Preview of the Rapid and Blitz World Team Championships

The idea of a world rapid chess championship was the brainchild of Wadim Rosenstein. Last year the Düsseldorf businessman hosted a very prestigious grandmaster tournament and then organised and funded the first World Rapid Chess Team Championship, in which the enthusiastic amateur chess player and tandem expert also wanted to take part. For this reason, the event was organised a little differently than usual.

The matches are played on six boards. Four boards can be set up at will, with some teams fielding top grandmasters. One board is reserved for a woman and one for an amateur with a maximum rating (in rapid and blitz) of 2000.

This proved to be an attractive format for the first edition of the new tournament and no fewer than 34 teams were able to meet the requirements in Düsseldorf. There were some professional teams with very strong players on the top boards, but also many teams who were happy to take part without much chance of winning this World Championship, but who were happy to play alongside or against absolute world class players.

In Düsseldorf Wadim Rosenstein had assembled a team of six top grandmasters, including Nepomniachtchi, Praggnanandhaa and Keymer, as well as two former women world champions, Hou Yifan and Alexandra Kosteniuk, and this team was the favourite to win the title. Rosenstein played on the amateur board and scored 50%. But WR Chess had very strong competition from teams such as Freedom (Anand on board one), Team MGD 1 (a team of top Indian players), Armenia and Germany and Friends (the German national team).

The tournament has now moved to Kazakhstan and will be held in Astana. After Russia was cancelled as a venue for international sporting events due to the war of aggression against Ukraine, Kazakhstan is increasingly taking on the role of host of major chess tournaments. There is a great enthusiasm for chess in the country, and after Kazakhstan already plays a major role in women's chess with strong female players, young male talents are now following suit with success. Kazakhstan is also putting a lot of effort and money into making chess even more popular.

FIDE will use the stage to organise various activities on the sidelines of the tournament to celebrate its 100th anniversary.

For the second edition, the World Rapid Team Championship has been expanded to include a blitz tournament, making it a World Rapid and Blitz Team Championship. Once again the field of participants is select and with 39 teams there are now even more contenders for this new world championship title.

Wadim Rosenstein's WR Chess is once again the Elo favourite and with Magnus Carlsen on board one, the team is even stronger than last year.

Magnus Carlsen | Photo: Nils Rohde

Second place in the seeding list is now taken by an international team from the United Arab Emirates, Al-Ain ACMG UAE. Third in the seeding list is the international team Chessy. They are followed by a Kazakh team, supplemented by Peter Svidler, Shahriyar Mamedyarov and Alexander Grischuk on the top boards. There will be an all-Chinese team with Ding Liren and Wei Yi. Team MGD 1 from India with Arjun Erigaisi is also taking part again.

In seventh place on the seeding list is the team GMHans.com, with Hans Niemann on board one and as team captain. 

The FIDE Board also fields a team. Nigel Short and Viktor Bologan are playing at the top boards. 

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