Chess world champion Magnus Carlsen has won his own online tournament with eight grandmasters. The 29-year-old Norwegian won 2.5: 1.5 against the American Hikaru Nakamura on Sunday evening. “It was tough, but I’m happy to have made it in the end,” said Carlsen.
–
In the final with four rapid chess games, both grandmasters dominated with the white pieces. Carlsen started with a win, Nakamura struck back before Carlsen took the lead again. In the fourth game, everything looked like another comeback for Nakamura, but the 32-year-old American did not take advantage of the final and had to agree to the draw.
The invitation tournament with eight of the world’s best players was a roller coaster ride for Carlsen. He started with four wins in the preliminary round, but then lost two of the last three matches and only went to the semi-finals as third. Here he prevailed after a tough battle against the world’s number three, the Chinese Ding Liren.
–
Carlsen had organized the tournament together with the chess24 platform after the candidate tournament in Saint-Petersburg, which had been canceled due to the corona crisis, in which he himself is involved financially. The invitation tournament was endowed with $ 250,000. Carlsen received a $ 70,000 win bonus, Nakamura a $ 45,000 bonus.
He has been playing online since the beginning of the millennium, Carlsen wrote to SPIEGEL on request. With his online pseudonym DrNykterstein, Carlsen wants to put chess in a better position, even for the time after the crisis. You can read the whole story here.
–
