2014 Norway Chess Tournament

The 2014 Norway Chess Tournament features much of the world elite: Carlsen, Aronian, Kramnik, and several other top 10 players. Naturally, Carlsen is the favorite, but the competition is so strong that he probably won't win clear first place.

I have recently been working on the model's draw rate assumptions. For this tournament, it won't matter very much; in classical games between 2700 players, the draw rate is fairly stable around 60% - 64% unless there is a large rating gap. The project is not done yet, but there are a few preliminary results:

-1.d4 really is safer than 1.e4. All else equal, the draw rate in 1.d4 games is 2% higher than for 1.e4. An even safer choice is 1.c4 (3% more likely to end in a draw than 1.e4). Irregular openings are just as likely to end in a draw as 1.e4.

-Chess is not being exhausted: the draw rate is not rising over time after the players' ratings are accounted for.

These conclusions have seemed fairly stable as I have experimented with different draw rate models, but it is quite possible that a more thorough investigation will overturn them.