Magnus Carlsen blogs from the World Blitz Championship in Moscow
Day 1
Following three back-to-back tournaments (Olympiad, Bilbao, Nanjing), a two weeks break came and went quickly, and we arrived in Moscow on Sunday evening. Monday a week ago NRK, the main Norwegian TV channel, covered a chess session I had at Simonsen Law firm with an 8-yr old (son of an employee) and Tuesday I was a guest at the “Storbynatt” talk show as I’m a fan of hosts Eia and Tufte Johansen. Friday and Saturday I visited Tromsø for the kick-off for the organizational phase of the 2014 Chess Olympiad, playing blindfold, blitz and chess with live pieces. Back to the Tal Blitz: At the opening and drawing of lots today I received the Chess Oscar for 2009! The combined Tal and World Championship Blitz takes place over three days as a 20-player all-play-all-twice tournament with time control 3 minutes + 2 seconds/move per game per player. I got off to an excellent start winning the first four games against blitz expert Nakamura, Ponomariov, Kramnik and Movsesian. The rest of the day was more up and down but 10/14 (as last year) and shared first with Aronian is a very good start. Particularly so as many of the games were quite good and the points didn’t all fall my way as last year. 14 more rounds follow tomorrow and the remaining 10 on Thursday. Great tournament, and excellent live coverage I’m told!
Magnus Carlsen, Moscow, November 16th, 2010
Day 2
A good night’s sleep did me well. Nope… I did sleep quite well, but my head more or less went on strike today. A head functioning at half speed doesn’t work too well in a blitz tournament. Oddly several of the other players with plus scores from day 1 seemed to play below par as well, and I managed to stay in contention for tournament victory despite a poor 7/14 and 50% score today. At 17/28 with 10 rounds to go, I’m in sole 2nd place 1,5 points behind leader Aronian. It could have been worse. It is quite crowded at 16 points and below, hence anyone in the top 5-8 having a great run tomorrow could win. Looking forward to an exiting finish.
Magnus Carlsen, Moscow, November 17th, 2010
Go Magnus!