Tata Steel (Wijk aan Zee) 2012

[Sebastian Stone]

Any endgame gurus care to offer a view on Van Wely vs Carlsen (move 35?). The traditional patzer view of opposite coloured Bs would say a draw, despite Carlsen's two extra (doubled a-) pawns.. but interested to hear what the cognoscenti think.

Not much of an endgame guru here, but I'd bet on a black win. The fact that the doubled a-pawns are passed makes it much harder to defend.

After 40. fxg5 then whites king scoots over to a1 and even if black gets the g pawn is still looks totally drawn.

I could be totally wrong here.

[AustinElliott]

And Van W and Carlsen have agreed a draw.

[Presumably if the White K reaches on the Q-side to blockade the a-pawns, as Sebastian says, then White can just run the BIshop up and down the f4-b8 diagonal to protect the g3 pawn, and Black can't do anything.]

I see the result makes Van Wely's record for the tournament + 0 - 2 and eleven (!) draws.

[AustinElliott]

So that leaves Aronian 1st on 9, and Radjabov & Carlsen joint 2nd on 8, with Caruana having a chance to join them if he can grind down Gelfand.

Though the Houdini read-out on the tournament live site thinks Caruana just dissipated most of his advantage by playing 30 Qf2

EDIT: A monumental time scramble appears to be in prospect in Grover-Sadler as both players are down to 6 min for 20 moves.

..down below FOUR min for Sadler, who is thinking about his 21st move.

..and now showing over SIX minutes again??!

All rather odd.

ANOTHER EDIT: And now showing THIRTEEN minutes.... WT*?