Nakamura remains undefeated for 27 games
Nakamura has not played an over-the-board tournament for almost 18 months and he won the Saint Louis Rapid and Blitz 2021 as a Wild Card entrant which has not happened in this season. He has already mentioned on his channel why he did not sign a contract for this season. "No regrets at all. I said it before. I stream most time, it's what I do primarily these days, so not regretting it at all and I have other big events coming up, so I am looking forward to everything else." Nakamura answering whether he has any regrets on not signing as a full tour player in this season of Grand Chess Tour.
"I think it's pretty simple, I am bit of an enigma because obviously I have been streaming a lot, of course primarily it's chess I am streaming but I think the fact that I have been streaming so much most people don't really know whether I am studying chess not studying chess how serious I am or not serious. So I think no one's really sure what to expect. In this event certainly I just thought I played very well, and I think main reason for that is because as I have said before, I consider myself a streamer first chess player second and I feel absolutely zero pressure. Maybe towards the end I was a little bit unhappy because of course this plus six score on blitz, I lost something like 16 points, and you know Magnus made some ridiculous tweet about it, but you know overall I would say that it was just the fact that I was relaxed throughout and just very chill. It didn't matter if I won or lost..." - Nakamura on his performance in this event.
World champion Magnus Carlsen, congratulated Nakamura on his triumph
twitter.com/i/status/1427061852513652752
Streaming is a priority for Nakamura, playing tournaments is secondary, which was echoed in his tweet
twitter.com/i/status/1427078299021422592
Round 10: Caruana - Svidler: 1-0
Caruana got his sweet revenge of his loss in their first encounter of blitz, by a brilliant display of attack to jumpstart the day.
26.Nxh5 is a prelude to a beautiful attack and arguably one of the best game of the event.
Round 11: Mamedyarov - So: 1-0
After blundering a rook against Shankland, Mamedyarov bounced back and outplayed So in the endgame to avenge his loss.
Nakamura - Caruana: 1-0
Nakamura got the better of Caruana once again as he won the second time since his victory in the Rapid.
twitter.com/i/status/1427009196537655298
Round 14: Caruana - Mamedyarov: 0.5-0.5
Caruana and Mamedyarov had the longest game of the tournament, a 170-move long draw which reached to an endgame only after the first twelve moves.
Round 15: Nakamura - Svidler: 0.5-0.5
Nakamura drew with Svidler to win the tournament with three rounds to spare. It was an exciting game where the momentum kept shifting between both players.
Round 16: Mamedyarov - Rapport: 0-1
Rapport swindled Mamedyarov from a completely lost position after the former blundered.
Find out the winning continuation for White. The game continued 37.Qf7 which is a blunder as White immediately loses the game because of the strong battery on the a1-g7 diagonal.
Scoring for the Rapid section: Win - 2 points, Draw - 1 and Loss - 0.
Scoring for the Blitz section will be usual, Win - 1 point, Draw - 0.5 and Loss - 0
Replay Blitz Round 10-18 games
Replay the livestream
Final Standings after Blitz Round 18
GCT 2021 standings
Links
Grand Chess Tour official site
