WESLEY So gave up a queen but managed to check struggling women’s grandmaster Hou Yifan and win in 30 moves of a Catalan Opening in the final round last Sunday.
The 24-year-old So went on to finish in a share of fifth and sixth places with Viswanathan Anand at the end of the 13-round 2018 Tata Steel chess tournament in Hiversum, the Netherlands.
So finished with 4 wins, eight draws and a loss after forcing Anand to give up after checking the Indian GM’s king for the second time.
Norwegian GM Magnus Carlsen won the crown for a record sixth time after beating Anish Giri, 1.5-0.5 in the blitz’ playoff finals.
Carlsen drew with Sergey Karjakin in 34 moves of a Ruy Lopez, while Giri halved his point with Wei Yi in 21 moves of a Reti Opening to finish tied for the lead at the end of the last game.
During the first playoff, Carlsen took 55 moves of turn back Giri after earning a one-pawn advantage at endgame.
In the second playoff, Carlsen threatened to force a queen exchange, but Carlsen opted for a draw following the presence of opposite-colored bishops after 38 moves.
The world no. 1 Carlsen won his first super tournament in 18 months. His last was a title victory in Bilbao.
Anand is the second winningest woodpusher in the tournament with five championships. He halved the point with Azerbaijan Grandmaster Shakhriyar Mamedyarov after 67 moves of Queens Gambit declined.
Russian GM Vladimir Kramnik toppled Indian Grandmaster Baskaran Adhiban after 55 moves of Vienna Opening to raise his total 8.5 points, the same output of Mamedyarov.
Kramnik took 3rd place, with a higher Sonneborn-Berger tiebreak score against 4th place Mamedyarov. Peter Atencio
