Viswanathan Anand and seven-time Russian champion Peter Svidler fought out an equal battle before signing peace in 31 moves in the second round of the Sinquefield Cup chess tournament here on Thursday.
The shortest battle of the day lasted only 31 moves after a series of exchanges, following the opening lines of English Symmetrical, left very little chance of a decisive verdict. Like the first round, there were three winners during the day. They included World champion Magnus Carlsen and Caruana Fabiano, who joined Maxime Vachier-Lagrave in the lead at 1.5 points.
The results (second round): Peter Svidler (Rus, 0.5) drew with Viswanathan Anand (1); Magnus Carlsen (Nor, 1.5) bt Sergey Karjakin (Rus, 1); Levon Aronian (Arm, 1) lost to Fabiano Caruana (USA, 1.5); Hikaru Nakamura (USA, 1) drew with Maxime Vachier-Lagrave (Fra, 1.5); Ian Nepomniachtchi (Rus, 0) lost to Wesley So (USA, 1). Third round pairings: Anand-Carlsen; So-Nakamura; Caruana-Nepomniachtchi; Karjakin-Aronian; Lagrave-Svidler.