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Three of the Super GM’s who belong in the Top 10 of the FIDE Ratings List represent the United States of America. They are Fabiano Caruana, Hikaru Nakamura and Wesley So.

Magnus Carlsen keeps winning in Bilbao Masters Final 2016 Round 4

After four rounds and twelve games in Bilbao Masters Final 2016, four of the games were decided (not drawn), all of which involved World Champion Magnus Carlsen, with 3 wins and 1 loss.

After the loss to Hikaru Nakamura in the opening round, Carlsen came back with a vengeance and won all of his next three games, the latest victim is the defending champion Wesley So.

That is the quality of games that Carlsen is showing in this year’s edition of Bilbao Chess. So high that someone actually tweeted his title should be CG (i.e., Chess God) instead of GM. Thus, he now is way ahead of the pack:

Bilbao Masters Final 2016 Standings after Round 4

#NameCountryRtgPts
1Magnus CarlsenNorway28559
2Hikaru NakamuraUnited States27876
3Anish GiriNetherlands27854
4Wesley SoUnited States27703
5Sergey KarjakinRussia27733
6Wei YiChina26963

Check out the Round 4 game between Magnus Carlsen and Wesley So below:

Magnus Carlsen in Sole Lead after Round 3 of Bilbao Masters Final 2016

Magnus Carlsen convincingly won against his would-be challenger in the world championship, Sergey Karjakin, to take the lead in the Bilbao Masters Final 2016 after Round 3.

The other games: Hikaru Nakamura vs. Wei Yi and Anish Giri vs. Wesley So were drawn.

With 3 points for a win and 1 for a draw, ranking after Round 3 are as follows:

Bilbao Masters Final 2016 Standings after Round 3

#NameCountryRtgPts
1Magnus CarlsenNorway28556
2Hikaru NakamuraUnited States27875
3Wesley SoUnited States27703
4Anish GiriNetherlands27853
5Sergey KarjakinRussia27732
6Wei YiChina26962

Replay all the games played so far.

Carlsen recovers with a win against Wei Yi, Round 2 Bilbao Masters Final 2016

World Champion Magnus Carlsen beats the Chinese Wei Yi in Round 2 of Bilbao Masters Final 2016, and just like that, he gets back into contention for the title. The rest of the games were drawn, again.

Wesley So drew his first two games in the tournament, first against Sergey Karjakin, and this time against Hikaru Nakamura.

Now, if it were a regular point-system, Wesley So would have been in second place and Carlsen in fifth in the ranking so far, which should look like as follows:

bilbao-2016-standings-r2

However, the three-point rule applies, thus Carlsen is up in second place with 3 points after that win against Wei Yi.

Nakamura Wins in Round 1 vs. Carlsen of Bilbao Masters Final 2016

After 12 losses and 18 draws in their previous match ups, Hikaru Nakamura finally won against Magnus Carlsen in a classical format game. That happened in the very first round of the Bilbao Masters Final 2016.

The rest of the games were drawn, thus leaving Nakamura on the lead at the start of this tournament.

Knockout (Matches) vs. Round Robin

Former challenger to the world chess crown, Boris Gelfand, when asked if anyone can beat Magnus Carlsen in the near future:

In matches, in general, anyone could. Carlsen is, of course, the clear favourite, but many would have a chance. As for tournaments – he wins the majority of them. Nevertheless, there are still contenders for his crown. I’m cautious in my predictions.

Perhaps, a majority of top grandmasters would agree that holding a tournament in a knockout (matches) format would yield a totally different result than when usually held in round-robin (or Swiss-system) format. That’s because different players perform differently between the two formats. Sometimes, a certain player acts as an Achilles heel against a particular opponent, but performs poorly when slated with the rest of the participants.

Thus, I think it would be interesting to follow tournaments that incorporate both formats. Maybe a round robin in the early stages that ultimately culminates in four-way knockout matches? Don’t you think?

FIDE Ratings List July 2016

The FIDE Ratings List updated for July 2016 is here. Check out the top 20 in the table below.

FIDE Ratings Top 20--July 2016

RankNameCountryRatingGames
1Carlsen, MagnusNOR28550
2Kramnik, VladimirRUS28120
3Caruana, FabianoUSA28109
4Vachier-Lagrave, MaximeFRA279810
5Aronian, LevonARM27920
6Nakamura, HikaruUSA27870
7Giri, AnishNED27859
8Ding, LirenCHN27783
9Karjakin, SergeyRUS27739
10Anand, ViswanathanIND27700
11So, WesleyUSA27700
12Mamedyarov, ShakhriyarAZE276412
13Topalov, VeselinBUL27610
14Svidler, PeterRUS27590
15Li, Chao bCHN27580
16Harikrishna, P.IND27559
17Rapport, RichardHUN275213
18Grischuk, AlexanderRUS27470
19Navara, DavidCZE274519
20Eljanov, PavelUKR27379

The Bilbao Masters Final 2016

For this year’s Bilbao Masters, Wesley So is the defending champion, when he defeated Anish Giri in blitz playoff last year.

The Bilbao Chess press release:

The Final completes its competitive line-up, the strongest in recent years, with So, the winner of last year’s tournament, Nakamura and Giri, who are among the top ten of the international ranking and the 16-year-old Chinese player Yi Wei, the sport’s emerging world star.

The tournament, which has been recognised as one of the most prestigious in the world, will take place between 13 and 23 July at the Campos Elíseos Theatre, alongside the Villa de Bilbao, one of the most compelling Chess Opens of the year in which 140 players will compete.

This year’s edition of Bilbao Masters has truly gone more exciting, because on top of the familiar rivalry between Wesley So and Anish Giri, the organizers are bringing us a treat with the preview of this year’s World Championship match between Magnus Carlsen and Sergey Karjakin.

Chess Beauty: Alexandra Botez

Katherine Eisenbrand writes in Standford’s Pulse Magazine — You Just Got Pawned:

ALEXANDRA BOTEZ IS among Canada’s best female chess players, speaks five languages, attends Stanford, and on top of all that she’s trending on Reddit, 9GAG, Imgur, and Tumblr. It also seems like no other “Alexandra Botez” exists in the world, because sixteen search pages later the headlines still read “Botez, Canada’s Best, Most Accomplished, Most Beautiful, Most Amazingly Talented Chess Players.” I’m paraphrasing, but you get the gist.

At the current ELO rating of 2092, I think she’s still far from what she is being described as The Most Amazingly Talented Chess Player.