Viswanathan Anand made sure of his triumph in the 14th Amber chess tournament with a round to spare at the Monte Carlo grand after drawing both the blindfold and rapid games against Russian Peter Svidler.
Taking his tally to an unassailable 14.5 points, Anand maintained a three-point distance with Russian Alexander Morozevich and Hungarian Peter Leko with just one round or two games to come in this Euro 193,250 prize-money tournament, played on a round-robin basis.
Anand also made sure of his unshared blindfold title after the draw with Svidler.
As other results surfaced in this unique event that has one rapid and one blindfold game in each
round, Anand was two points ahead of his nearest rivals, Vassily Ivanchuk of Ukraine, Svidler and Leko, with just one game to go.
In the rapid section, the Indian ace stretched his lead to a full point over Russian Alexander Morozevich and Leko and now just needs a half point to win on the final day to win this section also solely.
Anand just needed 20 moves in the blindfold to sign peace with Svidler who played the black side of a Sicilian Paulsen.
Just wanting to win this section first and the event with at least a round to spare, Anand made sure everything went right with his white pieces.
In the rapid game too Svidler did not try much playing white after Anand came up with the Rubenstein French. The draw came in just 20 moves.
Results round 10 Blindfold: Vassily Ivanchuk (Ukr) beat Alexander Morozevich (Rus); Alexei Shirov (Esp) drew with Evgeny Bareev (Rus) Francisco Pons Vallejo (Esp) lost to Peter Leko (Hun); Veselin Topalov (Bul) beat Loek Van Wely (Ned); Viswanathan Anand (Ind) drew with Peter Svidler (Rus); Vladimir Kramnik (Rus) drew with Boris Gelfand (Isr).
Round 10 Blindfold Standings: 1. Anand 7.5; 2-7. Ivanchuk, Svidler, Leko, Kramnik, Morozevich, Vallejo 5.5 each; 8-9. Gelfand, Topalov 5 each; 10. Shirov 4; 11. Van Wely 3; 12. Bareev 2.5.
Round 10 Rapid (March 30, 2005): Morozevich beat Ivanchuk; Bareev drew with Shirov; Leko drew with Vallejo; Van Wely drew with Topalov; Svidler drew with Anand; Gelfand lost to Kramnik.
Rapid Standings: 1. Anand 7; 2-3. Morozevich, Leko 6 each; 4-6. Svidler, Ivanchuk, Shirov 5.5 each; 7. Kramnik 5; 8. Bareev 4.5; 9-10. Gelfand, Topalov 4; 11-12. Vallejo Pons, Van Wely 3.5 each.
Combined Standings: 1. Anand 14.5; 2-3. Morozevich, Leko 11.5 each; 4-5. Ivanchuk, Svidler 11 each; 6. Kramnik 10.5; 7. Shirov 9.5; 8-10. Gelfand, Vallejo, Topalov 9 each; 11. Bareev 7; 12. Van Wely 6.5.
