The final day of Superbet Rapid & Blitz Poland was filled with a significant amount of excitement in the history of The Grand Chess Tour. Going to the final round of the blitz games, four players had a chance to win or tie for first place for this event. In the end, it was the Polish wildcard GM Jan-Krzysztof Duda who secured the Superbet Rapid & Blitz Poland first place prize. Duda’s performance was consistent throughout the event and his result only got better as the event came to a close.
The first day of the Blitz portion of the Superbet Rapid & Blitz Poland saw a drastic shift in the dynamic of the event. While former World Champion GM Vishy Anand maintained his lead and even extended it to 1.5 points, It was GM Fabiano Caruana and GM Levon Aronian who stole the show today. The former scored a whopping 8 out of possible 9 points while Aronian scored 7 from the same number of games. The two Americans dominated the rest of the field to move to a tie for third, two points behind Anand, and half a point behind the consistent Polish GM Jan-Krzysztof Duda. After a slow start, the Polish hero bagged three consecutive wins toward the end of the day and is now in second place. It surely was not a good day at the office for both GM Richard Rapport and GM Wesley So, but it would be a grave mistake to write these two players out of the tournament just yet.
The rapid portion of Superbet Rapid and Blitz Poland came to an end with GM Vishy Anand winning the rapid section, though his two points lead was diminished to one after the Indian legend conceded his first loss in the last round to his closest rival GM Richard Rapport. Tomorrow will see the first round of blitz games, with nine games lined up to be played. With eighteen points up for grabs, it is safe to say that the top six players after the rapid portion have good chances to win the event.
The second day of Superbet Rapid and Blitz Poland did not disappoint the tournament fans as day 2 was filled with exciting games and rapid action. The day came to an end with GM Vishy Anand continuing to maintain his two-point lead going to the last day of the rapid portion. The player of the day was undoubtedly GM Richard Rapport, who won all of his games today which allowed him to secure the sole second place on the leaderboard.
The second leg of the Grand Chess Tour, Superbet Rapid and Blitz in Poland, kicked off yesterday, May 18th in the Museum of the History of Polish Jews in Warsaw, Poland. The opening ceremony was kicked-off with a solo violin performance followed by a drawing of lots, where each player picked up his starting numbers ( one for Rapid and the other for Blitz) by choosing two large demo pawns with either color. The day ended with an enthusiastic simultaneous exhibition in a relaxing environment where each player played the moves in tandem.