Anand Wins Baden-Baden Tournament

  

World champion Viswanathan Anand scored two victories in the last two
games to surpass Fabiano Caruana of Italy and win the 1st Grenke Chess
Classic at Baden-Baden in Germany on Feb 17, 2013.

It has been a long wait for Anand fans. He had not won a classical
contest for some time. Three wins and seven draws helped him win this
six player double all-play-all by a half point margin.

Anand, 43, was the oldest competitor and kept his energy for the last
two games. Against Naiditch he sacrificed a rook for knight and two
pawns and played a great fighting game to win. This fighting spirit
was last seen at the tie-break games against Boris Gelfand at Moscow
last year.

In the final round, Anand needed Fridman to hold Caruana. Fridman lost
a pawn but held Caruana to a draw after a marathon struggle.

Anand played at a huge 2808 rating level. He would need to up his
rating as Magnus Carlsen is making speedy progress towards the
gigantic 2900 mark.

Anand, Kramnik and others would play at Zurich in a closed event
following this contest. From May 7, Anand will play the strongest
chess tournament ever at Norway. Anand is having his busiest year as
world champion.

Anand coming from behind and playing catch up with Caruana at the
penultimate round and even surpassing in the final round gives
cinematic entertainment value to this contest.