Magnus Carlsen was held to a 60-move draw in Round 7 of the 2016 Bilbao Masters, with Wei Yi once again calculating his way out of trouble. Magnus later commented on his 17-year-old opponent, “He plays very well and he’s showing so far that he belongs in the tournament”. Although Wesley So and Hikaru Nakamura tried out heart-rate monitors, the other games of the day failed to set the pulses racing, with three draws meaning less than 25% of this year’s games in Bilbao have finished decisively.

Replay all the Bilbao Masters games so far:

Magnus Carlsen ½-½ Wei Yi

The most anticipated clash of Round 7 lived up to its billing, with Magnus Carlsen putting everything into his attempt to do the double over the Chinese opponent many have tipped as a future World Champion. Let’s go straight to Jan Gustafsson’s analysis of the struggle that ensued:

After the game Wei Yi was asked to sum up how he feels about how things are going so far in Bilbao, but didn't give quite the global answer expected:

I feel very tired… very, very tired.

Magnus had a few more words to describe his opponent’s performance:

He plays very well and he’s showing so far that he belongs in the tournament and I hope for him he can have a successful end to the tournament as well.

Asked how 17-year-old Wei Yi compares to the 17-year-old Magnus, the World Champion felt a reminder was required:

I don’t know… right after I turned 17 I won in Wijk aan Zee, so I was also pretty good back then! But he’s come a long way.

The quote of the day, though, came in response to the question of how you can improve your mental strength:

Confidence is very important in chess, so I think winning is a good idea to improve your mental strength!

Easy as that

Hikaru Nakamura ½-½ Wesley So

This all-US clash was the game chosen to try out heart-rate monitors on the players and, as Murphy’s Law dictates, it was of course the first to finish, with barely a moment of real tension. A pair of black hanging pawns fell, but only with the complete annihilation of the remainder of the queenside as well.

The theme of the day in the post-game press conferences was whether the players would like their children to follow in their footsteps and play chess. Although it was International Chess Day, they were somewhat reluctant:

Nakamura:

We’re so good at chess that almost certainly our children could never live up to what we’ve achieved.

Giri agreed:

I’m sure that my child will be better than me in something, but I’ll be surprised if that will be chess.

Karjakin voiced a familiar concern:

I think that one chess player in a family is already too much!

They all added the proviso that if the child was keen they wouldn’t stand in his or her way. The World Champion was the most positive, even if he didn’t exactly exude enthusiasm while he said:

I think becoming a chess grandmaster is a very nice achievement, so why not?

Wei Yi, meanwhile, didn’t understand the question, and one of the highlights of the day was Leontxo García paraphrasing:

Leontxo: If you have a baby, would you like your baby to become a chess grandmaster? Wei Yi: I think I don’t want him to play chess… it’s very difficult!

The day’s remaining game finished only just after Nakamura-So:

Anish Giri ½-½ Sergey Karjakin

Both players in this game now have six draws and one loss in Bilbao 2016 and, perhaps predictably, their encounter wasn’t a classic. It all turned on a single move, 22.Ba6?:





White had been pressing and would be still if Black was forced to move the rook, but instead he had 22…bxa5! Giri lamented:

Here I wasn’t interested in the game anymore and I was glad that Sergey let me finish it.

Karjakin, for his part, called the position simply a “dead draw”. It certainly was 20 moves later (remember, no draw offers are allowed in Bilbao) when the players at least ended their day with a pleasing pawn structure:





That left the tournament table unchanged except for the addition of a point all round:

Karjakin’s thoughts may, of course, have been elsewhere, since in Thursday’s Round 8 he faces off once more against his future World Championship opponent.

Can he score a first classical win with the white pieces against Carlsen? Be sure to tune in to Jan and Niclas’ commentary from 16:00 CEST. You can also replay their Round 7 commentary below:

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