Carlsen wins the last big chess competition he’s never won before

Magnus Carlsen has won everything under the sun, except this chess tournament—at least until now. With a near-flawless run through the knockout bracket that culminated in a grand final matchup against 18-year-old Rameshbabu Praggnanandhaa, the Norwegian phenom has finally added the last missing feather to his cap, even as he confirmed his continued lack of interest in participating in the world championship cycle.

The chess world has long run out of superlatives when it comes to Magnus Carlsen. He is the highest-rated player in the world right now, with the highest all-time peak rating to boot, having topped the charts for 158 consecutive months—admittedly still a far cry from Garry Kasparov’s 255. He is also one of the select few to have become world chess champions, and he’s defended his classical title on five separate occasions before abdicating in 2022, citing a lack of interest in the super-slow format. Perhaps to underscore the point, he’s also reclaimed both the rapid and the blitz world champion titles in the same year.

From prestigious invite-only super tournaments to the biggest of open competitions, Carlsen has won them all—with one exception. The FIDE World Cup (not to be confused with the world championship) is a special affair, an eight-round single-elimination bout that pits the players against each other in back-to-back matches in classical time control before moving to faster tiebreakers all the way to three-minute games with two-second increments.

Related: Chess World Cup 2023: Players, schedule, and format

Carlsen’s had a topsy-turvy history with the tournament in the past. At a young age, he declined to attend on multiple occasions, and later on, regulations barred him from participating when he was the world champion. Last year, he crashed out in the semis against young Polish upstart Jan-Krzysztof Duda. 2023, however, would prove to be the Norwegian’s year.

The world No. 1’s run featured a solitary defeat in the classical portion along the way, and he scored notable victories against the new generation’s emerging players, dispatching Vincent Keymer and Gukesh D along the way before facing Pragg in the grand final, where he steered the classical games to two draws while battling with food poisoning, then decisively defeating his young Indian opponent in the rapid playoffs.

He has also confirmed along the way that he has no interest in participating in the Candidates Tournament, the event that decides the next world championship challenger, clearing up at least some of the concerns and considerations involved with the drama. Now, all three other semifinalists can be safe in the knowledge that they’ve earned themselves a spot—something that made the third-place decider between Fabiano Caruana and hometown hero Najit Abasov a little less intriguing than it otherwise would have been. After falling behind in game one, the American grandmaster managed to strike back and fully turn the tides in the rapid games to secure himself the bronze.

Over in the women’s section, IM Nurgyul Salimova won the event as the 29th seed and immediately earned herself the grandmaster title for her troubles.