7/31/2019 – India's wunderkind 13-year-old GM R Praggnanandhaa started out Xtracon Open 2019 as the 21st seed, scored an unbeaten 8½/10 at a performance rating of 2741, to win the tournament convincingly. He finished a half point ahead of the pack of five players who were all higher rated than him. Norwegian no.3 GM Aryan Tari scored 8.0/10 and finished 2nd, while Armenian GM Gabriel Sargissian finished 3rd according to their tie-break scores respectively.

7/16/2019 – Grandmaster Aryan Tari won his second Norwegian Championship title last weekend after narrowly edging GM Jon-Ludwig Hammer on tiebreak. Both players scored 6½/9. The tournament saw several top players withdraw in opposition to a controversial sponsorship proposal, that was eventually rejected by the Norwegian Chess Federation's Congress delegates. | Photo: Larvik Chess Club Facebook page

8/3/2018 – Norway's Jon Ludwig Hammer (pictured middle) won the tournament victory at the Xtracon Open in Helsingör, followed by Russian GM Dmitry Andreikin (left) while the German "prince" Rasmus Svane (right) finished third and Vincent Keymer was the eleventh but also enjoys his second GM norm. | Photo: Jacob Carstensen

2/9/2018 – Dubbed the "unofficial world championship in Fischer random chess" (a.k.a. Chess960), World Champion Magnus Carlsen and former Chess960 World Champion Hikaru Nakamura face off in a 16 game rapid and blitz match over five days, February 9th to 13th in Hovikodden, just outside Oslo, Norway. The psychedelic image below comes from an interactive quasi-3D animation by Pnkt design and web agency, which is also responsible for key graphics on the official site of altibox Norway Chess.

1/8/2018 – The Rilton Cup in Stockholm is over and in the end it came down to the many young players taking the top prizes. Six of the top seven places went to players under the age of 21. Kirill Alekseenko, Maksim Chigaev and Mikhail Antipov from Russia all won their games in rounds eight and nine and thus secured the podium places | Pictured: The decisive game of the tournament: Johan Salomon against Kirill Alekseenko | Photo: Lars OA Hedlund

11/25/2017 – Levon Aronian survived the pressure from Hikaru Nakamura, making a draw that ensured him a share of first place. He was somewhat surprisingly joined by Dmitry Jakovenko, who beat Maxime Vachier-Lagrave with the black pieces. MVL was in a must win situation, so had to go for broke. All other games ended in draws including the remaining key game for the Candidates qualification: Teimour Radjabov vs. Richard Rapport. In the end Shakhriyar Mamedyarov and Alexander Grischuk maintained their lead in the overall Grand Prix standings and secured the final two Candidates tournament spots.

11/20/2017 – What an exciting round it was! Round four not only saw a plethora of decisive games, but spectacular ones at that. Levon Aronian was once more his brilliant best as he defeated Anish Giri in a beautiful game with sacs coming from all directions. Ding Liren's imaginative attack against Ernesto Inarkiev was also a joy to watch, and even Hikaru Nakamura's endgame squeeze over Radjabov started with a sparkling queen sac. Report and analysis by GM Alex Yermolinsky. | Photo: Valerij Belobeev

11/19/2017 – Round three was mostly one of missed opportunities as many games failed to capitalize on the promise of their positions. The first and foremost was Maxime Vachier-Lagrave's excellent chances against co-leader Levon Aronian that fizzled out during the technical transition, while Rapport will regret his near-win not yielding its fruits. That said, Peter Svidler did deliver mate on the board against Jon Hammer! Report and analysis by GM Alex Yermolinsky | Photo: Valerij Belobeev

1/7/2016 – Jon Ludvig Hammer from Norway and Maxim Rodshtein from Israel were both in good form at the traditionally strong Rilton Cup in Stockholm. Both grandmasters played a number of impressive games and both managed to raise their ratings to 2700+. But fortune smiled a bit brighter on Rodshtein who won the tournament with 8.0/9, half a point ahead of Hammer.

5/13/2013 – It was a must win situation for Magnus Carlsen to still dream of first, and it started badly as Sergey Karjakin took the initiative. With his vintage luck of the champions, Karjakin miscalculated and Carlsen went on the attack to score an impressive win. Karjakin leads with 4.0/5, followed by Carlsen and Nakamura with 3.0/5. Jon Hammer scored his first win against Wang Hao. Report with GM commentary.

5/8/2013 – It was a great start with all games being hard fought and three ending in decisive results. Magnus Carlsen tried his best to beat Topalov, but the Bulgarian held fast. Anand and Aronian drew a sensible game, while Svidler ultimately managed to outclass Hammer in their endgame. Nakamura trounced Wang Hao while Radjabov continued his misery as he lost to Karjakin. Full report with GM commentary.