Norway’s World Chess Champion Magnus Carlsen didn’t manage to hang on to the championship title in rapid chess that he’s also held. After letting out an angry scream of frustration over an opening loss on Wednesday, though, Carlsen regained his composure and even managed a smile over his new bronze medal.
“In general I’m satisfied with the bronze,” said the young Norwegian who’s more accustomed to winning just about every chess game he plays. The FIDE World Chess Rapid and Blitz Championships playing out in Doha, Qatar this week, though, got off to a bad start for Carlsen on Monday and Tuesday, with two losses and two ties.
The scream on Wednesday came right after he also lost to Anton Korobov of Ukraine in the first round of the day, the 11th- of the 15-game tournament. It was a shocking loss caused by an error on Carlsen’s part that prompted him to run up the stairs of the arena right afterwards to his private lounge, from which he let out the scream that could be heard all over the otherwise quiet main floor.
“Yeah, I wasn’t very satisfied then,” Carlsen said with a grin when confronted wiht his noisy reaction by Norwegian Broadcasting (NRK). “But I didn’t know everyone else could hear me.” Carlsen had earlier called his loss to Korobov “completely horrible.”
The rest of the day went much better with the world champion winning the next four and final rounds. He called his victory in game 12 over Santosh Gujrathi Vidit of India “very important” because he still had a chance at that point to retain his rapid chess championship title as well. He also went on to beat Alexander Riazantsev of Russia, Ian Nepomniachtchi of Russia and Shakhriyar Mamedyarov of Azerbaijan.
But the man from Ukraine who had beaten Carlsen in the crucial Game 7 on Tuesday, Vassily Ivanchuk, was also doing well and the rapid chess part of the tournament ended with him as World Champion and Alexander Grischuk of Russia, who’d lost to Carlsen on Tuesday, with the silver medal.
“I can only congratulate Ivanchuk,” Carlsen told NRK. “If there’s anyone I want to succeed, it’s him. He has been a classic player for 30 years. He really deserves this.”
After letting off steam earlier in the day, Carlsen didn’t seem too bothered by losing his title to Ivanchuk: “It’s okay in the sense that I was so far far behind. I did as well as I could. I’ll hopefully come back stronger in blitz chess.”
That round of 21 fast games begins on Thursday with Carlsen keen on revenge, and winning back the blitz championship that he lost to Grischuk after being the only chess player to simultaneously hold all three world championship titles in classic, rapid and blitz chess.
newsinenglish.no/Nina Berglund
