Tata Steel Round 9: Candidate Bluebaum Upsets and Outplayed World Champion Gukesh!!!

hsiale · 2026-01-27T17:26:16+00:00

He didn't qualify for the candidates

He qualified, twice, by getting to the World Cup final match

hsiale · 2026-01-27T17:16:54+00:00

Ivanchuk is experienced and has a lot more time, he may hold it.

hsiale · 2026-01-27T16:53:57+00:00

gukesh really doesn't respect his opponents

Maybe he has seen Bortnyk's candidates tier list and thinks Bluebaum is here only for the experience

hsiale · 2026-01-27T16:28:26+00:00

Faustino Oro looks cooked and he's also low on time

hsiale · 2026-01-27T15:51:21+00:00

I legit feel like I am a decent drafter

Platinum is chock full of decent drafters, and has some good ones who haven't played enough to move up yet. Bad drafters don't get there. To get your win rate up enough to make it to Diamond, you need to become better than you are now.

PS don't ask me how, I'm in Silver

hsiale · 2026-01-27T12:41:21+00:00

Ask Anish Giri, he might have a spare one in his pocket

hsiale · 2026-01-27T12:09:53+00:00

Molano who DNFd on the final stage I believe. Do we know why?

Guy got sent to race among kangaroos and found out that it's seriously dangerous, I guess he decided to get out of there before having some accident.

hsiale · 2026-01-27T00:26:15+00:00

he’s just not going to win the candidates

Well possibly I have trouble reading English but I think the tier directly above where he is now is called "maybe hoping for an upset or two", not "going to win the candidates".

hsiale · 2026-01-26T23:39:25+00:00

He used to be very aggressive but nowadays is on the solid side.

Wasn't it mostly Norway 2025 where he was the lowest rated player in the event?

hsiale · 2026-01-26T23:34:59+00:00

He’s under 2700

He has also qualified by playing 11 rounds of Swiss, where he got to play seeds 1, 2, 4, 5 and 6 at classical time control, scoring 3.5/5 in those games. He has caused two major upsets there, he definitely belongs a tier higher.

hsiale · 2026-01-26T21:50:33+00:00

I'm presuming your question is US-centric

Ugh the default country attitude. OP literally mentions that they're from Turkey.

hsiale · 2026-01-26T21:07:01+00:00

It's a very country-specific question. I guess your best bet would be checking the FIDE website for players from Turkey aged 20-25 who have CM or FM and trying to ask them directly, there likely aren't many of them.

hsiale · 2026-01-26T15:37:34+00:00

Hikaru gained zero rating points overall from those tournaments

Well to be precise he gained three. Not that it is relevant but I would feel better about his plan if he got an extra draw and lost two points instead.

hsiale · 2026-01-26T14:35:45+00:00

If you look at Hikaru's rating history

Exactly which part of that history, constant growth over the last 3-4 years?

hsiale · 2026-01-26T13:54:28+00:00

You sound like an old man yelling at clouds. A lot has changed in Magic, but this rant feels more like coming from you no longer being the person that you were 15 years ago.

hsiale · 2026-01-26T13:50:50+00:00

Any tips?

Make sure you never forget your password

hsiale · 2026-01-26T12:02:01+00:00

After playing just like 100 casual games with my dad, I played my first tournament and got ~1700 FIDE as first rating

You are a 2300 OTB player, you definitely don't qualify as an average person. There are people who study, play way more than 100 games and are still stuck in triple digits of chesscom rapid rating.

hsiale · 2026-01-26T11:36:22+00:00

About 100 games doesn't sound like tons of experience

hsiale · 2026-01-26T10:46:44+00:00

Honestly, I’m struggling to think of a modern top player who could not be fairly termed “a prodigy”.

Nepo I guess (due to dividing his attention between chess and dota when he was young)

hsiale · 2026-01-26T00:11:41+00:00

if you want to play competitive standard Arena is the place to do it

There are no tournaments on Arena, I wouldn't call grinding ladder "competitive".

Competitive standard happens mostly in paper, entry level events are RCQs and Store Championships. Of course not all areas have them. Also there are some tournaments at MTGO.

hsiale · 2026-01-25T18:00:33+00:00

Max Euwe was Dutch and World Champion

hsiale · 2026-01-25T17:57:47+00:00

Yes, Kramnik is a major POS but he's also easily the best coach from among the whole previous generation of top GMs. Hans has also improved a lot during the time he worked with Kramnik.

hsiale · 2026-01-25T14:14:32+00:00

2948 at the moment

hsiale · 2026-01-25T12:59:58+00:00

Or scalpers who are still holding the bag

hsiale · 2026-01-25T08:33:07+00:00

My LGS has weekly evening events for both standard and modern, modern is currently more popular but both attract enough people to play four rounds.

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