Wesley So Wins London Chess Classic 2016 and Grand Chess Tour 2016 Titles

It’s a proud moment for Wesley So. He ends the year on a high note.

This, after Wesley So drew his final round game against Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, while his closest contender for the London title, Fabiano Caruana, settled for draws as well against Anish Giri.

London Chess Classic 2016 Round 9 Results

[csvtable file=”http://chesshive.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/london-2016-round-9-results.csv”]

Interesting to note that Veselin Topalov finally scored a win against Levon Aronian in Round 9. He’s not going home scoreless after all, although at the bottom of the ranking nonetheless.

Replay all Round 9 games below:[replay]

Sinquefield Cup 2016 Awarding Ceremony Pictures

Check out the pictures taken during the Sinquefield Cup 2016 awarding (closing) ceremony:

Photos credit: Lennart Ootes: Website | Twitter

Leuven Rapid Day 2: An Impressive 4/4 Performance by Carlsen

The rapid rounds are over for the Grand Chess Tour 2016: Your Next Move in Leuven, Belgium. A great performance was posted by the world champion, Magnus Carlsen, as he won all of his 4 games against three of the former world champions: Veselin Topalov, Viswanathan Anand, and Vladimir Kramnik, plus Anish Giri. In the process, he clinched the top spot with 18 rounds of blitz games to go in the tournament.

Chessbase:

If day one of the rapid games in Leuven was full of surprises, day two was no less so, though thankfully not due to record numbers of blunders. Vishy Anand started the day with a win, but after two losses lost the lead as he was caught up by Wesley So. In the meantime, Magnus Carlsen showed he was back and managed to win the rapid phase after a fabulous 4/4.

The final crosstable of the rapid games follows:

Grand Chess Tour Paris 2016 Blitz Day 1 Results and Standings

After the first round robin blitz games (9 games), Carlsen led with 7 points, ahead of Nakamura by half a point. See standings below:

# Name Pts SB
1 Carlsen, Magnus 7.0 30.25
2 Nakamura, Hikaru 6.5 24.50
3 Caruana, Fabiano 5.5 20.00
4 Aronian, Levon 5.0 20.50
5 Vachier-Lagrave, Maxime 4.5 20.50
Kramnik, Vladimir 4.5 16.50
Giri, Anish 4.5 15.25
8 So, Wesley 3.0 12.75
9 Topalov, Veselin 2.5 11.75
10 Fressinet, Laurent 2.0 6.50

Replay the games played so far (Rounds 1-9 of Blitz games): Grand Chess Tour Paris 2016 – Blitz Round.

Blitz games Day 2

The countdown is done. You may catch the games LIVE: Grand Chess Tour Paris 2016 Blitz Games

Photo courtesy of the Grand Chess Tour.