Georg Meier Wins Record 6th Titled Tuesday

GM Georg Meier once again topped a Titled Tuesday tournament with a convincing 8.0/9 score in the early event.

This was Meier's sixth victory — easily the record. The second place title holders are GMs Hikaru Nakamura and Baadur Jobava with four wins each.

Meier owes his bishops a well-deserved beer, as in fully six of his nine games, he exploited the advantages of the bishop pair or bishop versus knight! Pro-tip: Don't give Meier any bishops!

Meier's only loss came in round three against clear second place finisher, GM Varuzhan Akobian.

After that, Meier blazed a path through the field with five wins in a row! Arguably, Meier's best win was against GM Bartosz Socko in round eight where Meier squeezed Socko over 74 moves until in the final, picturesque position, his bishop dominated Socko's knight.

Meier demonstrating consistency and excellence.

The clear second place finisher, Akobian, cruised through the first four rounds of the tournament and rapidly moved to 4.0/4.

GM Varuzhan Akobian is 4/4 in Titled Tuesday! Watch his round 5 game here: https://t.co/XqWwmFti4o

— Chess.com (@chesscom) February 2, 2016

However, disaster struck almost immediately in the aforementioned fifth round game when Akobian tragically lost on time while up a queen against GM David Lorino!

Akobian seemed unperturbed and easily righted the ship. In the following game, Akobian found a pleasing and clear path to victory against GM Evgeny Shaposhnikov. Can you, esteemed reader, find the same path?

In the final round, Akobian demonstrated further tactical acuity and dropped a knight-shaped cocktail of the Molotov variety in GM Alexander Lenderman's position; Lenderman was himself hoping for a final-round win to enter the tie for second.

One of the shared third place victors, GM Valery Aveskulov was paired in round five against the new host of ChessTV's Material Odds Challenge show, IM Aman Hambleton. Sadly, the game did not go well for Hambleton as Aveskulov rapidly applied ferocious pressure and delivered a crushing victory.

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Many of the usual favorites struggled in the early event. Perennial contender, living blitz legend, and current co-leader in the Tradewise Gibraltar Chess Festival, GM Hikaru Nakamura, withdrew prior to round eight after losing two difficult games in a row. The prettiest was the following one against FM Renato Lujan, who found an aesthetic finishing shot.

Another favorite, GM Dmitry Andreiken, was similarly aesthetically abused by the following sweet closer from GM Mateusz Bartel. The finishing move appealingly capped an interesting if dubious exchange sac on f6.

Bartel produced plenty of sharp and exciting games for the spectators.

Titled Tuesday, Early Event | Final Standings (6.5 Points And Up)

The Titled Tuesday late event was conquered in convincing fashion by GM Yuri Solodovnichenko who notched his first-ever Titled Tuesday victory — congrats! Early on, Solodovnichenko showed the typical tactical awareness that is necessary for a tournament victory. Can you find the winning move in the two seconds it took Solodovnichenko to find it?!

In a critical showdown against Nakamura, Solodovnichenko offered a piece to attack Nakamura's king. The sac proved sufficient for a perpetual, but neither player could play for more without losing.

One of the second place finishers, GM Julio Sadorra, pulled off an incredible Swiss gambit as he lost his second and third games before winning six in a row to share second! Of his two upsets, the most exciting was by NM Gabriel Bick who allowed Sadorra to pick up a piece on the queenside while he broke through in powerful fashion on the kingside.

Striking back, Sadorra's most fun win may have been the game against FM Yo Mama who had the makings of a massive attack against Sadorra when Sadorra offered a creative piece sacrifice that provided excellent compensation.

As usual, Nakamura was battling for first in the final round when he either offered a miscalculated piece sac or (probably more likely) suffered a mouseslip against Sadorra and lost. To be fair, Nakamura's position was objectively dubious in any case, but it was certainly better before Bh8??

Despite a difficult day for Nakamura, he was still in the hunt for first in the last round.

Chess.com's fearless leader and commentator, IM Danny Rensch, both played in and commented on both events. The event was a great chance for Danny to warm up for his Death Match on Thursday, February 4 against IM Lawrence Trent in which both players will be playing and commenting. The event will be a double match with GM Fabiano Caruana tackling GM Robert Hess.

Readers can follow the action live on Chess.com/tv and Twitch.tv/chess, and you can still catch Danny's live commentary from the late and early events on Twitch.tv/chess.

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Titled Tuesday, Late Event | Final Standings (6.5 Points And Up)

For clear first place finishes, Meier and Solodovnichenko each collected $500. In the early event, Akobian collected $250 while Matlakov and Aveskulov split third and fourth to share $100. In a four-way tie for fifth, Socko, Bartel, Torre42, and Movsesian each collected $12.50.

In the late event, Sadorra, Huschenbeth, and Zierk each collected $150 while fifth place was again watered down: $12.50 was split between Nakamura, Amin, Corrales, and Holt.

The next Titled Tuesday tournaments will take place on Tuesday, March 1,2016 at 11 a.m. and 5 p.m. Pacific time.