5/8/2019 – Starting on Wednesday, the first stop of the Grand Chess Tour 2019 is the Ivory Coast. It's the first time the GCT has held an event in Africa. Ten top GMs compete in the Pullman Abidjan Hotel in Abidjan, the country's largest city, including World Champion Magnus Carlsen in rapid and blitz chess for a prize fund of USD $150,000. Live commentary will be available by GM Yannick Pelletier, IM Tania Sachdev, GM Alejandro Ramirez & GM Maurice Ashley.
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On this DVD, Grandmaster and worldrenowned commentator Maurice Ashley reviews some of the most interesting patterns with examples meant to educate and entertain.
GM Blohberger presents a complete two-part repertoire for Black: practical, clear, and flexible – instead of endless theory, you’ll get straightforward concepts and strategies that are easy to learn and apply.
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A new season
From May 8th to 12th, ten participants play 9 rounds of rapid chess and 18 rounds of blitz in the "Côte d'Ivoire Rapid & Blitz 2019", one of four new tournaments to be added to the Grand Chess Tour series in 2019. The tournament was made possible by a partnership between Vivendi SA, Canal+ Group and the Pullman Abidjan Hotel. The total prize fund is USD $150,000.
The economic capital of Ivory Coast, Abidjan, is the first stop of the new series and also the first tournament on the African continent in which a reigning World Chess Champion is participating.
2019 Grand Chess Tour participants
Ratings as of May 8th, 2019
#
FED
Name
URS*
FIDE Elo
Born
1
Carlsen, Magnus
2867 (1)
2861 (1)
1990
2
Nakamura, Hikaru
2805 (2)
2761 (11)
1987
3
Vachier-Lagrave, Maxime
2792 (3)
2780 (6)
1990
4
Caruana, Fabiano
2791 (4)
2816 (2)
1992
5
Ding, Liren
2786 (5)
2805 (3)
1992
6
Mamedyarov, Shakhriyar
2777 (6)
2781 (5)
1985
7
Nepomniachtchi, Ian
2776 (7)
2773 (8)
1990
8
Aronian, Levon
2776 (8)
2762 (10)
1982
9
Karjakin, Sergey
2773 (9)
2752 (16)
1990
10
So, Wesley
2772 (10)
2754 (13)
1993
11
Giri, Anish
2766 (13)
2787 (4)
1994
12
Anand, Viswanathan
2759 (15)
2774 (7)
1969
*URS stands for Universal Rating System, developed and used by the Grand Chess Tour
The players of the first leg of the GCT 2019 — Wei, Amin and Topalov are the wild cards
Let endgame expert Dr Karsten Müller show and explain the finesses of the world champions. Although they had different styles each and every one of them played the endgame exceptionally well, so take the opportunity to enjoy and learn from some of the best endgames in the history of chess.
Promotional video introducing the players | Grand Chess Tour
Abidjan is not the capital of Ivory Coast, but it is the largest city and economic hub
On the even of the tournament, Maurice Ashley and the GCT video crew visited a local chess school with Dr Essoh Essis
On this DVD, well-known Indian WGM Tania Sachdev shows you how to evaluate certain positions and then find the right concepts and plans on the basis of her own games.
From May 8th-10th, three rapid chess games will be played per day, starting at 17:00 local time (UTC) each day — 19:00, 20:30 and 22:00 (CEST) or 1PM / 2:30PM / 4PM EDT.
On May 11th and 12th, a total of 18 blitz games will be played. On both days, the rounds start at 14:00 local time (UTC), with each round starting 30 minutes after the prior round until 18:00. Should a tie-break be necessary, it starts on May 12th at 18:30 UTC.
All rounds will feature live commentary by GM Yannick Pelletier, IM Tania Sachdev, GM Alejandro Ramirez & GM Maurice Ashley.
In this course, you’ll learn how to take the initiative against the London and prevent White from comfortably playing their usual system by playing 1.d4 Nf6 2.Bf4 Nh5.
London System Powerbase 2026 is a database and contains in all 11 285 games from Mega 2026 and the Correspondence Database 2026, of which 282 are annotated.
The London System Powerbook 2026 is based on more than 410 000 games or game fragments from different opening moves and ECO codes; what they all have in common is that White plays d4 and Bf4 but does not play c4.
In this course, Grandmaster Elisabeth Pähtz presents the London System, a structured and ambitious approach based on the immediate Bf4, leading to rich and dynamic positions.
Opening videos: Open Spanish (Sipke Ernst) and Classical Sicilian (Nico Zwirs). Endgame Special by Igor Stohl: ‘Short or long side’ – where should the defending king be placed in rook endgames? ‘Lucky bag’ with 35 master analyses.
YOUR EASY ACCESS TO OPENING THEORY: Whether you want to build up a reliable and powerful opening repertoire or find new opening ideas for your existing repertoire, the Opening Encyclopaedia covers the entire opening theory on one product.
The Queen’s Gambit Declined Exchange Variation with 5.Bf4 has a great balance between positional play and sharp pawn pushes; and will be a surprise for your opponents while being easy to learn for you, as the key patterns are familiar.
€9.90
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