Praggnanandhaa Survives As Salem Crushes Challengers In Blitz
GM Praggnanandhaa Rameshbabu started the Masters Blitz at the 2024 Biel Chess Festival in an elimination spot, but he went on to win the tournament and climb to third place in the overall standings. Instead, it's GM Vincent Keymer who joins GM Sam Shankland in leaving the event. GM Liem Le has a three-point lead before the final three rounds of classical chess.
In the Challengers, GM Saleh Salem has a stunning seven-point lead after scoring 9/10 in Blitz. That was costly for GM Jonas Bjerre, who finished fourth but too far behind Salem after missing a win in the final moments of the final round. In addition to Bjerre, GMs Marc'Andria Maurizzi and Ihor Samunenkov are also eliminated.
The sixth round of classical chess starts Tuesday, July 23, at 8 a.m. ET / 14:00 CEST / 5:30 p.m. IST.
10 rounds of blitz chess left Salem needing only a draw in classical chess to win the Challengers, while Le has a three-point lead but now faces each of his three rivals in classical games with four points available for each win.
Masters And Challengers Standings After Blitz
Masters Blitz: Praggnanandhaa Moves Into Contention, Eliminates Keymer
The blitz was the last event before two players were to be eliminated, and while Shankland was too far adrift to have any real hopes, Praggnanandhaa in fifth place was just 1.5 points behind Keymer. That meant it mattered most for those two players, and their fortunes couldn't have differed more—Praggnanandhaa won with a 7/10 score (six wins, two draws, two losses), while Keymer was last on 2/10 (one win, two draws, seven losses).
Masters Blitz: Final Standings
The only player to suffer almost as much as Keymer was GM Abhimanyu Mishra, who dropped from second to fourth in the overall standings.
Praggnanandhaa Powers Past Keymer
Praggnanandhaa commented after his successful day at the office:
"The way I was playing in classical I thought I don’t deserve to play in this field, but today went well. I was lucky yesterday [vs. Shankland], I was worse out of the opening, but then somehow things went well and at least I had a shot today to make it to the top four. I started well and I got into the top four quite early, maybe the first two rounds itself, and then that pressure was off."
The way I was playing in classical I thought I don't deserve to play in this field...
—Praggnanandhaa Rameshbabu
Praggnanandhaa started the Blitz by beating Shankland again and then, when he won in the second round, he had indeed caught Keymer, who opened with 0.5/2. Since the tiebreak, as Praggnanandhaa pointed out, was the Chess960 that he'd won earlier in the event, that meant he was ahead of Keymer in fourth.
Praggnanandhaa took over, but when he lost to Shankland in round six while Keymer picked up his only win, vs. Mishra, there was only a 1.5-point gap with four rounds to go. That soon grew again, however, since in the very next round Keymer lost to Le while Praggnanandhaa beat Mishra, who was visibly upset when he realized the white knights were going to overwhelm his defenses.
A big win for Praggnanandhaa vs. Mishra while Keymer loses, so that Pragg is a win away from guaranteeing his spot in the final stage of #BielChess from Tuesday-Thursday! https://t.co/WPuIgDQlro pic.twitter.com/U8ZgZrD576
— chess24 (@chess24com) July 21, 2024
Keymer's elimination became official in the eighth round since, despite Praggnanandhaa losing to GM Haik Martirosyan and spoiling his chances of snatching second place, Keymer went down in flames against Shankland.
Shankland beats Keymer, which confirms both players are eliminated from #BielChess with 2 blitz rounds to go. Liem, Martirosyan, Mishra & Pragg will go forward to the final 3 rounds of classical chess! pic.twitter.com/CDvWNDpagm
— chess24 (@chess24com) July 21, 2024
Keymer's 13.Rfc1? in that game lost to a simple, if spectacular, tactical sequence.
Praggnanandhaa is five points adrift of the leader, Le, who posted a smooth four wins and one loss, to score just half a point less. Martirosyan exactly matched Le's score, which meant he remains three points behind.
With 12 points still up for grabs in the final three classical games from Tuesday to Thursday, any of the four remaining players can still win, particularly as they all play each other head-to-head.
Challengers Blitz: Salem On A Different Planet, Bjerre Misses Out
Only GM Vaishali Rameshbabu's time trouble had allowed Salem to escape with a draw in the final classical game, but in the Blitz he was on a different level entirely, as he stormed to 9/10, conceding just two draws. That was 3.5 points more than his closest rival.
Challengers Blitz: Final Standings
While Salem started with 5/5, Vaishali scored 1/5, so that a one-point lead in the overall standings had, by the halfway point in the Blitz, turned into a five-point lead for the player from the United Arab Emirates.
Saleh Salem starts with 5/5 in the Blitz and now has a 5-point overall lead over 2nd placed Vaishali! https://t.co/wsOGnq5uPC #BielChess pic.twitter.com/1H8qnOHW6v
— chess24 (@chess24com) July 21, 2024
When the dust had settled Salem had a seven-point lead, and it was over GM Alexander Donchenko, who was just half a point ahead of Vaishali.
Salem's trick was not just to play well, but to play much faster than his opponents, so that in the critical moments he was usually a minute or more up on the clock. For instance, in his crushing win over Bjerre, he got to do things in style. 33.Qf2 seems to defend the h4-knight and the f3-pawn, but in fact it does neither!
That game, and Salem's amazing streak in general, would prove costly for Bjerre. Bjerre had started the day in a safe fourth place, but had to ensure that he didn't end more than 12 points behind the leader, when he would be eliminated according to the regulations. It turned out he finished 12.5 points behind, after a tragic final game.
The 15-year-old Samunenkov, who had a fine last day, overlooked that he was blundering his queen in a key moment. But Bjerre missed it too—three times!
As you can see, Bjerre still had a draw after missing winning the queen—which would have been enough to stay in the event, but he blundered again and lost.
It was already known before the day began that Samunenkov and Maurizzi would be eliminated, but at least they went out on high notes, posting excellent blitz scores. For instance, 17-year-old Maurizzi scored this nice miniature against Vaishali:
The situation is different in the Challengers, where with only three players there will be just two rounds of classical chess for each player, with a maximum of eight points up for grabs. That means that Salem, with a seven-point lead, only needs a draw in either game to clinch the title. He claimed, however, that he's not focused on that:
"For me, classical games are more important. I don’t care if I win the tournament or not, I just want to play good. Anyway, there is also rating on the line. I just want to play good games. Winning the tournament or not is not relevant!"
Winning the tournament or not is not relevant!
—Saleh Salem
Monday is a rest day, with the remaining seven players in action from Tuesday onward.
How to watch?
The live broadcast was hosted by GM Arturs Neiksans and Angelika Valkova.
The 2024 Biel Chess Festival runs July 13-26 in Biel/Bienne, Switzerland, and features over 20 individual events. The main ones are the six-player Masters and Challengers GM Triathlons where the players compete in five rounds of Rapid chess (2 points for a win/1 for a draw), five rounds of Classical (4/1.5), and 10 rounds of Blitz (1/0.5). The top four then play three more rounds of Classical against each other, with colors reversed. Ties are settled by the standings of the Chess960 tournament held on the opening day.
Previous coverage:
- Day 7: Praggnanandhaa Bounces Back As Vaishali Misses Win In Last Seconds
- Day 6: Keymer Beats Praggnanandhaa As Le, Salem Snatch Lead
- Day 5: Vaishali Enters Top 10 With 3rd Win In A Row
- Day 4: Vaishali, Mishra Continue Giant-Killing In Biel
- Day 3: Vaishali Beats Top Seed As Praggnanandhaa Falls To Mishra
- Days 1-2: Praggnanandhaa, Martirosyan, Donchenko Star As Biel Chess Festival Begins
Colin McGourty led news at Chess24 from its launch until it merged with Chess.com a decade later. An amateur player, he got into chess writing when he set up the website Chess in Translation after previously studying Slavic languages and literature in St. Andrews, Odesa, Oxford, and Krakow.
