Dortmund: Nico Zwirs outright winner in A-Open

by Carlos Alberto Colodro
8/19/2024 – Nico Zwirs beat Christopher Yoo with white to become the outright winner of the A-Open in the 51st edition of the Dortmund Chess Festival. Out of a Sicilian Defence, the Dutch GM first defended resourcefully and then showed excellent technique in a rook ending. In the match between Elisabeth Paehtz and Dinara Wagner, a sixth draw (in six games) was signed on Sunday. | Photos: Hoogeveen Chess 2018 / Frans Peeters
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A sixth draw in Paehtz v. Wagner

The two highest-rated women players in Germany played a 6-game match at the 51st edition of the Dortmund Chess Festival. Elisabeth Paehtz managed to keep her small 3-point advantage in the ranking after drawing all six games with Dinara Wagner.

Suitably, the match ended with a completely symmetrical position.

Paehtz and Wagner will play on boards 1 and 2 for Germany at the upcoming Women's Chess Olympiad in Budapest. The German team will enter the event as the 9th seed.

Watch more videos on YouTube's Dortmund Chess Channel

A-Open: Zwirs beats Yoo to win it all

Three players entered the final round of the A-Open tied for first place with 6½ points each: Anton Korobov, Frederik Svane (the top two seeds in the event) and Nico Zwirs.

On the top board, Svane and Korobov signed a quick, 14-move draw, which was likely to get shared first place in the final standings. However, Zwirs on board 2 made the most of his chances to beat third seed Christopher Yoo and become the outright winner in the 9-round Swiss open.

Out of a Sicilian Najdorf, Yoo actually outplayed his opponent in the opening. Zwirs did not falter under pressure though, and got to place his pawn on h6 - creating problems for his young rival in the ensuing struggle.

The position was close to equal at this point, as Black needs to deal with back rank problems constantly - here, for example, 29...exd4 fails to 30.Qe8+ Rxe8 31.Rxe8#.

Later on, the players entered a pure rook endgame with six pawns per side.

This position is objectively equal, but Zwirs managed to showcase reamarkable technique to eventually outplay his opponent.

Six players finished a half point behind the outright winner, with David Gavrilescu, Yahli Sokolovsky, Evgeny Romanov and Andrey Sumets scoring wins in the final round to catch up with Korobov and Svane.

Final standings

Rk. Name Pts.  TB1 
1 Zwirs, Nico 7,5 48
2 Korobov, Anton 7 51
3 Svane, Frederik 7 49,5
4 Gavrilescu, David 7 49
5 Sokolovsky, Yahli 7 46,5
6 Romanov, Evgeny 7 43
7 Sumets, Andrey 7 41,5
8 Quesada Perez, Luis Ernesto 6,5 48,5
9 Zuferi, Enis 6,5 45,5
10 Meins, Gerlef 6,5 44
11 Waldhausen Gordon, Frederick 6,5 43,5
12 Gallasch, Jonas 6,5 42
13 Mainka, Romuald 6,5 38
14 Petrovskyi, Vadim 6 50,5
15 Yoo, Christopher Woojin 6 49
16 Gkoumas, Georgios 6 47,5
17 Vaganian, Rafael A 6 47
18 Zemach, Nadav 6 46,5
19 Peyrer, Konstantin 6 46,5
20 Weishäutel, Moritz 6 46

...191 players

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Carlos Colodro is a Hispanic Philologist from Bolivia. He works as a freelance translator and writer since 2012. A lot of his work is done in chess-related texts, as the game is one of his biggest interests, along with literature and music.