Zurich Armageddon – Nakamura defeats Anand to take the trophy
After the classical part of the Zurich Chess Challenge, which was won by Viswanathan Anand, the final day of the event was reserved for the rapid section.
The classical games were counted as 2 points for win, 1 point for draw towards the overall score. Rapid games were adding 1 point for a win, 0.5 for a draw.
Vladimir Kramnik excelled today to take the first place with 3,5/5 points. Hikaru Nakamura shared the second with 3,0 points, but this was sufficient to catch Anand in the overall standings as the Indian scored only 2,0 points in rapid.
Since the two players had a total of 9,0 points each, an Armageddon game was set to decide who will take the trophy. Nakamura won with black and was declared winner of 2015 Zurich Chess Challenge.
Replay rapid and Armageddon games
Rapid standings:
1. Kramnik Vladimir (RUS) 2783 – 3,5
2-3. Nakamura Hikaru (USA) 2776 and Aronian Levon (ARM) 2777 – 3,0
4-5. Karjakin Sergey (RUS) 2760 and Anand Viswanathan (IND) 2797 – 2,0
6. Caruana Fabiano (ITA) 2811 – 1,5
Classical standings:
1. Anand Viswanathan (IND) 2797 – 7,0
2. Nakamura Hikaru (USA) 2776 – 6,0
3. Kramnik Vladimir (RUS) 2783 – 5,0
4-6 .Karjakin Sergey (RUS) 2760, Caruana Fabiano (ITA) 2811 and Aronian Levon (ARM) 2777 – 4,0
Combined standings:
1-2. Anand Viswanathan (IND) 2797 and Nakamura Hikaru (USA) 2776 – 9,0
3. Kramnik Vladimir (RUS) 2783 – 8,5
4. Aronian Levon (ARM) 2777 – 7,0
5. Karjakin Sergey (RUS) 2760 – 6,0
6. Caruana Fabiano (ITA) 2811 – 5,5
Photo by RCF, videos courtesy of Vijay Kumar