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Meier Scores Yet Another Titled Tuesday Victory

Meier Scores Yet Another Titled Tuesday Victory

PeterDoggers
| 8 | Chess.com News

NEXT TITLED TUESDAY, May 5th at 11am Pacific 2pm Eastern.

GM Georg Meier is a jolly good blitz fellow. Less than two weeks after crushing GM Sam Shankland in Death Match 31, the German grandmaster won the eighth Titled Tuesday event.

Staying clear of the field with 7.5/9, Meier clinched the $500 first prize in what was his third victory in Titled Tuesday history. He also won the second edition, and tied for first with two others last month

Only GM Baadur Jobava beats that record. The popular Georgian GM, who might have skipped this edition because of his honeymoon (he married WGM Aleksandra Dimitrijevic on March 29) won the first, fourth and fifth edition and tied for first in the sixth.

It would be too much (or too little) to start showing Meier's first-round winner. He won it by playing the killer move 1.Nf3, and three minutes later the score was 1-0. GM Vladimir Belov must have had connection problems as he promptly withdrew.

If anyone named Danny still had doubts, GM Maxime Vachier-Lagrave (GM LyonBeast) showed that his victory against our own IM Danny Rensch, in a match with giant pieces last summer, was no coincidence. MVL duly won their round one game.

Because it was good fun, let's embed one of these games one more time here:

Back to last Tuesday. GM Maxim Dlugy, another blitz specialist in the field, barely needed 20 moves to win his game against CM Juan Antonio Urbina Perez:

GM Max Dlugy, one of the blitz specialists who participated.

MVL played a crazy tactical game in round two, plenty of pieces sacrificed or hanging. Hugaski was just winning on move 27, but then played a logical but inaccurate move that allowed a perpetual. 


The game of the tournament was Maxime Vachier-Lagrave vs Yaacov Norowitz. The French number one got a strong attack that finished with a queen sacrifice followed by a bishop giving mate. GM Meier joined the chat to call the mate “naughty.” 


A “naughty” checkmate by MVL.

By this point three players were leading with 4.5/5: MVL, Dlugy and Argentinian IM Lucas Liascovich (Megarompa). The latter drew with Meier while Vachier-Lagrave defeated Dlugy quickly:

In the same round something remarkable happened in the game between IM Bjarke Sahl and IM Rensch. The Norwegian master offered a draw a few moves after reaching the KBN v K ending, admitting he would never find the mate in the time he had left.

So far the Titled Tuesday regulations have worked out fine, and one can hardly imagine that a fun online blitz tournament needs anti-draw rules. However, after the 12-move draw between Vachier-Lagrave and Edouard, Chess.com staff might have to reconsider.

Keeping the lead, MVL commented “superbe!” but some spectators were not amused!

The game Dlugy vs GM Daniel Fridman deserves special attention because in the final phase Fridman had two knights and Dlugy only a pawn. This famous endgame was discovered by the Frenchman Chapais around 1780, although Gioachino Greco is said to have used it in a composition as early as 1620.

Later it was analyzed heavily by several endgame fanatics, and these days the tablebase has solved all the mysteries.


The main point is that two knights cannot force a checkmate because the defending side always escapes with stalemate... except when he has a pawn left! The attacker needs to try and push the enemy king into a corner while keeping the pawn from queening.

The starting position in Dlugy-Fridman was a draw, but White quickly erred. Fridman failed to spot the right idea and had to maneuver for about 35 moves, but eventually he found it!


Daniel Fridman | Photo Georgios Souleidis.

The key game for the tournament was MVL vs Meier in round eight— an incredible encounter! Meier was outplayed in the opening and gave up a rook for three pawns to create some chaos. Objectively speaking he was totally lost, but he somehow managed to get passed pawns rolling and made White's extra rook look helpess.


Meier moved into lead with 6.5/8, while a large group was sitting on 6.0/8 including MVL, Fridman and Megarompa. The leader secured sole victory with another win in a nice 
knight-and-pawn endgame:


Georg Meier does it again!

The second place was shared by GM Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, FM Marko Sokač (who won his last two games) and GM Romain Edouard. All scored 7.0/9 and earned $150. 

IM Jeffery Xiong was only one at 6.5/9, finishing clear fifth ($50) and commenting in the chat: “How can I claim check?” Laughing

xxx

Titled Tuesday, 7 April 2015 | Final Standings

# Fed Title Username Name Score SB
1 SWE GM GeorgMeier Meier, Georg 7.5 36.25
2 FRA GM LyonBeast Vachier Lagrave, Maxime 7 40.5
3 HRV FM zmaj23 Sokač, Marko 7 34.5
4 ESP GM Mugzyyy Edouard, Romain 7 24.5
5 USA IM jefferyx Xiong, Jeffery 6.5 28.5
6 ARG IM megarompa Liascovich, Lucas A. 6 35.25
7 DEU GM Daniel_Fridman Fridman, Daniel 6 30
8 ESP IM JRgascon Gascón D., Jose Rafael 6 27
9 FRA GM Mazetovic Maze, Sebastien 6 26.5
10 PER FM renatoterrylujan Terry Lujan, Renato Alfredo 6 24.5
10 USA GM kubrick28 Hungaski, Robert 6 24.5
12 FRA FM bugsbunny444 undisclosed 6 23.5
13 FRA GM REALBIZOO undisclosed 5.5 21
14 ESP GM jcibarra Ibarra Jerez, José Carlos 5.5 20.5
15 USA IM Yaacovn Norowitz, Yaacov 5.5 19.25
16 USA GM Dlugy Dlugy, Maxim 5 28.75
17 HUN GM Imre91 Balog, Imre 5 24.25
18 FRA IM tac49 undisclosed 5 23
19 LVA IM IMDbx Meshkov, Nikita 5 21
20 NLD IM SCIM Leenhouts, Koen 5 18.5
20 LVA NM Ar4uha Bernotas, Arturs 5 18.5
22 POL FM lukas_111111 Jarmula, Lukasz 5 17.5
23 USA NM brauliocuarta Cuarta, Braulio 5 16.75
24 USA NM HansCoolNiemann Niemann, Hans 5 15
25 HUN FM DrHolmes13 Juhasz, Armin 5 13
26 CHE NM pacific_heights undisclosed 4.5 18
27 ARG IM facu57 Quiroga, Facundo 4.5 15.5
28 USA NM Guardalban undisclosed 4.5 13.25
29 USA IM DanielRensch Rensch, Daniel 4.5 10.75
30 RUS FM petrpalachev Palachev, Petr 4 16.25
31 USA NM jbj Xu, Grant 4 15.75
32 INT CM kesarev Hafanana, Kakadu 4 15.5
33 ARG FM guillead1 Dibenedetto, Guillermo 4 14
34 ESP CM jaup Urbina Perez, Juan Antonio 4 10
34 USA FM MattyDPerrine Perrine, Dalton 4 10
36 USA NM iFrancisco Guadalupe II, Francisco 4 8.5
37 IRQ CM chessloveyou Muhsen, Abdulla 4 7
38 ISR NM shrekdavid undisclosed 3.5 13
39 KGZ NM AlmirDzhumaev undisclosed 3.5 12.5
40 NOR IM BjarkeSahl Sahl, Bjarke 3.5 9.25
41 ITA NM AndrewMcStone undisclosed 3.5 6
42 RUS WFM NastyaPro Pro, Nastya 3.5 5.75
43 USA NM chesstatour undisclosed 3 4.5
43 DEU CM ilmago undisclosed 3 4.5
45 VEN WIM OIAM03 Aponte, Oriana 1 0
46 NLD GM JackSnipe undisclosed 3 7.5
47 IND NM saumilpadhya undisclosed 3 7
48 NLD GM David_Klein Klein, David 2 4
49 RUS IM Zvonokchess Petrov, Nikita 2 3
50 USA FM grandmastergauri Shankar, Gauri 2 2.5
51 NLD FM chillinx There, Hi 2 2
52 BGR FM Tilicheev_Viacheslav Viacheslav, Tilicheev 1 3
53 IND WGM AccioChess Rout, Padmini 1 2
54 USA NM Petrosianic O'Brien, Matthew 1 1
54 VEN FM pedromartinez91 martinez, pedro 1 1
56 USA CM eltenedor Bennett, David 1 0
56 USA NM gumersindo Garcia, Erick 1 0
56 USA NM patzerplay Auger, Michael 1 0
59 RUS FM Keranke Seliverstov, Vladimir 0 0
59 USA NM kharposh abdi, farzad 0 0
59 USA IM Cryptochess Katz, Alexander 0 0
59 USA CM smarterchess Jensen, Matt 0 0
59 RUS GM VB84 Belov, Vladimir 0 0
59 USA NM esr44 Rosenberg, Evan 0 0

xxx

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Chess.com uses advanced cheat detection and scrutinizes all games played in the event.

The next Titled Tuesday event will be Tuesday, May 5, 11 am Pacific (GMT -7), 2 pm Eastern (GMT -4), 8 pm CET (GMT +1). All players with any FIDE title are invited to attend.

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PeterDoggers
Peter Doggers

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.”

In October, Peter's first book The Chess Revolution will be published!


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