International Events / 2016 Wijk aan Zee
be suffering,” explained Carlsen. 12. Rad1 Ng6
“A little bit dubious,” said Carlsen. “12. ...
Ng6 is a normal plan but after he acquires the doubled pawns it becomes that much harder to dislodge the knight from e5.”
13. Bxg6! hxg6 14. Bxd6 Qxd6 15. Ne5
Nxg6 fxg6 20. Qxg6+ is not enough because of my stupid pawn on h3.) 19. ... Nxe5 20. Rxf4! and I can’t see what he can do,” said Carlsen. During the post-mortem, Carlsen realized that he had overlooked the defense 20. ... g5!? but soon realized that 21. dxe5 Qxe5 22. Rg4 would be good for White, e.g. 22. ... f6 23. Nf3 Qxe3+ 24. Kh1 Rf7 25. Re1 Qf2 26. Rxe6 and White crashes through.
19. Qh4
24. ... Rab8 25. b3 a5 Most of Tomashevsky’s time disappeared
with this move as he realized that his queenside pawns cannot be held.
26. Rc7 a4 27. bxa4 Ba8 28. a5 Rb7 29. Rxc5 Ra7 30. Nc4, Black resigned.
A surprising moment to resign, but with 10
moves to go before the time control and White soon to redeploy his h4-rook, Tomashevsky did not see why he should prolong his suffering.
The final games of the 13 round marathon
event saw Carlsen running on “low energy” and later admitting “if Caruana had kept pace more I would have had to take more risks but as it went I was happy to keep my undefeated score.” Carlsen equalled Viswanathan Anand’s
15. ... g5 “Black’s problem is that I just want to play
f2-f4, then put a queen on h4 and a knight on g5 and mate him,” said Carlsen. “If 15. ... Ne4 I simply reply 16. f4 when it is still very hard to dislodge my e5-knight.”
16. f4!? “Here I became very excited about the
possibility of starting an attack and I just went for it,” said Carlsen.
16. ... gxf4 17. Rf1!
19. ... Qd8 “Now I believe that the position is just lost,”
suggested Carlsen. 19. ... fxe3 20. Rxf6 exd2 21. Rxd2 now leads to a winning attack for White but “I thought he should play 19. ... Nh7 when after 20. Rxf4 g5 21. Qg3 f6 I don’t see anything for White,” explained Carlsen. “So I would play 20. exf4 when White is clearly better. At some point he will need to play ... f7-f6 when my knight comes to g6, but it is still a game.”
20. Rxf4 Ne4? A move passed over without comment by
Carlsen, but he may have underestimated 20. ... cxd4! 21. exd4 and only now 21. ... Ne4!. Since the exchanges in the game would now lead to nothing for White, Carlsen would be forced to keep queens on the board and keep playing for an attack, which in Tomashevsky’s time trouble would have been hard to handle even if objectively Black should survive.
17. ... Nd7? “In lines such as 17. ... fxe3! 18. Rxf6! there
isn’t really that much to calculate,” admitted Carlsen, “since White will always have a draw and it feels like there should be more. Maybe he has a way to save himself, but I wasn’t so sure.” It took only seven minutes before Tomashevsky decided to decline the offer and trust Carlsen, although 18. ... exd2! 19. Qh5 gxf6 is critical and White’s rook seems just too slow to enter the attack with decisive effect, meaning that White will sooner or later have to take the perpetual check.
18. Qh5 Nf6 “After 18. ... g6 19. Qh6! (The followup 19.
21. Nxe4 Qxh4 22. Rxh4 dxe4 23. dxc5 bxc5
record of five Wijk aan Zee titles, a feat the prodigious Norwegian has managed from just eight attempts in a nine-year period. The World Champion seems to have
recovered completely from his slump during much of 2015, confessing “I’m happy that I am just playing decently again and it’s not just a mess in every game.” Caruana finished tied for second place with
Chinese rising star Ding Liren after Caruana’s last-round gamble to catch Carlsen had back- fired. After 10 of the 13 rounds Caruana had closed to within half a point of the lead but then came a lucky break for Carlsen.
CARLSEN’S LUCKY BREAK GM Magnus Carlsen (FIDE 2844, NOR) GM Yifan Hou (FIDE 2673, CHN) Tata Steel Chess 2016 (11), Wijk aan Zee, North Holland, 01.29.2016
AFTER 44. Qc3 Carlsen was making no progress against the
world’s strongest female player Yifan Hou when Hou suffered a brain fade. Hou could have had an easy draw by keeping
24. Rd7 “Now White has complete domination,” said
Carlsen.
queens on the board with 44. ... d4 but instead headed for the trickiest of all endgames, a king and pawn ending, by playing ...
44. ... Qxc3+? 45. Kxc3 Hou still had no idea her position now hung
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