Ignorance of tournament's rule cost World champion Magnus Carlsen dearly as he was declared “lost-on-time” against Veselin Topalov after World number three Viswanathan Anand featured in the lone draw on an action-packed opening day of the third Norway Chess 2015 in Stavanger.
On Tuesday, Anand ran into a firm home preparation of Italy’s Fabiano Caruana, ranked second in the World, and settled for a 37 move draw in Ruy Lopez. During this battle, it was clear that Caruana's home-work in the lines of Berlin Defence better made the five-time World champion think more. When the two met a day earlier in the blitz format, Anand had emerged victorious. As a result, Anand was expected to press harder for a win with white pieces but Caruna proved equal to the challenge and forced an clean draw.
With nine from World’s top-12 list making the 10-player field, the event is the strongest so far this year. This competition is part of the elite three-leg Grand Chess Tour, the other two being Sinquefield Cup and London Chess Classic.
With the average rating of the field being a whopping 2782, the on-board action lived up to the high expectations. Carlsen who reached a winning position against Topalov looked stunned when told that he had run out of his allotted time on the clock. While thinking for his 61st move, Carlsen was told by the arbiter that he had lost on time since the new time control of the tournament was two hours for 40 moves plus an extra 60 minutes plus 30-second increment for every move made till the end of the game. In fact, at the start of the round, the players were reminded of the new time control. Carlsen arrived late and missed the reminder. But he had only himself to blame for the fiasco since he should have known the rule anyway.
In the other games, surprise-winner of the blitz contest on Tuesday, Frenchman Maxime Vachier-Lagrave stunned Levon Aronian in 59 moves of Queen’s Gambit Declined, young Anish Giri tamed Alexander Grischuk in 42 moves of Sicilian Rossolimo and Hikaru Nakamura proved superior Jon Ludwig Hammer, a choice of the hosting city, after 53 turns.
The results:
First round: Viswanathan Anand drew with Fabiano Caruana (Ita); Magnus Carlsen (Nor) lost to Veselin Topalov (Bul); Maxime Vachier-Lagrave (Fra) bt Levon Aronian (Arm); Anish Giri (Ned) bt Alexander Grischuk (Rus); Hikaru Nakamura (US) bt Jon Ludvig Hammer (Nor). Second-round pairings: Giri-Anand; Grischuk-Aronian, Hammer-Vachier-Lagrave, Topalov-Nakamura, Caruana-Carlsen.
