First Russian title for Nepomniachtchi
Ian Nepomniachtchi won his first Russian Championship on Wednesday in Moscow. The grandmaster from Bryansk emerged as the winner after a tiebreak with Sergey Karjakin in which he drew the Armageddon game with the black pieces.General info
The Superfinal of the 63rd Russian Chess Championship for men was held in Moscow at the Central Chess Club, from 10 to 22 December. Alexander Grischuk (2771), Sergei Karjakin (2760), Dmitry Jakovenko (2726), Peter Svidler (2722), Ian Nepomniachtchi (2722), Vladimir Malakhov (2720), Nikita Vitiugov (2709), Evgeny Tomashevsky (2699), Igor Kurnosov (2676), Vadim Zvjaginsev (2676), Denis Khismatullin (2659) and Vladimir Potkin (2646) played. The time control was 90 minutes for the first 40 moves followed by 30 minutes to end of the game with 30 second increment.Rounds 10-11 & tiebreak
The 63rd Russian Championship Superfinal saw a dramatic finish on Wednesday. Sergei Karjakin, who seemed destined to win his first title, lost in the last round and then also went down in the tiebreak against Ian Nepomniachtchi.The former Ukrainian had grabbed sole lead in round 10 by beating Evgeny Tomashevsky in a Ruy Lopez, while Nepomniachtchi had drawn with Alexander Grischuk. In the last Nepomniachtchi drew again, with the white pieces against Vitiugov, and so Karjakin only needed a draw too against Malakhov.However, in a sharp Nimzo-Indian Karjakin reached a difficult ending with Black. He tried his luck with a piece sacrifice, hoping for a fortress on the kingside, but Malakhov demonstrated that it was just winning for White. This meant that Karjakin and Nepomniachtchi had ended on shared first place.
And so after the last round had finished Karjakin and Nepomniachtchi set down at the chess board again for a playoff. In the first game Karjakin had some advantage with White in a Najdorf but it was probably never enough to win. In the second he also had the better chances and then in the Armageddon game (6 minutes for White vs 5 for Black who had draw odds) Karjakin was completely winning after the opening - if he had played 18.Rg1, Nepomniachtchi would have had to resign within a few moves. In the game Nepomniachtchi eventually managed to hold the draw, and win the title.Here's a video of the Armageddon game shot by Eugene Potemkin - quite shaky unfortunately, but OK.[[{"type":"media","view_mode":"media_large","fid":"260","attributes":{"class":"media-image","typeof":"foaf:Image","height":"349","width":"580","style":""}}]]
Games rounds 10-11 & playoff
Game viewer by ChessTempoLinks
- Official website
- Live games
- Games in PGN: Superfinal | Playoff via TWIC
Peter Doggers joined a chess club a month before turning 15 and still plays for it. He used to be an active tournament player and holds two IM norms. Peter has a Master of Arts degree in Dutch Language & Literature. He briefly worked at New in Chess, then as a Dutch teacher and then in a project for improving safety and security in Amsterdam schools. Between 2007 and 2013 Peter was running ChessVibes, a major source for chess news and videos acquired by Chess.com in October 2013. As our Director News & Events, Peter writes many of our news reports. In the summer of 2022, The Guardian’s Leonard Barden described him as “widely regarded as the world’s best chess journalist.”
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