Artemiev Wins Star-Studded $10,000 Abu Dhabi Super Blitz Challenge

GM Vladislav Artemiev of Russia won the $5,000 first prize in the Abu Dhabi Super Blitz Challenge on Wednesday. The Russian grandmaster defeated GM Oleksandr Bortnyk of Ukraine in the knockout final; GM Daniil Dubov came third.

Organized by the Abu Dhabi Chess & Culture Club, the Abu Dhabi Super Blitz Challenge had a star-studded field, with five players from the world's top 10: GMs Fabiano Caruana, Ian Nepomniachtchi, Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, Alexander Grischuk, and Anish Giri.

Other big names included GMs Leinier Dominguez, Sergey Karjakin, Hikaru Nakamura, Dmitry Andreikin, and even Peter Svidler. The eight-time Russian champion doesn't make an appearance on our site too often, and he definitely showed his skills in online chess.

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A total of 1,215 players from 107 federations played: 300 GMs, 276 IMs, 32 WGMs, 329 FMs, 39 WIMs, 88 CMs, 106 NMs, 29 WFMs, and 16 WCMs. 

The tournament started as an 11-round Swiss, from which the top-eight players based on Sonneborn-Berger would qualify for a knockout phase. All games were played at Chess.com's Titled Tuesday time control: three minutes plus a one-second increment.

Live commentary was provided by GM Aryan Tari and IM Danny Rensch.

After six rounds, Russian GMs Andreikin and Artemiev were still on perfect scores together with GMs Klementy Sychev (also Russia) and GM Zaven Andriasian (Armenia). One top player was already out of contention by then; MVL had a terrible day at the office and scored just 2/6, after which he left the tournament.

Nonetheless, a win against MVL was a great achievement for Chess.com India's IM Rakesh Kulkarni (@Rakesh). He beat the current leader of the Candidates Tournament! Vachier-Lagrave's 1...a6 didn't provide the same success that GM Tony Miles once had with this move against GM Anatoly Karpov.

Speaking of staff members, our Spanish translater FM Mario Gavilan Diaz (@AquivaRubinstein) also played, but he made it to this report with a sad loss. He fell into a theoretical trap played by another good friend of Chess.com, Chessbrah GM Aman Hambleton (@KNVB), who had just published a video on this very topic earlier in the day!

Tips And Tricks Of The London System: Bxh7 Watch Aman Hambleton's brand new video on the London System!

Watch

After seven rounds it was Andreikin (@2Vladimirovich90) who was the only player left on a perfect score, and two rounds later he was again the sole leader with 8.5/9. Around that time, the tournament saw some elite clashes. For instance, here's Svidler facing Caruana.

The Russian GM failed to win a won endgame, but he would still qualify for the knockout while Caruana missed it by 5.25 SB points.

Svidler was the oldest of the eight players who made it to the knockout, and he got there with impressive wins against both Grischuk and Nakamura in the final two rounds. The American player needed to win this game,  and he played a somewhat risky line of the French which Svidler dealt with strongly:

Despite his excellent start of 8.5/9, poor Andreikin (@2Vladimirovich90) failed to qualify as he finished with two losses against his compatriots Nepomniachtchi and Dubov.

The biggest surprise among the qualifiers was 16-year-old FM Artur Avalyan from Yaroslavl, Russia. In round 11, he outplayed the seasoned GM Georg Meier. Avalyan knew his theory in the Owen's Defense, incidentally another Tony Miles specialty.

The special $500 prize for the best female player went to Polish WIM Anna Kubicka (@Savagelittlemole), who scored 7.5/11. Her biggest scalp was GM Ilia Smirin (@Tapuah) in round seven.

Final Standings Swiss | Players With 9 Points Or More

Below you can find all the games of the exciting knockout phase, which consisted of two-game matches (also 3+1 games) and, if needed, an armageddon to follow. Among the (dramatic) highlights was Nepomniachtchi's loss to Artemiev in their first game, after he had built up a winning position:

Here's the only armageddon game that was played. As he finished in a higher position in the Swiss, Svidler could choose the color. He went for Black and got four minutes and draw odds against Dubov's five minutes. The game was decided early due to a blunder:

Artemiev won the final convincingly against Bortnyk, a true blitz specialist. With a combination of solid chess and tactical wit, the 23-year-old Ukrainian GM had knocked out both Avalyan and Sarin, but the reigning European Champion was a bridge too far. Don't miss Artemiev's beautiful, final move, worthy of $5,000.

All knockout games

Related:

• Nakamura, MVL, Caruana Confirmed For Abu Dhabi Super Blitz Challenge