Tata Steel 2018

Ho -Humm , big surprize..Magnus wins another major tournament. Not decided until after two 5 minute Blitz games vs Giri. I hate seeing the elite tournaments settled by blitz games.. why not have the two players share the 1st & 2nd prize money ?

Originally posted by @ogb
Ho -Humm , big surprize..Magnus wins another major tournament. Not decided until after two 5 minute Blitz games vs Giri. I hate seeing the elite tournaments settled by blitz games.. why not have the two players share the 1st & 2nd prize money ?

They do share the money.

The play off's are for who gets the trophy and if this was a qualifying event for
another tournament (not the case here) then it secures the winning player that spot.

Carlsen last lost a blitz play off way back in 2007 v Aronian in the candidates.
That was a qualifying event. SInce then Carlsen has won 9 blitz/rapid play off's on the trot.

Interesting to note, though not too surprising, that the top two are not playing
in the candidates in the March. (Carlsen for obvious reasons and Giri failed to qualify..)

The other candidates here (Wes So, Caruana, Kramnik, Karjakin, and Mamedyarov)
were possibly saving their goodies for the candidates and a chance at a money spinning
match v Carlsen in November in London. (not to mention the money for actually winning
the candidates. 95,000 Euros.)

Somebody must have lit a fire under Giri for this one, he usually draws most, or all of his games in these super-tournaments.