GM Vladimir Kramnik would like to fast-forward over the middle rounds of the Shamkir super-tournament.

His audacious 25. Rxe5 in round four is now a distant memory. After losing in round five before the rest day, he dropped another today in round six as White to the continuous leader, GM Shakhriyar Mamedyarov. Kramnik had not lost back-to-back games in classical chess since the 2015 event in Shamkir.

That year, Kramnik's unfortunate streak also began in round five, and also included a loss to the top Azeri player. He will try to avoid a full repeat of 2015, when the losing streak carried on to three games (luckily for Kramnik, the third opponent in 2015 was GM Magnus Carlsen, who isn't playing this year).

Consequently Mamedyarov extended his lead to a full point in his bid to repeat as champion, just as Carlsen was able to do in 2014-2015.

The title is far from clinched, as GM Wesley So won his second in a row today after seeing his 67-game unbeaten streak end in the opening round. Maybe starting with a bagel is the new breakfast of champions? Recall that the final two Speed Chess Championship qualifiers also took zeroes in round one, only to rally to win their events!

GM Veselin Topalov also rebounded. He lost before the rest day but is back on +1 and still chasing Mamedyarov after a wild win today over GM Pavel Eljanov.

So's win came at the expense of the other round-five winner, GM Sergey Karjakin. The American seemed to draw blood from a stone. The sedate position should serve as a caution to anyone thinking that trading is a sure path to a draw. So identified the two soft spots on a6 and e6 and had just enough artillery remaining to break through. read more...

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