Duda Wins Nailbiter Over Vachier-Lagrave, Carlsen

GM Jan-Krzysztof Duda won a dramatic Titled Tuesday on December 23, just barely winning on tiebreaks ahead of GM Maxime Vachier-Lagrave. It was Duda’s first win in the event since February 18, and he got there by defeating GM Magnus Carlsen in the final round in a game that also went down to the wire.

Carlsen nonetheless maintained his wide lead in the Champions Chess Tour (CCT) standings and his somewhat smaller lead in the December-February Titled Tuesday split, but Duda improved his position greatly in both.

Broadcast

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CCT Standings

Tournament Recap

Out of the field of 422, making this the busiest Titled Tuesday since October, seven players started 5/5. But only Vachier-Lagrave reached 6/6, which he accomplished with a win over GM Jeffery Xiong. Vachier-Lagrave’s path to 7/7, however, went through GM Hikaru Nakamura however. Both players had their winning chances before settling for a draw, while GM Haowen Xue joined Vachier-Lagrave in the lead after defeating GM Nodirbek Abdusattorov (dubbed “Abdu-Santarov” by the commentators on the final Titled Tuesday before Christmas).

A giant 14-player group was gathered a half-point back, leaving the possible results wide open with four rounds to play. Vachier-Lagrave took the advantage back for himself in the eighth round, beating Xue in the battle of co-leaders.

Only three of the 14 players remained half a point behind Vachier-Lagrave (or “MV Elf” in another of Howell’s Christmas puns): Carlsen, Duda, and GM Zhamsaran Tsydypov. But there were still 14 more on 6.5/8 entering the break.

Coming out of the break, Vachier-Lagrave had to defend his lead against Carlsen with the black pieces. Vachier-Lagrave chose the Grunfeld Defense, but Carlsen won fairly smoothly.

Meanwhile, Duda and Tsydypov made a draw, giving Carlsen the sole lead with just two rounds remaining, but eight players trailed him by the half-point. Defending his lead against Nakamura, the advantage wouldn’t last long. They played an unusual but drawish variation of the Four Knights, and no player ever built a significant edge, leading to a drawn endgame with more than 45 seconds left on both players’ clocks. The result was an atypically uneventful draw for the most anticipated matchup in chess.

Meanwhile, Vachier-Lagrave continued his perfect performance against everyone not named Magnus or Hikaru (this time against GM Andrey Esipenko in a battle of world championship candidate versus former candidate), while Duda won a mad time scramble with IM Renato Terry.

Tsydypov and GM Pranav Venkatesh also won their penultimate-round matchups, leading to a five-way tie for first place on 8.5/10. Six players had 8/10, but they didn’t have much of a chance at winning the event with so many players ahead of them.

The last round was still set for plenty of drama involving Duda–Carlsen, Vachier-Lagrave–Tsydypov, and Nakamura–Pranav on the top three boards. Vachier-Lagrave built the best early position as Tsydypov dropped a pawn, but Pranav also fell behind Nakamura, while Carlsen got a modest positional edge on Duda. All three held a time advantage as well into the mid/late middlegames, but Duda-Carlsen turned into an even endgame as Vachier-Lagrave became the first co-leader to win.

Pranav continued to fade against Nakamura, but before their game ended, Carlsen pushed a pawn in the other game. It was a blunder, opening a diagonal leading to a mating net and victory for Duda.

Nakamura shortly thereafter ended Pranav’s victory hopes.

Between Vachier-Lagrave and Duda, the tiebreaks were completely unclear. In the end, the first tiebreak score was even, but Duda pulled it out on the second tiebreak after GM Alexander Grischuk lost on time in an equal position in the final round for the second straight week. GM Nikolas Theodorou was the player to flag Grischuk, giving the Greek player a fourth-place finish behind Nakamura in third. The other cash winners were GM Parham Maghsoodloo in fifth, GM Dmitry Andreikin in sixth, and IM Polina Shuvalova in 43rd as the highest woman scorer.

December 23 Titled Tuesday | Final Standings (Top 20)

(Full final standings.)