London R2: Wins for Carlsen, Nakamura and again McShane

In yet another attractive round in London Luke McShane grabbed sole lead by beating Nigel Short with Black. Magnus Carlsen won with the white pieces against Michael Adams while Hikaru Nakamura gave himself a perfect birthday present by beating Vladimir Kramnik with Black.

On his birthday Nakamura beats Kramnik

General info

The second London Chess Classic takes place December 8-15 at the Olympiad Conference Centre on Hammersmith Road in Kensington, London. Besides the Classic itself there's a big open, a women's invitational, rapid and blitz events, simuls by Viktor Kortchnoi, lectures by GMs Boris Avrukh and Jacob Aagaard, and more. This wonderful fresh tradition in the capital of the United Kingdom anticipates a FIDE World Championship in 2012 and supports chess in schools and communities at the same time. In the top group Anand, Carlsen, Kramnik, Nakamura, Adams, Short, McShane and Howell play. More info here.

Round 2

The chess fans who are following the London Chess Classic (and who isn't) haven't been disappointed so far as in eight games there were six wins and two fighting draws. In yet another attractive round Luke McShane actually "escaped with a win", as Nigel Short had a winning attack in a Sicilian Dragon with 9.g4 but then spoilt it and lost the subsequent ending.

At the press conference the players showed all kinds of spectacular variations, which we've all included in the game viewer below for you to replay. However, after adding a few computer lines it shows White was actually winning... Short felt he had been playing better than in the first round. "I actually saw some lines. Unfortunately not the important ones," which was a remark that turned out to be on the spot - see for yourself below.



Magnus Carlsen recovered from his loss in the first round with a victory over Mickey Adams. The Norwegian didn't get much out of the opening, actually, but his determination to play for a win in just about every game got him the full point in this second round. With f2-f4 he made the game sharper, and in time trouble Adams more or less blundered on move 40, after which the ending was hopeless.



On the day that Hikaru Nakamura turned 23 years old, he received a very nice birthday present from Vladimir Kramnik: a full knight. The Russian either tried a long-term piece sac or simply "forgot about 12...g5", as Nakamura mentioned to us, but the American wasn't sure either. (After the game the players only spoke about the ending.)



After the queens came off the board there was probably an easy win for Black somewhere (GM Sergey Shipov pointed out one) but in the game Kramnik got more and more chances, until he was quite close to a draw actually. But after another big mistake on move 41 the ending was winning after all for Nakamura.



Vishy Anand drew his second game, with Black against David Howell. In a 3.Bb5+ Sicilian the World Champion got a promising position with the more active heavy pieces in a Dragon pawn structure, and even won a pawn. However, Howell found a strong defensive set-up and held his own.

Commentary

In the video below you can watch the press conferences of Carlsen-Adams and Short-McShane - all variations and most of the quotes can be found in the game viewer below.

Game viewer

Game viewer by ChessTempo


--> See GM Sergey Shipov's analysis of Kramnik-Nakamura here London Chess Classic 2010 | Pairings & results


London Chess Classic 2010 | Round 2 standings

Photos © John Saunders and Ray Morris-Hill

Link

• Official website
• Games in PGN via TWIC
• GM Sergey Shipov analysis at Chess in Translation