Mysterious Moves

Viswanathan Anand glided to an easy victory in the intercontinental SuperGM tournament just now concluded in Mexico and Spain. Playing with the white pieces, he did not even need to demonstrate any new opening preparation, evidently preserving his best ideas for the world-championship match with Vladimir Kramnik coming this fall in Germany. Remarkably, playing with the black pieces, Anand scored three victories and no losses in this tournament, and managed only one win (and one loss) with the white, which makes his performance all the more notable. The means by which he outplayed his opponents, including Peter Leko, via a deeply analyzed line of the Sicilian Defense, are difficult to comprehend.