Poikovsky: Jakovenko in sole lead
Dmitry Jakovenko leads the Karpov tournament in Poikovsky with 5.5/8. In round 8 he beat Alexander Motylev with Black, while co-leader Alexander Riazantsev lost to Sergey Karjakin with the white pieces in a spectacular game. The top seed is now half a point behind the leader.The 11th edition of the tournament named after 12th World Champion Anatoly Karpov takes place June 2-13 in Poikovsky, Russia. For the first time the tournament has not 10, but 12 players. See our first report for more info.Rounds 7-8
In our previous report we complained a little bit about the many (short) draws in Poikovsky, but there's no reason to be unhappy about what happened on Wednesday and Thursday. Many great fights, and three black victories in the last round, brought Jakovenko in sole lead.The following game was an interesting draw.
White should be winning. However, after 32.Bxf8 Black managed to complicate matters with 32...Rb3!? 33.Qa5 (33.Qc5!) 33...Bd3+! 34.Rxd3 Rxd3 and now instead of 35.Bh6! White went 35.Qa6? gxf5! and Black saved himself.Yesterday Riazantsev wasn't so lucky anymore against Karjakin, who managed to defend against a strong, prepared piece sacrifice.
White came up with 12.Nf5!?. Karjakin took the knight, defended by playing his king to the queenside and all the way to d2 and eventually won!
