New In Chess Classic: Carlsen, Nakamura Still Unbeaten
GM Magnus Carlsen took the lead at the New in Chess Classic on day two of the preliminaries. With an undefeated 7/10, Carlsen is half a point ahead of GMs Hikaru Nakamura (also unbeaten) and GM Alireza Firouzja.
The games of the New in Chess Classic preliminaries can be found here as part of our live events platform. IM Levy Rozman and IM Anna Rudolf are providing daily commentary on GM Hikaru Nakamura's Twitch channel starting at 10:00 a.m. Pacific / 19:00 Central Europe.
GM Praggnanandhaa R. couldn't repeat his good score from day one. The 15-year-old Indian GM, who still has a rapid rating below 1800 because of a lack of official games, scored 1.5/5 on day two and is in danger of elimination.
The same can be said for GM Jan-Krzysztof Duda and GM Sergey Karjakin, but also GM Levon Aronian and GM Wesley So cannot afford mistakes in rounds 11-15. If GM Aryan Tari has a good third day, we'll see two Norwegians in the knockout stage.
New in Chess Classic | Round 10 Standings
| # | Fed | Name | Rtg | Perf | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | Pts |
| 1 | Carlsen | 2881 | 2838 | ½ | ½ | 1 | ½ | 1 | ½ | 1 | ½ | 1 | ½ | 7.0/10 | |||||||
| 2 | Nakamura | 2829 | 2819 | ½ | ½ | 1 | ½ | ½ | 1 | ½ | ½ | ½ | 1 | 6.5/10 | |||||||
| 3 | Firouzja | 2703 | 2804 | ½ | 0 | ½ | 1 | 1 | 0 | ½ | 1 | 1 | 1 | 6.5/10 | |||||||
| 4 | Radjabov | 2758 | 2686 | ½ | ½ | ½ | ½ | ½ | 1 | 0 | ½ | 1 | 1 | 6.0/10 | |||||||
| 5 | Mamedyarov | 2761 | 2703 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | ½ | 1 | 1 | 1 | ½ | 6.0/10 | |||||||
| 6 | Le | 2744 | 2702 | 0 | ½ | ½ | 1 | ½ | 1 | 0 | ½ | 1 | 1 | 6.0/10 | |||||||
| 7 | So | 2741 | 2662 | 0 | ½ | 1 | ½ | 1 | 1 | ½ | 0 | 1 | 0 | 5.5/10 | |||||||
| 8 | Aronian | 2778 | 2739 | ½ | ½ | 0 | ½ | ½ | ½ | ½ | 1 | 1 | ½ | 5.5/10 | |||||||
| 9 | Tari | 2531 | 2662 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | ½ | ½ | 1 | 1 | ½ | 1 | 5.5/10 | |||||||
| 10 | Vidit | 2636 | 2630 | ½ | ½ | ½ | 0 | 0 | ½ | ½ | ½ | 1 | 1 | 5.0/10 | |||||||
| 11 | Praggnanandhaa | 1781 | 2670 | 1 | ½ | 0 | 0 | 0 | ½ | 0 | 1 | 1 | ½ | 4.5/10 | |||||||
| 12 | Dominguez | 2786 | 2613 | 0 | ½ | 0 | 0 | ½ | ½ | 1 | ½ | ½ | 1 | 4.5/10 | |||||||
| 13 | Duda | 2774 | 2515 | ½ | 0 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | ½ | ½ | 3.5/10 | |||||||
| 14 | Karjakin | 2709 | 2554 | ½ | ½ | 0 | 0 | ½ | 0 | 0 | ½ | ½ | 1 | 3.5/10 | |||||||
| 15 | Jones | 2615 | 2474 | 0 | 0 | ½ | 0 | 1 | 0 | ½ | ½ | 0 | ½ | 3.0/10 | |||||||
| 16 | Christiansen | 2521 | 2425 | ½ | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | ½ | 0 | 0 | 0 | ½ | 1.5/10 |
Like yesterday, we're starting with Praggnanandhaa because it's so interesting to see how the prodigy from India is doing in this stellar field. He started his day with losses to two former world blitz champions, GM Le Quang Liem and GM Leinier Dominguez. A draw with compatriot GM Vidit Gujrathi was followed by a lucky win vs. GM Teimour Radjabov, but then Tari was too strong.
Like Karjakin the other day, Radjabov blundered vs. Pragg in an equal position. Especially with the Candidates going on as well, some will say that online rapid is more entertaining than chess.
Like on day one, Carlsen scored three draws and two wins. One of his victims was GM Gawain Jones, who played the Sicilian Dragon like he had done against the world champ in 2018 in Wijk aan Zee.
This time, Carlsen decided to avoid the main lines with the surprising 7.Qd2!? that has always been condemned for allowing 7...Ng4 but in the hands of a super-grandmaster, even this is playable for White. Helped with the ridiculously strong cloud engines, these days we can rewrite all opening books.
Both Firouzja and Nakamura are smoothly heading toward the knockout stage as well. In round nine, Firouzja won a nice attacking game against Aronian, whose king had to run into an open field but didn't survive the onslaught:
Nakamura has drawn seven games and won three so far. GM Johan-Sebastian Christiansen, who had started with 0/5, scored three draws on the second day but didn't stand a chance against Naka:
All Games Day 2
The New in Chess Classic runs April 24-May 2 on chess24. The preliminary phase is a 16-player rapid (15|10) round-robin. The top eight players advance to a six-day knockout that consists of two days of four-game rapid matches, which advance to blitz (5|3) and armageddon (White has five minutes, Black four with no increment) tiebreaks only if a knockout match is tied after the second day. The prize fund is $100,000 with $30,000 for first place.
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