Mamedyarov Grabs Another Titled Tuesday
Four weeks after his first win, GM Shakhriyar Mamedyarov won the January 19 Titled Tuesday tournament as well. The Azerbaijani grandmaster finished in clear first place with 10/11.
This week's Titled Tuesday tournament, our weekly blitz event for titled players, had a total of 741 participants. It was an 11-round Swiss with a 3+1 time control.
The live broadcast of the tournament.
An interesting game early in the tournament was @NewBornNow vs. @Hikaru. The white player is GM Victor Bologan, the Moldavian grandmaster who is FIDE's Executive Director. It's nice to see that this chess official still enjoys his evening blitz sometimes.
Bologan's strong opening knowledge (he has published numerous books and DVDs) helped him to leave GM Hikaru Nakamura with little chance in a Modern Defense:
Speaking of openings, let's look at the clash between GM Oleksandr Bortnyk and GM Anton Korobov (@GOGIEFF) where the white player tried the Wing Gambit against the French, a popular variation at club level. It looks like one of the ways to get a satisfactory position as Black is to simply accept it:
That brought Korobov to 7/7, but he was not the only one. The Ukrainian grandmaster Alexander Zubov, also on a perfect score, was his next opponent. This game was a good example of why "weakening" the kingside with ...gxf6 is not always bad for Black. Zubov was already winning when Korobov suddenly allowed a mate in one:
Zubov even won another game to make 9/9 but found his Waterloo in Mamedyarov:
The tournament was decided in a hectic game between Mamedyarov and Korobov. An online blitz game like this perhaps doesn't deserve a serious analysis, but surely the readers are interested in the many twists and turns:
Jan. 19 Titled Tuesday | Final Standings (Top 20)
| # | Rk | Fed | Title | Username | Name | Score | SB |
| 1 | 4 | GM | @Azerichess | Shakhriyar Mammadyarov | 10 | 65 | |
| 2 | 20 | GM | @champ2005 | Raunak Sadhwani | 9.5 | 64.25 | |
| 3 | 10 | GM | @Alexander_Zubov | Alexander Zubov | 9.5 | 58.5 | |
| 4 | 17 | GM | @jefferyx | Jeffery Xiong | 9 | 63 | |
| 5 | 13 | GM | @ChessWarrior7197 | Nodirbek Abdusattorov | 9 | 62.25 | |
| 6 | 15 | GM | @GM_dmitrij | Dmitrij Kollars | 9 | 59.75 | |
| 7 | 36 | GM | @igorkovalenko | Igor Kovalenko | 9 | 58.5 | |
| 8 | 21 | GM | @GOGIEFF | Anton Korobov | 9 | 54 | |
| 9 | 42 | GM | @HansOnTwitch | Hans Niemann | 9 | 53 | |
| 10 | 115 | GM | @zaur-mammadov | Zaur Mammadov | 9 | 51.5 | |
| 11 | 165 | GM | @ENajer77 | Evgeniy Najer | 9 | 46.5 | |
| 12 | 35 | GM | @PSvidler | Peter Svidler | 9 | 46 | |
| 13 | 63 | GM | @Alexsur1981 | Aleksei Pridorozhni | 8.5 | 56.5 | |
| 14 | 18 | IM | @Ducu14 | David Gavrilescu | 8.5 | 55.25 | |
| 15 | 16 | IM | @AlexTriapishko | Alexandr Triapishko | 8.5 | 55 | |
| 16 | 69 | GM | @Sam_ChessMood | Samvel Ter-Sahakyan | 8.5 | 52.75 | |
| 17 | 54 | GM | @TigrVShlyape | Gata Kamsky | 8.5 | 52 | |
| 18 | 164 | IM | @elohunter1999 | Robert Baskin | 8.5 | 49.5 | |
| 19 | 56 | IM | @kuban1991 | Oleg Vastrukhin | 8.5 | 49 | |
| 20 | 140 | GM | @Harry_Rakkel | Krzysztof Jakubowski | 8.5 | 48.5 |
(Full final standings here.)
Mamedyarov won $750 for first place, Sadhwani $400 for second, Zubov $150 for third, and Xiong $100 for fourth. The $100 prize for the best female player went to GM Aleksandra Goryachkina (@Goryachkina), who scored 7.5/11.
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).
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.
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