Yesterday the only double round of the tournament was played at Harpa and we saw the first serious upsets. The biggest surprise on the top boards in the morning round was Daniel Bisby’s (2321) win against Sergei Movsesian (2665)! Several GMs were also held to draws, notably Melkumyan by Rosner, Granda by Antal, or Naroditsky by Ni. Birthday boy GM Alexandr Fier, who was paired against his girlfriend WGM Nino Maisuradze, showed no mercy as he won a very interesting game that both players went on to comment on in the live commentary show. You can watch the replay of all the shows here: http://new.livestream.com/chess/reykjavikopen2015
In the afternoon Daniel Bisby continued his fantastic run by outplaying Italian GM Axel Rombaldoni with the black pieces. On the top 13 boards, it was funny that every higher rated player who had the white pieces won his game, while the GMs who had Black were all held to draws. On boards 14 and 15 however, FM Hauge (2380) beat GM Rasmussen (2532), while WGM Abdumalik (2379) overcame GM Danielsen (2514) with the black pieces! Down on board 43 there was another big upset, as Henrik Carlsen (1986), the father of the current World Champion Magnus Carlsen, beat the young Dagur Ragnarsson (2347).
So after 3 rounds 14 players are in the lead with a perfect score, with the most surprising guests in that group being FM Daniel Bisby, WGM Zhansaya Abdumalik and the two young Norwegian FMs Lars Oskar Hauge and Johan-Sebastian Christiansen.
Today’s 4th round will see the first GM clashes as the local Hedinn Steingrimsson battles Shakhriyar Mamedyarov on top board. The other pairings of players on 3/3 are Tari-Eljanov, Georgiadis-L’ami, Hauge-Fier, Abdumalik-Gretarsson, Christiansen-Stopa and Bisby-Gao.
The round will start at 5pm GMT and you can watch the live games here http://www.reykjavikopen.com/live-games/ and live commentary here http://www.chess.com/tv !
You can also find all the pictures from the tournament on the official Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/ReykjavikOpenChess/photos_stream?tab=photos_albums
Fiona Steil-Antoni
