Rd. 1 - GM Levon Aronian vs. Fabiano Caruana

Written and annotated by GM Alejandro Ramirez.
 

This was the first game to finish and was brilliant to watch. Aronian smashed Caruana’s position when there was a tremendous amount of tension in the center. Caruana released it too early; the Armenian saw his opportunity and sacrificed a full rook! His devastating continuation with a quiet move, Rf1, was sufficient to topple the American’s defenses and Caruana lost soon after.