The two players who have shown the strongest and most stable performances throughout the event reached the final of the FIDE Grand Prix in Berlin. Levon Aronian and Hikaru Nakamura drew with black on Sunday to knock out Leinier Dominguez and Richard Rapport, respectively. Since there was no need for tiebreaks in either match, the finalists will have a rest day on Monday. | Photos: World Chess
GM Leinier Dominguez and GM Richard Rapport defeated GM Wesley So and GM Radoslaw Wojtaszek respectively in the rapid tiebreak games with identical 1.5-0.5 victories to reach the semifinals of the 2022 FIDE Grand Prix in Berlin. Ironically, they had lost to the same opponents in the regular time control.
GM Maxime Vachier-Lagrave (also known as MVL) finished first in the World Blitz Chess Championship with 15/21 in the Swiss tournament, after defeating GM Jan-Krzysztof Duda in their third blitz playoff game. Duda finished in second and GM Alireza Firouzja finished in third, each with 15/21 as well. With.
One of the most anticipated events in the chess calendar, the FIDE World Rapid and Blitz Championship, is around the corner. The open and women’s championships that have been held concurrently since 2016 will take place on December 25-31 in Warsaw, Poland, at the PGE Narodowy Stadium. | Pictured: Alireza Firouzja facing Hikaru Nakamura at the 2019 edition | Photo: Amruta Mokal
The 2021 FIDE Chess.com Grand Swiss is set to take place from October 27 until November 7 in Riga, Latvia. An open tournament and a women’s tournament will take place concurrently, each an 11-round Swiss event. The participants’ main focus will be to finish in the top two places, as the tournaments grant two spots in the next edition of the Candidates (Open and Women’s respectively). | Photo: Mark Livshitz