Thursday, November 14, 2013

Chennai- The current Mecca of Chess

I reached Chennai on 14th November 2013! My main aim was to be a part of the current World Championship match between Anand and Carlsen. After all I am sure such a huge event will not happen anytime soon in India! After 4 games, the match is interestingly poised at 2 ponts a piece!!

However another reason why I am here, is to play an International Open tournament that is simultaneously held along with the World Championship match!

The organisers have done a splendid job of merging the two events.
The international GM open tournament begins from 15th November!
The Anand Carlsen games begin everyday at 15.00 hrs while the open tournament games are from 09.00 hrs.
When there is a rest day for the World Championship, the tournament will have double rounds.
 In this way, the players can not only watch the world championship match but also play some chess and win some prize money back home!! :)
Great Idea and planning by AICF!! hats off to them!

The open tournament is extremely strong having 23 GMs and 28 IMs and also a few WGMs.
As many as 38 players are above the ELO of 2400!! It promises to be an excellent event with lot of exciting chess.
The top seed of the event is the Russian GM: Ivan Popov!

Russian GM Ivan Popov 2645!!

The Indian Challenge is being led by the talented and young GM Vidit Gujarati!

GM Vidit Gujrathi 2582

I hope there will be some interesting games and some great opening Novelties too!
Who knows maybe Vishy Anand and Magnus Carlsen might just get some new ideas from this tournament itself!!

You can get the complete players list from this link:
http://www.chess-results.com/tnr116295.aspx?lan=1

The first round begins at 09.00 hrs IST on 15th November 2013.

No comments:

Post a Comment