40 moves, 50 minutes for the next 20 moves, and 15 minutes for the rest of the game, with an increment of 30 seconds per move starting from move one. Games start at 15:00h local time (last round 13:00h). Draw offers are not allowed until after the first time control. The participants are required to comment on their games in the press center after each round. The prize fund is 100,000 Euros.

Round nine

Dedicated videographers and photographers capture the opening moments

After so many dramatic twists and turns, the Tal Memorial finally ended, and possibly with a genuine record. No doubt the masters of such lists can confirm or debunk it, but with only nine rounds and ten players, five different sole leaders is quite probably a first, at least in a GM round robin.

Three players had clear chances, and though Fabiano Caruana had a half point lead, he also had the toughest opponent: Levon Aronian. It was his poor luck that he fell into some prime home preparation by the world number two, and was unable to salvage a disintegrating position.

Annotated game by GM Gilberto Milos

While Teimour Radjabov drew with Hikaru Nakamura to draw level with Caruana, Magnus Carlsen took complete advantage of his last and best chance to lay claim to the crown. In a game that was nearly a model of how to exploit Luke McShane’s opening choice, he left the Brit no chance to complicate the game, and outplayed him quite thoroughly to take clear first and thus become the fifth and last sole leader.

Alexander Grischuk looks down, seated next to his daughter and wife, WGM Natalia Zhukova

Alexander Grischuk had a chance of lifting himself past the 50% mark, when he built a very large advantage in his endgame against Evgeny Tomashevsky, but a mistake on the 40th move dashed this hope away and a draw was agreed shortly after.

The longest game was between the two previous leaders: Vladimir Kramnik and Alexander Morozevich, both who were trying to recover from a series of painful losses that had dropped them from hero to the break even point. Kramnik emerged with an extra pawn in the endgame, but Morozevich’s active pieces made the task of converting a tough one, and eventually his resourcefulness saved the game.

Teimour Radjabov (3rd), Magnus Carlsen (1st) and Fabiano Caruana (2nd)

Complete round nine games

Tal Memorial 2012 Round nine Play of the Day by Daniel King: McShane - Carlsen

Pictures by Eteri Kublashvili

Final standings

Schedule and Results

Links Official tournament site + video clips All games in PGN The games are being broadcast live on the official web site and on the chess server Playchess.com. If you are not a member you can download a free Playchess client there and get immediate access. You can also use ChessBase 11 or any of our Fritz compatible chess programs.

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