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Indian Express
2 days ago
- Sport
- Indian Express
Vincent Keymer breaks into world top 10 and edges closer to Chennai Grand Masters title
Vincent Keymer barged into the world's top 10 ranking spots in the FIDE live ratings that are updated in real time on Wednesday after his victory in 39 moves with black pieces against Awonder Liang, the Cinderella story of the Chennai Grand Masters tournament. The win also helped Keymer put daylight between him and his pursuers — India's Arjun Erigaisi and Awonder himself — at the top of the standings as he leads by a 1.5 points with just two more rounds left. Arjun Erigaisi played out a short draw against Anish Giri, which he explained was forced partially because he was under the weather coming into the game. Keymer, who helped Gukesh become the world champion last year as part of the Indian teen's team, has played some pragmatic chess in Chennai. After defeating three players who were rated below the 2700 mark in the first three games (Nihal Sarin, Pranav V and Karthikeyan Murali), Keymer played out draws against the strongest men in the event, Anish Giri, Vidit Gujrathi and Arjun. Then, finding himself taking on Awonder in the seventh round, he struck again. It was a result that Awonder saw coming. A day before he sat across the table to take on tournament leader Keymer, the American grandmaster with one of the cheeriest dispositions in the sport, had a grim take on his chances the next day against the German GM. Having breached the 2700 rating threshold for the first time in his career, Awonder said he was suddenly feeling a sharp stab of pressure to keep his rating stable at that mark. That pressure, he felt, could hurt him and cost him the game against tournament leader Keymer, he prophesied. Awonder's prediction came true on Wednesday. Awonder had told Chessbase after the previous round how he was riding the wave of his unpredictability in Chennai: because he usually plays in open tournaments, his openings are slightly different — 'weaker' was the term he used — than what his opponents had been expecting at Chennai. But with six rounds behind them, the element of surprise was gone. Keymer took a healthy edge in the game from the 19th move itself, a blunder by his opponent. Soon, by the 29th move, Keymer was up a rook in return for two less pawns, a sizable material advantage besides the edge on the board. He converted that advantage into victory without breaking into sweat. For Awonder, it was only his second defeat of the tournament. For Keymer, who has already won a Freestyle Chess event earlier in the year, even a simple draw on Thursday will be enough.
Indian Express
6 days ago
- Entertainment
- Indian Express
Hans Niemann jokes about buying a castle as he detoxes in nature after Freestyle Chess high in Las Vegas
American chess Grandmaster Hans Niemann has always been one of a rather colourful characters in the world of the sport. Be it his overjoyed reactions at arch-rival Magnus Carlsen's or being accused of the World No.1 of cheating, he has always grabbed headlines. In a new video uploaded on his YouTube channel, Niemann, who finished second in the recently concluded Freestyle Chess event at Las Vegas, was seen relaxing on the countryside, detoxing from the constant hectic schedule and jokingly said that he had bought a castle. 'Hello everyone. Welcome to my new castle. After my victory in Las Vegas, I wanted to make a new acquisition. This is where I'll be doing most of my training. And uh perhaps I'll welcome some of my fellow chess players to enjoy my new purchase,' he said in the video. In the video he also talked about getting to playing classical chess. He said that he had played 261 classical games in 2021, then 180 in 2022. Then the cheating scandal happened. He said since October last year, he played in just one classical chess event, Aeroflot Open in Russia. He will be playing at Spanish league now as he looks to get back into classical chess mode as he looks to get in shape for big events like FIDE World Cup in India and the Grand Swiss tournament 'Recap: Las Vegas. Obviously my performance in Las Vegas was a surprise to fully everyone but myself. I immersed myself into freestyle and probably haven't opened Chessbase in a while. So hopefully when I play my first classical tournaments in a while, the Spanish League, starting from August 8th, I'll be able to reacclimatize to the speed or the lack of speed in classical. I'll be playing the Spanish league. It's a seven games all classical. And then after that, there's obviously the Grand Swiss from September 3rd to 15th in Uzbekistan. And then after that we have the next freestyle tournament which is the second to last slam of the tour and then after that the US championship and then after the US championship we have the world cup from the world cup you have the final in Cape Town. After the final in Cape Town there's a global chess league so I am just in nature detoxing from life uh preparing for the all the big tournaments that lie ahead,' Niemann said. 'As you guys know, my last classical tournament if you disregard the Aeroflot Open last March was the US championship in October. So that means from from now, you know we're in August between October, I played one classical tournament which you know as some of you may remember, I played 261 games in a year. So it's quite weird going from that form but looking forward to play a lot of classical chess and focusing on that and trying to make it to the Candidates. So I'll continue documenting the journey and um thank you guys for watching and I'll see you soon, he added.
