All photos by Vasily Papin
It started with a generous lineup of players, ranging from top seed Ernesto Inarkiev (2727), Dmitry Jakovenko (2718), and Maxim Rodshtein (2700), but also including players such as Anton Korobov, who won it last year, Spanish talent David Anton Guikarro, who tied Nakamura at Gibraltar (though lost the playoff), European Champion Evgeny Najer, as well as Viktor Bologan, Emil Sutovsky, Daniil Dubov, and Sergey Zhigalko.
The competition is held in honor of Anatoly Karpov, the 12th World Champion
The opening ceremony was to a packed house of players, officials, and many chess fans, many of whom brought their families with them
Ernesto Inarkiev and Daniil Dubov share a selfie
The players, organizers, and special guests Anatoly Karpov and Sergey Karjakin
The opening game of round one, very much set the tone, as Emil Sutovsky beat last year's winner, Anton Korobov in convincing fashion
David Anton Guijarro had a slightly sub-par event, though it helped give him a lot of experience, which will be of great benefit as he grows
Rodshtein - Dubov
Second seed Dmitry Jakovenko was unable to shine, and settled at 4.0/9. This was in spite of being 5th, another consequence of two players achieving superlative results in the same event.
That other was of course, Evgeny Najer. Although Najer finished with 7.0/9 also, he lost his individual game against Sutovsky and only caught him in the very last round as he scored the only win of the final round. With black no less!
His own win against Anton Korobov was a fantastic game that is shown below
Although Anton Korobov lost to both the winners of the tournament, he did not let this hold him back and scored 6.0/9, coming in sole third, and with a 2800 performance no less. Some people talk about taking it one game at a time, and some people do it.
(click for high-res)
You can use ChessBase 14 or any of our Fritz compatible chess programs to replay the games in PGN. You can also download our free Playchess client, which will in addition give you immediate access to the chess server Playchess.com.
