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Levon Aronian outplayed the world’s best to clinch the second Grand chess tour tournament of the calendar year, held in St. Louis, Missouri. He needed just a draw in the last round against Bulgaria’s Vesselin Topalov and did so convincingly. Though the first leg was taken up by storm by Topalov, Aronian took the next.
The Grand chess tour is a three tournament format comprising the world’s best 10 players competing against each other in a round-robin format. The three events will be played in Norway, Saint Louis and London. With the conclusion of the Norway and Saint Louis tournaments, the biggest one is yet to come. It will be held in December in London, and is also known as the classic tournament.
The tour has many big attractions for the game of chess. First, there is a large amount at stake as prize money for each event. In addition, at the end of the tour, the top three will receive an added bonus. The winner also earns the title of the best in the world.
Even though he does not win the world championship title, he still gets some bragging rights. There is also a lot of media attention from around the world making chess a more popular sport. The tournaments are also attracting increasingly large crowds and has a huge fan following.
It only goes to say that chess is headed in the right direction and if things continue like this chess will get all that it deserves as a sport.
The Sinquefield Cup turned out to be a bright tournament for many, however things were not so good for a few players.
Indian icon Viswanathan Anand had a dull tournament since the start and ended eighth, although he finished second in the Norway leg of the tour. The tournament was also dissappointing for Fabio Caruana and Wesley So who finished ninth and tenth respectively.
The biggest disappointment of the tournament was Magnus Carlsen’s performance. Despite being the favourite at the tournament, he did not win, and has yet to win a grand tour tournament. Despite his early collapse, however, he still managed a third-place finish.
The event was however fantastic for Anish Giri, Maxime Vachier-Lagrave and Hikaru Nakamura who all managed to gain some crucial ELO Rating points. All in all, the tournament was a great experience and had something interesting in each of the nine rounds.
All eyes are now set on London for the final showdown in December.
The final ranking of the players in the Sinquefield Cup 2015:
- Levon Aronian (6 points)
- Anish Giri (5 points)
- Magnus Carlsen (5 points)
- MVL (5 points)
- Hikaru Nakamura (5 points)
- Veslein Topalov (4.5 points)
- Alexander Grishchuk (4.5 points)
- Viswanathan Anand (3.5 points)
- Fabio Caruana (3.5 points)
- Wesley So (3 points)
