Maxime Vachier- Lagrave: France get gold in blitz!
Official website: http://sportaccord2011.fide.com
Maxime gained the first Gold medal for France here in the blitz event, competing with such famous players as Alexander Grischuk and Shakhriyar Mamedyarov!
We had this interview with him after his last game.
– Congratulations! What do you feel now?
– Thank you! You have no idea how tired I am right now! The fact is that, I usually play blitz events on a good level. For example, I won the European Blitz Championship. But blitz events always demand a lot of energy. You need to have maximum concentration and every time its a new situation. So now I feel just that I want to go to sleep – as soon as possible. (Maxim smiled) Of course, later I will feel happy.
– What can you say about your performance in a whole?
– I finished the first day with 5,5 out of 8. And it could be better, because I did not convert some winning positions. But today I scored 6,5 out of 7 being extremely lucky. I won 2 completely lost and 2 completely drawn positions.
— How can you evaluate this year in general?
– Sometimes it was nice, for example, I performed very good in Wijk aan Zee. But The European Team championship looked like a disaster.
– What about your life outside the chess board?
– 1,5 years ago I finished my University studies. I am totally a professional chess player. And my life this year was ordinary – more or less
| SNo. | Rank | Name | Rtg | FED | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | Pts | |
| 15 | 1 | GM | Vachier-Lagrave Maxime | 2710 | FRA | * | ½ | ½ | 1 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 12 |
| 6 | 2 | GM | Grischuk Alexander | 2752 | RUS | ½ | * | ½ | ½ | 1 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 1 | ½ | ½ | 1 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 10½ |
| 16 | 3 | GM | Mamedyarov Shakhriyar | 2733 | AZE | ½ | ½ | * | 1 | ½ | 1 | 1 | 1 | 0 | ½ | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 10 |
| 1 | 4 | GM | Karjakin Sergey | 2763 | RUS | 0 | ½ | 0 | * | ½ | 0 | 1 | 0 | ½ | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 9½ |
| 13 | 5 | GM | Gashimov Vugar | 2757 | AZE | 0 | 0 | ½ | ½ | * | 1 | 1 | 0 | ½ | 1 | ½ | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 9 |
| 2 | 6 | GM | Vallejo Pons Francisco | 2705 | ESP | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | * | ½ | 0 | 1 | ½ | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 9 |
| 3 | 7 | GM | Ivanchuk Vassily | 2775 | UKR | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | ½ | * | ½ | ½ | ½ | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 9 |
| 9 | 8 | GM | Almasi Zoltan | 2707 | HUN | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 1 | ½ | * | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | ½ | 0 | ½ | 1 | 8½ |
| 8 | 9 | GM | Ponomariov Ruslan | 2723 | UKR | 0 | 0 | 1 | ½ | ½ | 0 | ½ | 0 | * | 1 | 1 | 1 | 0 | ½ | 1 | 1 | 8 |
| 12 | 10 | GM | Le Quang Liem | 2714 | VIE | 0 | 0 | ½ | 0 | 0 | ½ | ½ | 1 | 0 | * | 1 | 0 | 0 | ½ | 1 | 1 | 6 |
| 4 | 11 | GM | Kamsky Gata | 2732 | USA | 0 | ½ | 1 | 0 | ½ | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | * | 1 | 1 | 0 | ½ | 0 | 5½ |
| 5 | 12 | GM | Giri Anish | 2714 | NED | 0 | ½ | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | * | 0 | 1 | 1 | ½ | 5 |
| 7 | 13 | GM | Wang Hao | 2736 | CHN | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | ½ | 1 | 1 | 0 | 1 | * | 0 | ½ | 1 | 5 |
| 11 | 14 | GM | Dominguez Perez Leinier | 2712 | CUB | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | ½ | ½ | 1 | 0 | 1 | * | ½ | ½ | 5 |
| 10 | 15 | GM | Wang Yue | 2697 | CHN | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | ½ | 0 | 0 | ½ | 0 | ½ | ½ | * | ½ | 4½ |
| 14 | 16 | GM | Nielsen Peter Heine | 2693 | DEN | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | ½ | 0 | ½ | ½ | * | 3½ |
In the women’s section, Hou Yifan wins gold, Stefanova silver, and Anna Muzychuk bronze.
Just curious, how did he manage to check his iPhone while playing blitz? That is actually pretty impressive.