Magnus Carlsen

Both yesterday and today we had dinner at the nearby Italian restaurant in the fashionable Arbat street close to the hotel. Eating out can be quite a challenge coming from a country with strict anti-smoking laws. Magnus is very sensitive to cigarette smoke and most Russians seem to smoke during restaurant visits. Fortunately the restaurant is fairly empty early in the evening. Maybe it is related to the fact that a dinner costs 5-10 times more than in nearby McDonald (compared to for instance a ratio of 2 or 3 in Norway.) 

Magnus had a bit of a cold when he went to Crete and a worse cold when he came back. He was better when we left for Moscow but not really in his best shape to start a super-tournament. After sleeping long nights and resting a lot here in Moscow he is fortunately much better now, and we believe he can finish this tournament without being affected by illness.  

Lots of fighting games today in Tal Memorial.
Magnus was surprised by 1.d4 by Jakovenko. He followed a prepared line and more or less equalised but was not sure what to do after 20.Re1. After 24.a5 Jakovenko offered a draw but nearly an hour ahead on the clock and with a comfortable position Magnus chose to play on. It is hard to say exactly where white went wrong, maybe the whole plan of pushing the a-pawn was faulty. After 28.Bd5 f3 black is better and after 29.c4 he is probably winning due to all the tactics in the position. At the right time Magnus could play Bxc4 and exchange two rooks for the white queen and a c-pawn that was impossible to stop. Jakovenko fought on until move 41 before resigning. 0-1.
Magnus felt in great form during the game today and it was probably quite a good one. In his 12^th Tal Memorial game (previously he has scored =9-2) it sure was great to secure his first win! 

After some 20+ moves Mamedyarov and Ivanchuk had a position it was extremely hard to evaluate, but when Shak found the excellent piece sacrifice Bf7 removing the queen from the protection of e5, his powerful knights and discovered threats soon overpowered Ivanchuk. 1-0.
Another decisive game of the day was a close to 6 hour battle between Kramnik and Leko. Kramnik got a pawn majority on the queen side and through his better coordination of pieces in the end managed to break Leko?s stubborn defence to win the a-pawn and the game. 1-0.
Kamsky soon got into trouble against Shirov despite the white pieces. Shirov was positionally much better after 19 moves but with 2 minutes and 30s increments left on the clock we would not have been surprised by any outcome of the game. In a probably lost position Kamsky ended up hanging a piece. 0-1.
Alekseev seemed to have an initiative against Gelfand but obviously could not find a way to break Gelfand's defence and a draw was agreed before the time before 40 moves. 

Kramnik, Mamedyarov and Magnus is leading with 2/3, and Magnus has white against Mamedyarov tomorrow! 
Several GMs present has noted the improvements in Magnus' play relative to last year. It does indeed look promising with regard to improving last year's 3,5/9 performance.
 
Henrik Carlsen
Moscow, November 12th