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Cover Story / 2014 Sinquefield Cup Need another good indicator of the


I changed Federations [from U.S. to Italy] in 2005. At the time I was promising but nothing special—2300 more or less. I had a choice since I have two passports and the idea was that since I am living in Europe, I should play for Italy, closer to home.


The Italians have given me support throughout the years, though at the start it wasn’t much. The Federation doesn’t have a huge budget but they do what they can; they actually have a budget for the best players. Now the Italians give me a fee which helps cover my training which helps me to play a lot throughout the year. They also give some money for the Olympiad and the European teams; they support me.


The U.S. Chess Federation never gave me support when I was playing for the U.S.— although maybe they had no reason to.


In 2007 I went to Hungary, with my family; there I worked with Alexander Chernin. All my coaches contributed in some way to shaping me as a player. My first coach was Bruce Pandolfini, who is American and after that they have all been Russian. I inherited their work ethic which is pretty good; if there is one way to play chess it is probably like the Russians.


In 2009 the Caruana family moved to Lugano, the Swiss city on the border with Italy.


It was only 10 minutes by car across the border and we were close to the Federation in Milano, just an hour’s drive right to the Federation [headquarters] which was nice.


At the end of 2010 Caruana began training with Vladimir Chuchelov, his Belgium-based current coach. At first Chuchelov mostly worked with Caruana when they were together at tournaments but more recently the relationship has become full-time.


I don’t like to work alone so much. If I am working alone I’ll do a bit but I am not very motivated. But I still try to keep on.


When I am working with Chuchelov it could be six hours a day. But again it depends, sometimes we work on Skype for a couple of hours. When we have a session together we work most of the day. We are usually talking every day about something—sometimes less, sometimes more.


When not playing chess, Caruana mentioned a range of interests.


I love movies—I wanted to go to the theatre in St. Louis but never got around to it.


I don’t play sports like Magnus but if there is


a pool I swim a lot. I played squash a couple of years ago; now I am into swimming; it is not so easy to find a squash court.


I have a lot of chess books but nowadays I don’t really read chess books. I have no interest in opening books—but there are some books that interest me; Kasparov’s My Great Predecessors and Revolution in the 70s. That series of books was great to read, but not much interesting comes out. I read the occasional novel.


I am also very interested in what’s going on in chess politics but it doesn’t directly affect me. Well, OK, the [FIDE] election was a big thing. It would have changed chess life for everyone—not just top players, not just Magnus. It would have completely reshaped how things are run—well, maybe. But what can you do?—it’s not a great situation at the moment.


So where does Caruana see his chess career heading?


My short term goal is to get into the top two places in the Grand Prix and qualify for the Candidates tournament. It’s a long way ahead—2016—but the qualification process has already started so it is time to get ready for that.


Do you feel pressure that everyone will expect you to play like you played here?


I think people are pretty surprised and wondering if I can keep up the good results but nobody expects that. I don’t expect it either; I don’t think it’s really possible.


I will see what I can do if I can get into the Candidates tournament. I can qualify for that, I am pretty sure. And if I play like I did here then I can win the Candidates as well.


Becoming world champion that is everyone’s ambition. I might come to the realization [that it is not going to happen] at some point, but at the moment I think I do have chances.


However there was one question about which Caruana felt uncertain—whether or not he could see himself at some time returning to play for the United States.


I’ve been asked that nearly every day I have been here.


I can’t say too much about it. People obviously have interest in me playing for the U.S.—I am sure a lot of people want to see it. At the moment there is nothing concrete and there are definitely reasons to stay with Italy.


~ GM Ian Rogers


unexpectedness and rarity of “the streak”? Caruana grew up in the United States and competed in many national scholastic championships, which are all seven rounds. He was playing against kids, not 2800s. Though he won several titles, never once he did go 7-0. At the closing press conference, I asked


each of his five opponents to encapsulate Caruana’s tournament in a single word:


GM Hikaru Nakamura—“Fantastico.” GM Veselin Topalov—“Memorable.” GM Maxime Vachier-Lagrave—“Ruthless.” GM Levon Aronian—“Surprising.”


And the world champion? Carlsen broke


from the others by smiling large and offering an acerbic but candid re sponse— “Depressing.” The answer brought down the house. Carlsen had guessed early in the event


that Caruana would soon become his main challenger. Perhaps he didn’t know how soon his prediction would prove correct. Out of 1000+ worldwide grandmasters, Carlsen only has one grandmaster between him and Caruana alphabetically, but there are now zero grandmasters separating the two on the rating list. The tournament winner firmly took over the world number two position after augmenting his rating 35 points and halving the buffer between the world’s top two players. The other five players, with the possible


exception of Topalov, can be summed up by the following evaluation—disappointing. The only difference is a matter of degree. Carlsen (51


⁄2 /10) failed to finish at least


+2 for the first time in several years, although a last round draw secured clear second. He had to also worry about the world championship contract deadline, which changed three times. He eventually signed after the tournament ended. “I'm focused on the tournament now,”


he said early in the event. “Other people are focused on the world championship,” he added, probably referring to both his management team and the chess public at large. Let’s give closer scrutiny to Caruana’s


string of wins and also examine the results of his opponents, which of course were closely and usually inversely intertwined. (All quotes after the round numbers are from Caruana.)


ROUND 1: “I WOULD HAVE BEEN HAPPY WITH A DRAW BEFORE THE GAME.” The carnage spanned two Wednesdays.


Topalov became the first victim after a failed idea to relocate his dark-squared bishop. The exotic plan beginning with 17. g4 backfired quickly. Both players’ bishops


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