Ivanchuk - How is this possible at the top level?

Just finished watching the Aronian vs Ivanchuk game from round 10 and was amazed that he lost on time again. Well, not amazed, it was the 4th time in the candidates so far. Certainly shocked to see it in such a prestigious tournament though.

I just don't understand it. I thought I would come on here and ask some experienced OTB chess players what their view on this is.

He seems to be missing time control by a mile. Not a move or two. He's missing it by 10+ in some instances.

Is this really such a struggle in OTB chess tournaments?

Have any of you flagged so often in a tournament?

Is it just a case of getting into 'the zone' and forgetting about the clock?

He has played some really interesting chess. Against Aronian, he was probably even better for parts of the game. Ivanchuk is obviously an incredible player (and very experienced)....how is it possible that he can't make time control?

Maybe health reasons,but more likely strain of playing against the best puts too much pressure on his game.

Ivanchuk lives on his own planet.

He's a genius, but whenever the tournament is somehow related to a world championship, his nerves get the better of him.

I have no clue how to answer that: but perversely, I like Ivanchuk all the better because he is capable of everything from the sublime to the ridiculous, because he's not one of these super-serious machines. And credit to him, he's been at the top or thereabouts for a while now.

He became my favourite active player when I stumbled across this game years ago, when he just crushes Kasparov into a corner. Enjoy! After that, I can indulge him his bad days.

Walter Browne and Sam Reshevsky were both also notorious for time trouble issues as I recall. 

This is a semi well known quote some professional has said about Ivanchuk.

Time trouble is one thing, and yeah, in a hard game OTB, you can get yourself down pretty far, but I've never actually flagged (run out of time). Aside from one time where I intentionally used all the time I had left on the 40th move looking for a knockout (only to not find it and move with 10s left), the worst off I've been in a classical time control is a minute or two for the last move, maybe 5 minutes for the last 3 moves. 

There was one tournament which was G/15 that I flagged in a few times, but that was also a conscious decision because I knew there was no chance of winning anything (several masters in attendance) and I wanted to just play as well as I could so I'd have something worth analyzing later.

So in answer to the question, no, it's not this much of a struggle for us mortals in the class sections, but notice the time of all the players in this tournament. Kramnik was up by an hour last round. So was Carlsen, and Aronian. The weaker the player, the more time they have to use to keep pace with the better moves of the stronger player. Time trouble is very common, but I don't understand missing time control by 10 moves any more than you do.

Yeah.  Time trouble is one thing.  Many professional players get into time trouble all the time (just look at the candidate tournament) but missing it by 10 moves?  I agree, it's almost too much to believe.

The commentators mentioned this as a possible reason, which I think is part of it at least. Years ago there weren't time increments.

When did they start that, evidently its helpful at least to some degree and people got used to it possibly even the GM's like Ivanchuk, because with every move you get a certain amount of seconds added to your clock.

Well this match doesn't have it, and players not used to that, well it could cause some problems. I have never played a game with time increments, so it wouldn't affect me personally, but I can see how one could get used to it, and by not having it, could cause one time issues.

I do not know if that is the reason for Ivanchuk obviously, but it is a possibility its at least a factor.

Yeah, he flagged on move 30. This was what I found unbelievable.

I understand time trouble occurs (happened a lot in this tournament), but to miss it by 10 moves is unfathomable to me. It is so far off time control that it's like he is playing a different tournament to everyone else.

Surely better to make a couple of inaccurate moves, than to lose on time all together.

It could be the same sort of phenomenon that sometimes can lead players to give up the whole game rather than lose their queen. Like in an attack where it looks like you'll either be mated or lose your queen, it happens that people assume that there must be some way out of the mating net and so they keep their queen, only to be checkmated a few moves later.

Better to take your time and lose on time rather than play bad moves and suffer for 30 more moves before your super-grandmaster opponent converts, as he inevitably will, after you make a mistake? I suppose it's possible.

Are you familiar with the concept of imagery?

na, maybe knows a bit of sarcasm though.

 The best way to appreciate an artist, it is said, is not to try to dissect him.

Aye, but this is a comeptitive competition. it is important that people play at roughly their expected level or it has knock on effects for the rest oof the tournament.

If he wants to skip about with flowers singing about a whale's mating call, very well, just don't do at top competitions.

Someone once gave me the hint better think and lose on time then play shameful moves.

Why don't they just use the Fischerclock? Less time at the begining, larger increments. Same length game. No time scamble. No time-scamble blunders. Problems solved.

Or would that be too easy?

man i think im burned out as well and need a vacation

He's putting on a not bad show against Carlsen.

10 moves left with around 8 mins on the clock though so you never know.

It's not such a struggle in OTB, something is wrong or he was just left in such bad positions he didn't even want to make a move.