Mamedyarov Wins Dec. 22 Titled Tuesday
GM Shakhriyar Mamedyarov won his first Titled Tuesday tournament on December 22. The Azerbaijani grandmaster edged out GMs Raunak Sadhwani, Eltaj Safarli, and Alexander Zubov on tiebreak.
This week's Titled Tuesday tournament had a total of 766 participants. It was an 11-round Swiss with a 3+1 time control.
The live broadcast of the tournament.
Two players started with a perfect 7/7: GM Rustam Khusnutdinov (@RD4ever) of Kazakhstan and the Chessbrah GM from Canada, Eric Hansen (@erichansen). It was Khusnutdinov who kept his perfect score despite a small glitch at move 32:
Khusnutdinov finished with a half point out of three. He met his Waterloo in his game with Mamedyarov (@Azerichess) in round nine, where one mistake in the opening was enough:
Mamedyarov was the only player on 8.5 points by that point. He finished with two draws when Sadhwani (@champ2005), Safarli (@Eltaj_Safarli), and Zubov (@Alexander_Zubov) had also reached 9.5 but with a lower tiebreak.
Top favorite GM Hikaru Nakamura (@Hikaru) didn't finish at the top this time, despite finishing with 4/4. Besides two draws, he suffered a loss as early as round three against the 32-year-old Russian IM Roman Lovkov.
On a final note, for educational purposes, here's a rook endgame from round four between the Russian GM Dmitry Andreikin (@FairChess_on_YouTube) and his compatriot FM Evgeny Sapunov (@esapunov). Both missed a win, so perhaps a draw was the correct result:
December 22 Titled Tuesday | Final Standings (Top 20)
| Place | Seed | Fed | Title | Username | Name | Score | SB |
| 1 | 12 | GM | @Azerichess | Shakhriyar Mammadyarov | 9.5 | 69.75 | |
| 2 | 2 | GM | @champ2005 | Raunak Sadhwani | 9.5 | 66.75 | |
| 3 | 42 | GM | @Eltaj_Safarli | Eltaj Safarli | 9.5 | 65 | |
| 4 | 20 | GM | @Alexander_Zubov | Alexander Zubov | 9.5 | 62.25 | |
| 5 | 1 | GM | @Hikaru | Hikaru Nakamura | 9 | 64.5 | |
| 6 | 3 | GM | @Sibelephant | Vladislav Artemiev | 9 | 60.25 | |
| 7 | 62 | FM | @Ducu14 | David Gavrilescu | 9 | 55.5 | |
| 8 | 21 | GM | @Oleksandr_Bortnyk | Oleksandr Bortnyk | 9 | 55 | |
| 9 | 104 | GM | @Dynamikus | Sebastian Bogner | 9 | 54.25 | |
| 10 | 47 | GM | @GMHess | Robert L. Hess | 9 | 53 | |
| 11 | 40 | GM | @GukeshDommaraju | Gukesh D | 9 | 51 | |
| 12 | 72 | GM | @dretch | Conrad Holt | 8.5 | 57.25 | |
| 13 | 163 | GM | @swisspower96 | Noël Studer | 8.5 | 55.75 | |
| 14 | 36 | GM | @kuli4ik | Mikhail Demidov | 8.5 | 54.25 | |
| 15 | 23 | GM | @Jospem | Jose Eduardo Martinez Alcantara | 8.5 | 53.75 | |
| 15 | 80 | GM | @RD4ever | Rustam Khusnutdinov | 8.5 | 53.75 | |
| 17 | 107 | FM | @Kosak12 | Jakub Kosakowski | 8.5 | 52.75 | |
| 18 | 14 | GM | @dropstoneDP | David Paravyan | 8.5 | 51.25 | |
| 19 | 4 | GM | @FairChess_on_YouTube | Dmitry Andreikin | 8.5 | 50.5 | |
| 20 | 60 | IM | @kuban1991 | Oleg Vastrukhin | 8.5 | 49.75 |
(Full final standings here.)
Mamedyarov won $750 for first place, Sadhwani $400 for second, Safarli $150 for third, and Zubov $100 for fourth. The $100 prize for the best female player went to WGM Anna M. Sargsyan (@AnotherGrumpy), who scored 7/11.
Titled Tuesday is Chess.com's weekly tournament for titled players. It starts each Tuesday at 10 a.m. Pacific time (19:00 Central Europe).
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Peter Doggers is Chess.com’s Senior Global Correspondent. Between 2007 and 2013, his website ChessVibes was a major source for chess news and videos, acquired by Chess.com in October 2013. The Guardian’s Leonard Barden described him as “widely regarded as the world’s best chess journalist.”
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