Tata Steel 2014 starts tomorrow

Tata Steel Chess Tournament 2014

The 76th edition of the Tata Steel Chess Tournament will take place from 10 to 26 January 2014. The top players will compete in two groups (previously there were three), with twelve players in each, instead of fourteen. The structure of the amateur tournaments remains unchanged.

The two disappointments are the absence of World Champion Magnus Carlsen, and former World Champion Viswanathan Anand. Carlsen first played in Wijk, in the "C" group, in 2004, when he had just turned thirteen. Here are his most recent results in this tournament (wich was formally sponsored by Corus, a steel company subsequently bought by the multinational Indian corporation Tata):

Anand, who is a tad older, started playing in the Dutch seaside resort in 1989, when he had just turned nineteen and the tournament was named after Koninklijke Hoogovens, a steel maker that later merged into the Corus Group. Here are Anand's records:

Tata Steel Masters 2014 (Group A)

This year the A-Group has an average rating of 2743, which exceeds last year's event (2732). The top players are Levon Aronian, the current number two in the world and winner of the Tata Steel Chess Tournament in 2007, 2008 and 2012. Hikaru Nakamura, the world's number three, won the tournament in 2011, and and Sergey Karjakin, number ten in the world, won it in 2009. Veteran Boris Gelfand and young Fabiano Caruana, both in excellent form in recent months, are also part of the tournament.

Traditionally youth plays an important role in the Tata Steel Chess Tournament. With the participation of Anish Giri, Wesley So and Richard Rapport three players do in the top five juniors in the world are playing. The Dutch number two GM Loek van Wely, who has played in the Wijk tournament more than twenty times, is also in the 2014 event. The Cuban GM Leinier Dominguez and German GM Arkadij Naiditsch complete the line-up. Dominguez had an excellent year in 2013 and thus forced his invitation. Arkady Naiditsch promoted to the A-group by his first place in the B group in 2013.

Average rating: 2743 – Category: 20

Tata Steel Challengers 2014 (Group B)

This year's Challengers Group is led by GM Radek Wojtaszek of Poland, who has had a string of successes recently – as Anand's second Radek has excellent prep. He is challenged by GM Baadur Jobava of Georgia, who is just one rating point below him. Then there is a substantial gap to the next player, who is Yu Yangyi of China, who recently won the World Junior Championship in Kocaeli with a stunning 11.0/13 final result.

There are two female players in the B Group this year: Anna Muzychuk of Slovenia and Zhao Xue of China. The youngest players are the two fifteen-year-olds Kayden Troff of USA (born May 6, 1998) and Jan Krzysztof Duda of Poland (April 26, 1998). Duda is a full grandmaster and Troff is the reigning World Youth Champion U14. The oldest participant is Dutch legend Jan Timman, who has just turned 62.

Average rating: 2579 – Category: 14

Schedule and location

Both groups start on January 11th 2014, with all rounds starting at 13:30h (1:30 p.m.) local time, except for the last round on January 26th, which begins at 12:00h. Two rounds will be played in Amsterdam and Eindhoven and will start at 14:00. The time controls are 100 minutes for 40 moves, followed by 50 minutes for 20 moves, then 15 minutes for the remaining moves with 30 seconds cumulative increment for each move starting from the first move. The external rounds will be as follows:

On January 15 the grandmasters will play the fourth round in the National Museum in Amsterdam

Thursday, January 23 , round nine, takes place in the High Tech Campus Eindhoven

Commentary schedule on Playchess

Links Official tournament site All games in PGN The games will be broadcast live on the official web site and on the chess server Playchess.com. If you are not a member you can download a free Playchess client there and get immediate access. You can also use ChessBase 12 or any of our Fritz compatible chess programs.