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During the 46th Biel Chess Festival all attention went to the Grandmaster Tournament, in memoriam of Olivier Breisacher. Rightly so, as the games were full of fighting spirit. However there were also other two chess tournaments: the Master Tournament (for players with FIDE rating 2000 and more) and the Main Tournament (for players with FIDE rating 2050 and below). Other chess events like blitz, rapid, chess960, chess-tennis and a simultaneous event gathered many chess lovers in the city of Biel. There were over 200 players from 30 countries, over 50 titled players in total from which 23 grandmasters.
The Master Tournament that was held simultaneously was very tough and also deserves an article. The tournament was an eleven round Swiss, with one rest day.
After five rounds Salem A.R. Saleh was the sole leader, having beaten Jan Smeets. The GM from UAE lost in round six to Harikrishna, who took the lead together with Mateusz Bartel. In the final round these two players were leading: Pentala Harikrishna and Mateusz Bartel, both with 7.5/10, with several players half a point behind. Harikrishna managed to beat Daniel Hausrath, while Bartel was winning but had to settle for a draw against Susant Megaranto.
The winner of the 2013 Biel Master Tournament: Indian GM Pentala Harikrishna
Second (on tiebreak) with 8.0/11: Polish GM Mateusz Bartel
The winners of the Master Tournament: Bartel
Mateusz (second),
Pentala Harikrishna (first place) and Dragan Solak (third)
Equal 2nd-4th: Chinese GM Bu Xiangzhi, with 8.0/11 points
| # | Player | Ti. | Rtng | Nat | + | = | – | Pts | TB1 | TB2 |
| 1. | Harikrishna,Penta | GM | 2680 | IND | 6 | 5 | 0 | 8.5 | 68.5 | 665.0 |
| 2. | Bartel,Mateusz | GM | 2619 | POL | 5 | 6 | 0 | 8.0 | 72.0 | 662.5 |
| 3. | Solak,Dragan | GM | 2598 | TUR | 5 | 6 | 0 | 8.0 | 71.5 | 677.0 |
| 4. | Bu,Xiangzhi | GM | 2664 | CHN | 6 | 4 | 1 | 8.0 | 70.0 | 669.5 |
| 5. | Gharamian,Tigran | GM | 2655 | FRA | 5 | 5 | 1 | 7.5 | 68.5 | 646.0 |
| 6. | Adianto,Utut | GM | 2548 | INA | 6 | 3 | 2 | 7.5 | 64.0 | 631.5 |
| 7. | Megaranto,Susanto | GM | 2524 | INA | 5 | 5 | 1 | 7.5 | 62.0 | 630.0 |
| 8. | Grachev,Boris | GM | 2683 | RUS | 4 | 6 | 1 | 7.0 | 72.0 | 660.0 |
| 9. | Salem,A R. Saleh | GM | 2531 | UAE | 6 | 2 | 3 | 7.0 | 69.0 | 654.5 |
| 10. | Smeets,Jan | GM | 2643 | NED | 6 | 2 | 3 | 7.0 | 69.0 | 644.5 |
| 11. | Hausrath,Daniel | IM | 2516 | GER | 4 | 6 | 1 | 7.0 | 68.5 | 647.0 |
| 12. | Zhao,Xue | GM | 2553 | CHN | 6 | 2 | 3 | 7.0 | 65.5 | 645.5 |
| 13. | Saric,Ivan | GM | 2639 | CRO | 6 | 2 | 3 | 7.0 | 65.0 | 632.0 |
| 14. | Ganguly,Surya | GM | 2628 | IND | 4 | 6 | 1 | 7.0 | 64.5 | 632.5 |
| 15. | Cvitan,Ognjen | GM | 2562 | CRO | 4 | 6 | 1 | 7.0 | 64.0 | 630.0 |
| 16. | Malakhatko,Vadim | GM | 2529 | BEL | 6 | 2 | 3 | 7.0 | 61.5 | 627.0 |
| 17. | Kurnosov,Igor | GM | 2657 | RUS | 4 | 5 | 2 | 6.5 | 67.5 | 630.0 |
| 18. | Antipov,Mikhail A | IM | 2490 | RUS | 5 | 3 | 3 | 6.5 | 65.5 | 646.0 |
| 19. | Sandipan,Chanda | GM | 2623 | IND | 3 | 7 | 1 | 6.5 | 65.5 | 641.5 |
| 20. | Farid,Firman Syah | IM | 2396 | INA | 6 | 1 | 4 | 6.5 | 61.5 | 616.5 |
| 21. | Donchenko,Alexand | IM | 2477 | GER | 4 | 5 | 2 | 6.5 | 60.5 | 616.5 |
| 22. | Saric,Ante | GM | 2565 | CRO | 4 | 5 | 2 | 6.5 | 60.5 | 615.0 |
| 23. | Medina,Warda Auli | WIM | 2286 | INA | 4 | 5 | 2 | 6.5 | 56.0 | 590.5 |
| 24. | Raetsky,Alexander | GM | 2412 | RUS | 4 | 5 | 2 | 6.5 | 55.5 | 603.0 |
Ninth: UAE GM Salem A.R. Saleh, who led during the first five rounds
Tenth: Dutch GM Jan Smeets
It is no surprise that in such a strong and big open several norms were scored: GM norm by Daniel Hausrath (GER), IM norms by Qian Huang (CHN), Rasch Holger (GER) and Ghazal Hakimifard (IRI), who also got a WGM norm.
Eleventh: Daniel Hausrath, happy about his last GM norm (and other things)
Twelfth: Chinese GM Xue Zhao, best women in the tournament
14th: Indian GM and Anand second: Surya Shekhar Ganguly
IM Anna Zozulia, BEL, scored 5.5 points from 11 games
Iranian WIM Ghazal Hakimifard scored two norms: WGM and IM
Chinese WGM Qian Huang finished 25th and made an IM norm
The podium in the Main Tournament: Ireneusz
Lada (second),
Sayadyan Edvard (first) and Nadia Anggraeni (third)
Biel (in German) or Bienne (in French) is the biggest bilingual town or city in Switzerland, in which German and French are spoken side by side in equal measure. The beautiful town lies next to Lake Biel, at the foot of the chain of Jura Mountains. Being the center of the largest continous lake and river system in Switzerland, Biel is an ideal location for your next trip! The dates for the 47th Biel Chess Festival are already announced: 12th-25th July 2014!
View of the Lake Biel – the weather was good enough to have a swim
You can also go on a boat tour on the free day
A rainbow over the city
Raclette – a Swiss specialty (heating the cheese and scraping off the melted part)
The beautiful old town of Biel
Pasquart Church in Biel
The funicular railway takes you up to Magglingen/Macolin ...
... which is more than 400 meters above the lake and the city (scroll right)
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. |
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