World Youth Championship: heroes and heartbreak

by Albert Silver
12/28/2013 – The 2013 World Youth Chess Championship is nearing the end, and interestingly only two gold medals have been decided: Indian Praggnanandhaa in the Open under-8 and FM Awonder Liang in the Open under-10. Several sections have four or more tied for first, with more a half point behind, and the last round promises to be extremely bloodthirsty. Heroes will be praised and hearts will be broken.

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World Youth Chess Championship 2013

17-29 December 2013, Al Ain, UAE

The 2013 World Youth Chess Championship is nearing the end, and interestingly only two gold medals have been decided, and in both cases, it is also the only two cases where 100% scores took place: in the Open under-8 the young Indian Praggnanandhaa ran away with the championship with 10.0/10 and in the Open under-10 the towering FM Awonder Liang has also scored an imperial 10.0/10. Curiously the waters surrounding the silver and bronze medals in both these sections have more piranha than the Amazon river as exactly eleven players in each can realistically consider they are in contention.

India has also had the overall best campaign of any nation as they have no fewer than eight players in the top five spread throughout the various sections. In second is Russia, with seven, and third is China, with five. Of special note is Iran, not exactly a power nation in chess, who have four athletes in the top five, and more impressively two of whom are leading their respective sections.  In the Girls under-16, WGM Sarasadat Khademalsharieh, also top seed with 2298 FIDE, is in sole lead with 8.5/10, a half a point ahead of two rivals, and in the Open under-18, IM Pouya Idani, ranked only 14th, is also in sole lead with 8.0/10 with a superb 2669 performance.

IM Pouya Idan from Iran has been having the result of his
life. Just one more good round is needed for a historic gold.

Several sections have four or more tied for first, with more a half point behind, and the last round promises to be extremely bloodthirsty. Heroes will be praised and hearts will be broken.

For some, it can be heart-wrenching...

... while others can barely keep.... their... eyes.... zzzzzzz

The parents are all there...

...to give the children support

Don't eat the badge dearie, let me get you some popcorn instead

Inspired by Rybka, AKA "little fish"?

I will hold my breath until he resigns

Sara Masud Jabbari from Kurdistan Region of Iraq. She is from
Erbil city and with the Iraq Chess National Team. Thanks to
Mohamed Ali Baba Jabbari.

Team Zimbabwe with Canadian Ashley Tapp, the chess girl

South African under-12 player Ananta Reddy fought for five hours and forty five
minutes to draw an endgame a pawn down and succeeded. Last players left!

Sometimes a little help is needed

Team South Africa was kind enough to label some of the top boards and players, and a warm thank you is extended their way. See more of their excellent pictures at their Facebook page.

So what was the result?

Stylish play

This could be the beginning of a beautiful friendship

The championship has played ten of eleven rounds, and here are the standings for each category:

Girls Results:

WYCC U8 Girls Classic

Rk
SNo
Tit
Name
FED
Rtg
Pts
TB
1 23 WCM Zhu Harmony CAN 0 8.0 37.5
2 3 WFM Divya Deshmukh IND 1482 8.0 41.0
  82   Mungunzul Bat-Erdene MGL 0 8.0 41.0
4 79   Mironenko Galina RUS 0 8.0 39.5
5 7   Rakshitta Ravi IND 1357 8.0 37.5
6 111   Wan Qian CHN 0 8.0 40.5
7 38   Cai Boheng CHN 0 7.5 40.0
8 5   Bhagyashree Patil IND 1423 7.5 39.0

The Girls under-8 will be a girl-eat-girl in the final round

WYCC U10 Girls Classic

Rk
SNo
Tit
Name
FED
Rtg
Pts
TB
1 14 WCM Salonika Saina IND 1642 8.5 37.5
2 22   Yip Carissa USA 1602 8.0 38.0
3 6 WFM Lakshmi C IND 1757 8.0 41.0
4 11 WFM Asadi Motahare IRI 1657 8.0 40.0
5 23 WCM Pham Tran Gia Thu VIE 1601 7.5 34.0
6 41 WCM Fernandes Krystal IND 1514 7.5 39.0
7 18   Vuller Anastasia Israel 1624 7.5 36.5

WYCC U12 Girls Classic

Rk
SNo
Tit
Name
FED
Rtg
Pts
TB
1 35   Shengxin Zhao CHN 1753 8.5 38.5
2 18 WFM Antova Gabriela BUL 1815 8.5 38.0
3 36 WCM Serikbay Assel KAZ 1752 8.0 39.0
4 2   Shuvalova Polina RUS 2052 8.0 41.5
5 21 WCM Balajayeva Khanim AZE 1804 8.0 36.0

WYCC U14 Girls Classic

Rk
SNo
Tit
Name
FED
Rtg
Pts
TB
1 4 WFM Vasenina Anna RUS 2053 8.5 39.5
2 31   Narva Mai EST 1875 8.0 41.0
3 1   Tsolakidou Stavroula GRE 2132 8.0 40.0
4 18   Abdusattorova Bakhora UZB 1933 8.0 38.0
5 6 WFM Kiolbasa Oliwia POL 2021 7.5 37.5

Russian Anna Vasenina leads her group going into the last round

Estonian Mai Narva has been the surprise second place, and
is overperforming her rating by nearly 300 Elo

WYCC U16 Girls Classic

Rk
SNo
Tit
Name
FED
Rtg
Pts
TB
1 1 WGM Khademalsharieh Sarasadat IRI 2298 8.5 40.0
2 12 WCM Wozniak Mariola POL 2079 8.0 35.0
3 6   Gu Tianlu CHN 2128 8.0 38.0
4 15   Velikic Adela SRB 2055 7.5 38.0
5 3 WIM Nicolas Zapata Irene ESP 2237 7.5 39.0

WYCC U18 Girls Classic

Rk
SNo
Tit
Name
FED
Rtg
Pts
TB
1 11 WFM Tomnikova Lidia RUS 2167 8.0 37.0
2 2 WGM Ziaziulkina Nastassia BLR 2354 8.0 39.5
3 24   Bezkorovaina Mariia UKR 2081 7.5 37.5
4 9 WIM Ibrahimova Sabina AZE 2205 7.5 39.0
5 7 WIM Bivol Alina RUS 2236 7.5 37.0

Lidia Tomnikova from Russia and...

...Nastassia Ziaziulkina from Belarus are tied for first in the
Girls under-18.

Open Results:

WYCC U8 Open Classic

Rk
SNo
Tit
Name
FED
Rtg
Pts
TB
1 4 FM Praggnanandhaa R IND 1852 10.0 38.5
2 24   Amiri Amirali IRI 1524 8.0 36.5
3 5   Can Isik TUR 1751 8.0 41.5
4 157   Suleymanli Aydin Elshan AZE 0 8.0 38.5
5 101   Issani Nameer CAN 0 8.0 36.0

WYCC U10 Open Classic

Rk SNo Tit Name FED Rtg Pts TB
1 1 FM Liang Awonder USA 2246 10.0 39.0
2 3 CM Peng David T USA 2042 8.0 39.0
3 13   Teclaf Pawel POL 1893 8.0 41.5
4 66 CM Kushagra Mohan IND 1602 8.0 37.5
5 8 FM Yu Kaifeng CHN 1960 8.0 36.0

Ten-year-old FM Awonder Liang lived up to his favoritism and rating

WYCC U12 Open Classic

Rk SNo Tit Name
FED
Rtg
Pts
TB
1 30   Hakobyan Aram ARM 2015 9.0 43.5
2 19   Kevlishvili Robby NED 2070 8.0 39.0
3 2 FM Esipenko Andrey RUS 2287 8.0 41.0
4 10 FM Raghunandan K. Srihari IND 2168 7.5 41.0
5 4   Lobanov Sergei RUS 2239 7.5 39.0

WYCC U14 Open Classic

Rk
SNo
Tit
Name
FED
Rtg
Pts
TB
1 40   Li Di CHN 2091 9.0 39.0
2 19   Atabayev Saparmyrat TKM 2203 8.5 40.5
3 4 FM Rambaldi Francesco ITA 2385 8.0 40.5
4 5   Zajic Milan SRB 2340 8.0 38.5
5 16   Dai Changren CHN 2216 8.0 36.5

In round nine, Li Di (2091) beat IM Aryan Tari (2418), right after beating FM
Aravindh rated 2415 in round eight

WYCC U16 Open Classic

Rk
SNo
Tit
Name
FED
Rtg
Pts
TB
1 4 FM Alekseenko Kirill RUS 2445 8.0 39.0
2 9 IM Dastan Muhammed Batuhan TUR 2409 8.0 38.5
3 7 FM Girish A. Koushik IND 2413 8.0 39.5
4 6 IM Karthikeyan Murali IND 2431 8.0 38.0
5 17   Akhmetov Ayan KAZ 2382 7.5 35.0
6 80 CM Azarya Jodi Setyaki INA 2112 7.5 38.0

Indian IM Murali Karthikeyan, one of the leaders

WYCC U18 Open Classic

Rk
SNo
Tit
Name
FED
Rtg
Pts
TB
1 14 IM Idani Pouya IRI 2483 8.0 39.0
2 6 GM Gabuzyan Hovhannes ARM 2532 7.5 38.0
3 7 GM Naroditsky Daniel USA 2531 7.5 37.5
4 9 GM Abasov Nijat AZE 2510 7.5 34.5
5 3 GM Anton Guijarro David ESP 2558 7.0 36.0

IM Pouya Idani vs top-seed GM Jorge Cori. Draw.

Links

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.


Born in the US, he grew up in Paris, France, where he completed his Baccalaureat, and after college moved to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. He had a peak rating of 2240 FIDE, and was a key designer of Chess Assistant 6. In 2010 he joined the ChessBase family as an editor and writer at ChessBase News. He is also a passionate photographer with work appearing in numerous publications, and the content creator of the YouTube channel, Chess & Tech.

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