Fabiano Caruana notched the result of his life at the Sinquefield Trophy in St Louis last year. Since then he has done nothing in particular and not done it very well, to adapt W.S. Gilbert’s lordly formula from Iolanthe. Now Caruana has reasserted himself at the elite tournament in Dortmund, where final scores (out of 7) were as follows: Caruana 5½, So and Nisipeanu 4, Kramnik 3½, Nepomniachtchi and Naiditsch 3, Hou Yifan and Meier 2½.
As can be seen, Caruana outclassed the field by a substantial margin, in spite of losing one game to Wesley So.
Nisipeanu-Caruana, Dortmund 2015 (see diagram 1)
Black’s plan of advancing the a-pawn is obvious. However, the brilliant tactic that makes it work is not. 27 … a5 28 Nd4 axb4 29 Nxc6 b3!! 30 Rxc7 Nd6 White resigns Despite the extra rook White has no way to prevent the b-pawn from promoting.
So-Kramnik, Dortmund 2015 (see diagram 2)
Wesley So handled this tricky endgame perfectly to keep the black queenside pawns under control.
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