101 games without a single defeat: World chess champion Magnus Carlsen continues to work on his reputation as the best chess player of his time. In the last round of the tournament on the Isle of Man, the Norwegian played against Lewon Aronjan Remis and thus secured the record.
As the first top player in chess history, Carlsen has been undefeated since 101 classic games. Most recently, he had lost a game on 31 July 2018, then against Shakhriyar Mamedyarov from Azerbaijan.
"100 is a magic number, I never thought I could do it," Carlsen said after the final game, but self-critical: "The show is nice, but the performance was mediocre at best." The Norwegian ended up sixth in 154 places, 0.5 points behind winner Wang Hao of China. The win qualifies Hao for the Candidates Tournament 2020, in which the upcoming World Cup challenger Carlsens is determined.
Liren loses record after a few months
Carlsen had already set the old record of the Chinese Ding Liren of 100 games without defeat last Sunday. Liren's record of November 2018 was only a few months old. Until then, the 1974 set 95 games long series of the Latvian-Soviet world champion Mikhail Tal was considered an almost eternal record.
Carlsen's series is second to none in the world class. The world record for the longest series without defeat but reclaim at least two other players for themselves: The Croat Bogdan Lalic and the Russian Sergey Tiviakov claim for themselves to be unbeaten 110 games. However, as these series were not scored at the highest level, Carlsen's performance is rated as a record by experts and trade media such as the New in Chess magazine.
The World Champion is probably the best phase of his career. Until July 31, 2019, he won every tournament with classical reflection, in which he participated this year, including the prestigious tournaments in Baden-Baden and Wijk an Zee. When he also won the tournament in Zagreb, he also set his Elo world record of 2882 points from 2014 a. In Elo, the performance of chess players is measured, then the world ranking list is based.
Carlsen's new style
Above all, Carlsen plays so successfully in 2019 because he has changed his playing style. Instead of a more tactical style, in which he forces his opponents to mistakes in long games, the Norwegian plays riskier. Already in the opening, the 28-year-old chooses daring variants and presents his competitors early with problems for which they often find no solutions. Two new sources of inspiration are responsible for changing his strategy: the chess program AlphaZero and Carlsen's helper Daniil Dubow. Read here how Magnus Carlsen is inspired by the chess computer AlphaZero and a new second.
Carlsen could expand his series at the next classical chess tournaments. Next, however, he will be playing the World Cup in Fischer Random Chess starting next Sunday, a new official variant in which the pieces are randomly positioned on the base line. At the end of October, Carlsen could crown himself the first official world champion in this variant.
