Home Page 
Chess Life Online 2010 November Nakamura Staying Cool in Moscow
Chess Life Online 2010 November Nakamura Staying Cool in Moscow | Nakamura Staying Cool in Moscow |
|
|
| By Macauley Peterson | |
| November 9, 2010 | |
 Hikaru Nakamura, the U.S. number one, and as of now, number ten in the world on the Live Rating list, is in a five-way tie for second at the Tal Memorial super-GM tournament in Moscow. Heading into Tuesday's rest day, everything was more or less going as planned, as Hikaru held his two black games against Shakhriyar Mamedyarov and Sergei Karjakin, knocked off the struggling Pavel Eljanov in round two, and had ex-World Champion Vladimir Kramnik on the ropes in the fourth. Kramnik was in serious trouble but escaped with a perpetual check in mutual time trouble. After the game, both players analyzed the complications in the press room and on the live video feed (replay available at time index 18:55:00). Replay the game below. Karjakin was pressing Nakamura, who surprised fans by essaying the Berlin Defense to the Ruy Lopez, characterized by an early exchange of queens, but he misplayed the line and was forced to defend a worse endgame for five hours. Nakamura seems quite relaxed, as the eighth seed in his first super-tournament since Corus last January. Here's a snapshot from the first four rounds from Nakamura's perspective, with comments from Karjakin and Kramnik. 5056 5058 5059 Levon Aronian leads the event with 3/4--you can view the full crosstable here. Macauley is in Moscow for CLO and ChessVibes.com, where you can read the latest on Magnus Carlsen's withdrawal from the World Championship cycle. He can be reached at MacauleyPeterson.com and on www.Facebook.com/ |