Rest day in Norway and Legnica

The first third part of supertournament Norway Chess 2013 ended yesterday, and in the EICC in Polish Legnica today finished seventh round which means that tomorrow is a rest day.
There were really interesting fights in these top events.

The results from Norway can be seen in the table.
After three rounds it is obivious that Karjakin is in great form.
He has 3 out of 3, and on the opposite end of the table is Hammer with 0 out of 3.
This tournament is too hard for him, but I am sure that he will manage to get some points.
The highest rated player, Magnus Carlsen played three draws, and the we are still waiting to see the best of him.
The World Champion, Anand won in a very convincing style against Topalov in his favourite opening, Najdorf variation of The Sicilian (Although, he was annoyed by the questions in the commentary room by Simon Agdenstain, and left the room without answering on the last question).
Aronian´s form looks good, and other players did not impressed.
Radjabov won against Hammer to climb on 50% while, Svidler and Nakamura had one bad day and one good round.
One more bad day had Wang.
Topalov´s play was really pail, but he had very tough opposition, so he can hope for better days in the coming rounds.

Results/Standings

	Players		1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	Total	A	B	C
1	KARJAKIN Sergey	RUS							1	1		1	3	2,5	3	1
2	ARONIAN Levon	ARM			½		1	½					2	3,25	1	0
3	ANAND Viswanathan	IND		½		½					1		2	2,75	1	0
4	CARLSEN Magnus	NOR			½		½				½		1,5	2,25	0	0
5	NAKAMURA Hikaru	USA		0		½				1			1,5	1,75	1	0
6	SVIDLER Peter	RUS		½						0		1	1,5	1	1	0
7	RADJABOV Teimour	AZE	0								½	1	1,5	0,5	1	0
8	WANG Hao	CHN	0				0	1					1	1,5	1	0
9	TOPALOV Veselin	BUL			0	½			½				1	1,5	0	0
10	HAMMER Jon Ludvig	NOR	0					0	0				0	0	0	0

EICC in Legnica

One could see that players were approaching the rest day in Legnica.

On the first 20 boards only three had decisive results.

It does not mean that the players did not want to win their games, but it seems that they are saving an energy for the last four rounds and did not want to take any risks.

After seven rounds, GM Moiseenko Alexander is still leading.

I am sure that his primary goal is to win this championship, and not only to qualify for The World Cup.

The first 23 players will qualify for The World Cup, and the majority of players has that as a goal for the championship.

Swedish GM Nils Grandelius is not an exception.

However, in the last four rounds he needs 3,5 points in order to get 7,5 out of 11.

In the last two championships, 7,5 was enough for the qualification (with a good tie break).

In today´s game he played brave against Romanian GM Nisipeanu, and after mutual mistakes eventually drew.

Despite that this results means that his chances for top 23 decreased, he can be satisfied with a draw if we consider what happened in the game.

As you can see from the table, Championship is dominated by the players from the East of Europe.

Spanish GM Vallejo Pons is only non east-European player in the group of players chasing Moiseenko.

I played against two of these guys, and I lost both of the games.

I lost against Fedorchuk in Germany 2008 and against Romanov in Copenhagen 2012.

Rank after Round 7

Rk.			Name	FED	Rtg	Pts.	TB1	TB2	TB3	TB4	Rp	K	rtg+/-
1		GM	MOISEENKO Alexander	UKR	2698	6.0	2624	27.0	27.5	5	2772	10	14.8
2		GM	ALEKSEEV Evgeny	RUS	2700	5.5	2628	28.5	31.5	4	2838	10	11.4
3		GM	ROMANOV Evgeny	RUS	2640	5.5	2616	28.5	32.0	4	2812	10	15.1
4		GM	VALLEJO PONS Francisco	ESP	2695	5.5	2600	26.0	29.0	4	2812	10	9.4
5		GM	LYSYJ Igor	RUS	2641	5.5	2588	24.5	27.5	4	2793	10	12.8
6		GM	BELIAVSKY Alexander G	SLO	2628	5.5	2586	27.0	29.5	4	2788	10	13.8
7		GM	LUPULESCU Constantin	ROU	2634	5.5	2580	25.5	28.0	4	2784	10	12.8
8		GM	FEDORCHUK Sergey A.	UKR	2660	5.5	2550	23.5	26.5	5	2752	10	7.7