Well, the Tata Steel results came in a week ago, and I was hit-and-miss with my predictions. I had Anand winning the A group, but his non-winning streak in regular tournament play continues for at least a few months more. Instead, he finished half a point behind the winner, Hikaru Nakamura.
This must be Hikaru’s biggest win to date, and it takes him up to about 2775 FIDE. He was briefly #7 on the live list, until Chucky’s amazing 9/10 in Gibraltar vaulted him slightly ahead in the rankings.
One potentially interesting development was that within hours of Hikaru’s win, Kasparov was on the record at a NY Times blog with this comment:
“Fischer never won a tournament ahead of the world champion. He was second in Santa Monica. Of course there were far fewer such events back then, and Fischer had several great tournament results like Stockholm 62, but it’s interesting. Reuben Fine only equaled Keres on points at AVRO in 38. Then you have Marshall at Cambridge Springs in 1904 ahead of Lasker, though Tarrasch wasn’t there. So unless you include Capablanca as an American player, I think you can go back to Pillsbury at Hastings 1895 for an American tournament victory on par with Nakamura’s!”
There and Back Again 