Carlsen does it again!

Carlsen wipes out a fourth opponent in six rounds. This time it was Gelfand who fell foul of Carlsen's power.
Ivanchuk drew both games and has been overtaken by the Norwegian in the overall standings.

In Friday's Blindfold games there were four White wins.

One of these was Carlsen's win over Gelfand and another, more surprising, was Smeets's over Kramnik.

Carlsen had again caught Ivanchuk (who drew) in the battle for first place in the overall standings. However it seems that Carlsen is the king of Blindfold chess with a full point more than his closest rival.

Vassily Ivanchuk (3.5)UKR27480.5-0.5Ruslan Ponomariov (2.5)UKR2748
Peter Svidler (2.5)RUS27500-1Alexander Grischuk (3.5)RUS2756
Sergey Karjakin (2.5)RUS27251-0Leinier Dominguez Perez (0.5)CUB2713
Levon Aronian (1.5)ARM27821-0Vugar Gashimov (2.5)AZE2740
Jan Smeets (1)NED26511-0Vladimir Kramnik (2.5)RUS2790
Magnus Carlsen (4)NOR28131-0Boris Gelfand (3.5)ISR2750
A sweet win for Smeets.
© official site.

In the day's rapid games, Karjakin won with Black against the hapless Dominguez who is out of sorts and stuck firmly at the bottom of the table.

Ivanchuk drew again against his compatriot, and thus adds 0.5 to his rapid total, but with Kramnik winning he is no longer in the sole lead in rapidplay.

Alexander Grischuk (2)RUS27560.5-0.5Peter Svidler (3)RUS2750
Ruslan Ponomariov (2)UKR27480.5-0.5Vassily Ivanchuk (4)UKR2748
Leinier Dominguez Perez (1.5)CUB27130-1Sergey Karjakin (2)RUS2725
Vugar Gashimov (2.5)AZE27400.5-0.5Levon Aronian (2)ARM2782
Vladimir Kramnik (3.5)RUS27901-0Jan Smeets (1)NED2651
Boris Gelfand (3.5)ISR27500-1Magnus Carlsen (3)NOR2813

By winning both games, Carlsen outpaced Ivanchuk and now has the overall lead.

The battle for third place is hotting up with three players on 7/12.

Aronian is well down the field in tenth after finishing first in the previous two editions.

RankingSeedNameCountryRatingRapidplay TotalBlindfold TotalOverall Total
11Magnus CarlsenNOR2813459
27Vassily IvanchukUKR27484.548.5
3=2Vladimir KramnikRUS27904.52.57
3=4Alexander GrischukRUS27562.54.57
3=6Boris GelfandISR27503.53.57
610Sergey KarjakinRUS272533.56.5
75Peter SvidlerRUS27503.52.56
8=9Ruslan PonomariovUKR27482.535.5
8=8Vugar GashimovAZE274032.55.5
103Levon AronianARM27822.52.55
1212Jan SmeetsNED2651123
1111Leinier Dominguez PerezCUB27131.50.52

For more information official tournament site


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