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Grand Prix: Bacrot & Grischuk Score in Round 5

Grand Prix: Bacrot & Grischuk Score in Round 5

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| 4 | Chess Event Coverage

On Friday Alexander Grischuk and Etienne Bacrot both won their black games at the Grand Prix in Élancourt (near Paris). In this fifth round, Grischuk beat Vassily Ivanchuk in a Grünfeld. Anish Giri's loss to Bacrot was his third in the tournament; the Dutchman went down in an ending that started as a Symmetrical English. Boris Gelfand kept his half point lead.

*** Update: here's Jason Stoneking's interview with Hikaru Nakamura after round 4! ***

On the rest day a number of players joined a trip to the Palace of Versailles, which is located literally around the corner. 


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The Palace of Versailles, which was as the centre of political power in France from 1682, when Louis XIV moved from Paris, until the royal family was forced to return to the capital in October 1789 after the beginning of the French Revolution (source: Wikipedia).

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The players had the luxury of a private tour guide

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The famous Hall of Mirrors

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A group photo on a "giant chess board"

Whereas the tournament started with a few victories for White only in the first three rounds, the black pieces are seriously catching up! In the fifth round, four games ended in draws and two were won by black.

The young Dutch GM Anish Giri is not having a great tournament so far. It's not that he's playing that badly, actually, but somehow Caissa is clearly not on his side. In the fifth round, Giri got a slight endgame advantage (Bacrot felt that he was "under serious pressure"), but his 24.Nb2?! wasn't great and then he must have miscalculated the tactical phase that followed. The French GM could give a piece on f6 because he had an overwhelming advantage on the queenside.

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It was a good round for Alexander Grischuk, who got half a point closer to Fabiano Caruana and the others at the top thanks to beating Vassily Ivanchuk. The Ukrainian didn't handle the opening well, and was clearly worse as early as move 13 (look at that poor bishop on h2). Chuky seemed to doing reasonably well, but Black's last two moves suddenly made it clear how big his advantage was.

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Nakamura-Fressinet was a 4.d3 Berlin and in this line, an early Bxc6 is quite trendy these days. Following some top games for a while, Fressinet's 8...f6 was the novelty and after he castled queenside, Black looked very solid. Just when White seemed to get a slight space advantage, the Frenchman found the liberating 22...d5! which solved all his problems tactically. 

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Another topical opening is the Semi-Tarrasch, and Wang Hao successfuly employed it against the tournament leader, Boris Gelfand. The Israeli GM suggested a slight improvement on move 21, but in general White never came close to a clear advantage.

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Evgeny Tomahsveky and Leinier Dominguez played a Nimzo-Indian where White got the bishop pair and Black the better structure, as so often in this opening. Also in this game, the position was always about equal.

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Fabiano Caruana and Ruslan Ponomariov played a Berlin Ending and also here White didn't manage to get an advantage. On the contrary, it was Black who had an edge at some point, but his extra pawn in the rook ending wasn't worth much.

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Paris Grand Prix 2013 | Results & pairings

Round 1 15:00 CET 22.09.13   Round 2 15:00 CET 23.09.13
Fressinet ½-½ Ponomariov   Ponomariov ½-½ Giri
Grischuk ½-½ Wang Hao   Tomashevsky ½-½ Gelfand
Caruana ½-½ Bacrot   Dominguez ½-½ Nakamura
Ivanchuk ½-½ Dominguez   Bacrot ½-½ Ivanchuk
Nakamura ½-½ Tomashevsky   Wang Hao ½-½ Caruana
Gelfand 1-0 Giri   Fressinet 1-0 Grischuk
Round 3 15:00 CET 24.09.13   Round 4 15:00 CET 25.09.13
Grischuk ½-½ Ponomariov   Ponomariov ½-½ Tomashevsky
Caruana 1-0 Fressinet   Dominguez 1-0 Giri
Ivanchuk 1-0 Wang Hao   Bacrot ½-½ Gelfand
Nakamura 1-0 Bacrot   Wang Hao ½-½ Nakamura
Gelfand 1-0 Dominguez   Fressinet 0-1 Ivanchuk
Giri ½-½ Tomashevsky   Grischuk ½-½ Caruana
Round 5 15:00 CET 27.09.13   Round 6 15:00 CET 28.09.13
Caruana ½-½ Ponomariov   Ponomariov - Dominguez
Ivanchuk 0-1 Grischuk   Bacrot - Tomashevsky
Nakamura ½-½ Fressinet   Wang Hao - Giri
Gelfand ½-½ Wang Hao   Fressinet - Gelfand
Giri 0-1 Bacrot   Grischuk - Nakamura
Tomashevsky ½-½ Dominguez   Caruana - Ivanchuk
Round 7 15:00 CET 29.09.13   Round 8 15:00 CET 30.09.13
Ivanchuk - Ponomariov   Ponomariov - Bacrot
Nakamura - Caruana   Wang Hao - Dominguez
Gelfand - Grischuk   Fressinet - Tomashevsky
Giri - Fressinet   Grischuk - Giri
Tomashevsky - Wang Hao   Caruana - Gelfand
Dominguez - Bacrot   Ivanchuk - Nakamura
Round 9 15:00 CET 02.10.13   Round 10 15:00 CET 03.10.13
Nakamura - Ponomariov   Ponomariov - Wang Hao
Gelfand - Ivanchuk   Fressinet - Bacrot
Giri - Caruana   Grischuk - Dominguez
Tomashevsky - Grischuk   Caruana - Tomashevsky
Dominguez - Fressinet   Ivanchuk - Giri
Bacrot - Wang Hao   Nakamura - Gelfand
Round 11 14:00 CET 04.10.13        
Gelfand - Ponomariov        
Giri - Nakamura        
Tomashevsky - Ivanchuk        
Dominguez - Caruana        
Bacrot - Grischuk        
Wang Hao - Fressinet        

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Paris Grand Prix 2013 | Round 5 standings

# Player Rating 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 Score SB
1 Gelfand,Boris 2764 phpfCo1l0.png ½ ½ 1 ½ 1 3.5/5
2 Nakamura,Hikaru 2772 phpfCo1l0.png ½ 1 ½ ½ ½ 3.0/5 7.00
3 Caruana,Fabiano 2779 phpfCo1l0.png ½ ½ ½ ½ 1 3.0/5 6.75
4 Ivanchuk,Vassily 2731 phpfCo1l0.png 0 ½ ½ 1 1 3.0/5 6.50
5 Grischuk,Alexander 2785 ½ 1 phpfCo1l0.png ½ ½ 0 2.5/5 6.75
6 Tomashevsky,Evgeny 2703 ½ ½ phpfCo1l0.png ½ ½ ½ 2.5/5 6.25
7 Bacrot,Etienne 2723 ½ 0 ½ ½ phpfCo1l0.png 1 2.5/5 5.75
8 Ponomariov,Ruslan 2756 ½ ½ ½ phpfCo1l0.png ½ ½ 2.5/5 5.50
9 Dominguez Perez,Leinier 2757 0 ½ ½ ½ phpfCo1l0.png 1 2.5/5 5.25
10 Wang,Hao 2736 ½ ½ ½ 0 ½ phpfCo1l0.png 2.0/5 6.00
11 Fressinet,Laurent 2708 ½ 0 0 1 ½ phpfCo1l0.png 2.0/5 5.25
12 Giri,Anish 2737 0 ½ 0 ½ 0 phpfCo1l0.png 1.0/5

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This report was cross-posted from ChessVibes with permission. Photos by Alina l'Ami courtesy of FIDE unless specified otherwise. You can follow the games live here.

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