Vachier-Lagrave wins Paris Ch
The summer is finally there. After performing a bit too modestly in many European countries the sun now does its job big time, which meant a sudden change of the weather into really hot summer days. Those days you normally don't play chess. Or do you?Of course everywhere many, many tournaments are being played at this very moment or very soon. The weather description I just gave took place in many European cities and also in the French capital, where last week I played in the Championship of Paris. Luckily the really hot days coincided only with the last two rounds, which therefore reminded me of last year's ACT tournament. (Because my opponent didn't show up in round 8 I only had to suffer for one round, and I could spend my Saturday celebrating Quatorze Juillet, although it wasn't as special as I expected it to be. Nothing beats our Queen's Day I guess.)A not too well-known tournament (it wasn't on Harmen Jonkman's chess calendar for example) but still quite big and strong. Four different groups played in the Stadium de Coubertin, in the 16th arrondissement which is known to be quite poshy, with terras prices like 4,5 euros for a beer. The main group was for players above 2200 and here the GMs David, Fressinet, Fedorchuk, Dizdar, Vachier-Lagrave, Schekachev and Tregubov played for the prizes. The latter started strongly with five wins, but then the fun was over. He finished with four draws, surviving several lost positions. This way both first-seed Fressinet and the French top talent Vachier-Lagrave could come by. Because of his great start Tregubov would be declared the winner in almost every tournament but the French always do things a bit differently, and this includes their tiebreak system. It has something to do with leaving out the worst results of the opponents ?¢‚Ǩ‚Äú don't ask me for the details ?¢‚Ǩ‚Äú but Vachier-Lagrave may call himself champion of Paris. Like with all talents of these days, his fans call him a 'tactisch beast'.Top final standings:
1 g VACHIER-LAGRAVE Maxime 2595 7 44,5 2719 2 g TREGUBOV Pavel V. 2599 7 43,5 2728 3 g FRESSINET Laurent 2646 7 43 2686 4 g MORADIABADI Elshan 2540 6,5 40,5 2563 5 g DAVID Alberto 2529 6,5 40 2548 6 g RENET Olivier 2498 6 45,5 2639 7 g FEDORCHUK Sergey A. 2618 6 45 2617 8 g SHCHEKACHEV Andrei 2541 6 38 2476 9 m BERNARD Christophe 2354 6 38 2455 10 m VAN DELFT Merijn 2408 6 37,5 2450 11 g DIZDAR Goran 2553 5,5 40,5 2507 12 FAYARD Alain 2305 5,5 39,5 2506 13 DOURERASSOU Jonathan 2346 5,5 38,5 2483 14 m BROCHET Philippe 2396 5,5 37 2422 15 PILE Richard 2277 5,5 36,5 2452 16 m ONKOUD Abdelaziz 2396 5,5 36 2429 17 CARLHAMMAR Magnus 2331 5,5 33 2377 18 m GOVCIYAN Pavel 2430 5,5 31 2343Full final standings here. The games of the top boards can be found here for download. I can recommend the game of ChessVibes-editor Merijn van Delft with White against Laurent Fressinet. The puzzle to solve is: on which two moments could White make a draw? The venue?¢‚Ǩ¬¶ ?¢‚Ǩ¬¶very close to Porte St. Cloud square Inside the stadium, one hour before the tournament Ready to play? GM Alberto David GM Goran Dizdar GM Sergey Fedorchuk GM Laurent Fressinet GM Andrei Schekachev, second of Alexander Grischuk in Mexico GM Pavel Tregubov GM Maxime Vachier-Lagrave GM Olivier Renet IM Merijn van Delft, who took the 10th prize (500 euros) The arbiters Top boards, last round Beamer + screen showing the top boards An interesting ending: Van Delft-Fressinet (round 2) Fressinet & Dizdar analysing their last round game (1-0) together with David Playing chess possible throughout the year in Parque Luxembourg