Sargissian scores 3021 performance
28 March 2007 11:30 AM | Last modified: 11:56
After last week’s lengthy article on the Ruy López Festival we had to return to this wonderful tournament once more. And especially because of the big success of the Armenian Gabriel Sargissian, who won the tournament with 6,5 out of 7 and a performance rating of 3021! Winning 24 rating points in one tournament, as a 2600 player, that’s not so bad.
We left the tournament last week after round 4, when Sargissian was leading with 3,5 points. In the fifth round Ponomariov had to beat him with Black to keep chances for victory, but didn’t succeed. The Unkrainian did try, including a pawn sacrifice, but Sargissian stayed cool, took over the initative and won the game. The fight for the second spot, between Candelario and Granda, was not yet decided after their draw. Sokolov found himself in a lost position against Stefanova but with some tactival strokes he managed to beat her anyway. Hou Yifan had a advantage against Sasikiran but couldn’t convert it.
With his victory over Candelario in round 6, Sasikiran secured the victory already. The two players know each other well as they play for the same team in the Spanish competition, Linex-Magic from Mérida. Candelario was brave enough to accept Sargissian’s Marshall but soon got into trouble. A bit later it seemed that the Spaniard had good drawing chances in the ending but Sargissian’s excellent technique secured a win anyway. Ponomariov beat Hou Yifan in style and Granda again confirmed his good form by defeating Sokolov. The draw between Sasikiran and Stefanova was another great fight.
In the last round Sargissian won again, this time against Julio Granda Zuniga, who was put under pressure more and more, until he had to resign in the ending. In her last game, Hou Yifan scored her first victory, over local hero Manuel Pérez Candelario, who afterwards said that because of tiredness he couldn’t fully remember his opening preparation. Ponomariov couldn’t beat Stefanova and so had to be satisfied with the third place. Sokolov showed spectacular chess till the end and was successful against Sasikiran, one of the Mtel participants. The final position is of great beauty, where the Indian can’t make a single move anymore.
The games of the last three rounds:
Final standings Magistral:
pnt + = 0 tpr 1. Gabriel SARGISSIAN (2658) ARM 6,5 6 1 0 3021 2. Julio GRANDA (2612) PER 4,0 2 4 1 2656 3. Ruslan PONOMARIOV (2723) UKR 4,0 3 2 2 2640 4. Ivan SOKOLOV (2652) HOL 3,5 3 1 3 2600 5. Manuel Perez CANDELARIO (2515) ESP 3,0 2 2 3 2570 6. Antoaneta STEFANOVA (2483) BUL 2,5 1 3 3 2522 7. Krishnan SASIKIRAN (2700) IND 2,5 0 5 2 2491 8. HOU YIFAN (2509) CHI 2,0 1 2 4 2462
Gabriel Sargissian | photo: Jorge Armestar Marroquin
After the tournament, a nine round Swiss rapid was played in which the Ruy Lopez opening was obligatory. All Magistral participants played, and a bunch of GMs with them, e.g. Spasov, Fedorchuk and Ye Jiangchuan. Sargissian also won here, but he is quite a Ruy Lopez specialist. This also counts for Ivan Sokolov, who was shared first but second on tiebreak. The final standings:
1. GM Sargissian, Gabriel 2658 ARM 6 26 2. GM Sokolov, Ivan 2652 NED 6 24½ 3. GM Sasikiran, Krishnan 2700 IND 5½ 25 4. GM Spasov, Vasil 2588 BUL 5½ 24 5. GM Granda Zuniga, Julio E 2612 PER 5½ 24 6. GM Ponomariov, Ruslan 2723 UKR 5½ 23½ 7. GM Fedorchuk, Sergey A 2601 UKR 5½ 23 8. GM Khamrakulov, Ibragim S 2527 ESP 5 22 9. WFM Hou Yifan 2509 CHN 5 22 10. GM Ye Jiangchuan 2632 CHN 5 21½ 11. GM Paunovic, Dragan 2516 SRB 5 21½ 12. IM Carrasco, Martinez Juan M 2421 ESP 5 21½ 13. GM Strikovic, Aleksa 2557 SRB 5 21 14. FM Cabezas, Ayala Ivan 2318 ESP 5 20 15. GM Georgiev, Vladimir 2529 MKD 5 19 16. Figuero Toro, Julian 2249 ESP 5 19 17. Garcia Romero, Benjamin Abel 2235 ESP 5 18 18. GM Gofshtein, Zvulon 2539 ISR 4½ 22 19. GM Kolev, Atanas 2538 BUL 4½ 22 20. GM Stefanova, Antoaneta 2483 BUL 4½ 20½ 21. IM Perez, Candelario Manuel 2515 ESP 4½ 19½ 22. GM Djuric, Stefan 2464 SRB 4½ 19½ 23. ... (89 spelers)
See also: “In remembrance of Ruy López”
I wonder what the world record TPR is? Fischer in the candidates, perhaps?
3066 Was Fischers’ record in his match against Larsen
Its meaningless to say that fischer’s perfomance was 3066 as the score of the match was 6-0. However, had Fisher won the match by 5.5 - 0.5 his performance would have been 417 elo points above Larsen. Assuming that Larsen was of 2700 strength by today’s standards (he must have been as he was one of the best players at that time) that put fischer’s perfomance at the level of 3100 or above. Yet, Larsen probably underperformed at that time so this is not a safe conclusion. Fischer however won 20 consecutive games against top GM’s that took part in the interzonal and the candidate matches during that period. This would be unthikable achievement for a modern grandmaster. His overall record from the interzonal until he concured the title was 39 wins 21 draws and only 4 losses (bobbyfischer.net). That corresponds to performance 213 points above his competitors whose weighted elo average must have been at least equivalent to 2700 by modern standards. There are about 20 players today whose elo exceeds 2700 and most of Fischer’s game were against Spassky and Petrosian and players who were definetily in the top 20 of that time. Therefore even a conservative statistical estimate of his perfomance at that time his was comparable to that of a 2900 modern player.