Take a deep breath: Wijk aan Zee starts today

Wijk aan Zee 2007 – information and schedule

Wijk aan Zee (pronounced: whyk aahn zeh) is a small town on the coast of the North Sea in the municipality of Beverwijk in the province of North Holland of the Netherlands. The prestigious yearly Corus tournament, formerly called Hoogovens, takes place in three Grandmaster Groups. There are also a number of amateur groups taking part at the same time. The three Grandmaster tournaments have 14 players each and are round robins (each competitor plays against every other).

Participants of Grandmaster Group A

Participants of Grandmaster Group B

Participants of Grandmaster Group C

FIDE ratings of January 2007

Location: The tournament 2007 takes place in the De Moriaan Community Centre (Dorpsduinen 4, 1949 EG Wijk aan Zee) and the nearby bar de Zon. There is running commentary on the games of the Grandmaster Groups in a special Chess Pavilion, on the Village Green in Wijk aan Zee (one minute walk from De Moriaan).

Accommodation: For information contact the local Tourist Office. Stichting Toerisme Wijk aan Zee
Julianaplein 13-15, 1949 AT Wijk aan Zee. Telephone: + 31 (0)251 374253. E-mail: vvvwijkaanzee@ncn.nl Website: http://www.visitwijkaanzee.nl

Playing days in January 2007

Games begin at 13:30h local time (CET), except for the last round on January 28th, which begins at 12:30h (Grandmaster group C starts at 11:30h hours in the last round). There are three rest days, on January 17th, 22nd, and 25th.

Schedule and pairings of Grandmaster Group A

Schedule and pairings of Grandmaster Group B

Schedule and pairings of Grandmaster Group C

Pictures from the opening day

The following pictures were provided by our Russian colleague Yury Vasiliev, who is in Wijk aan Zee covering the event for ChessPro.

Arriving in wind-swept Wijk: Peter Svidler, Vishy and Aruna Anand

The drawing of lots with hyperactive young boys – see video below

Sergey Karjakin, who turned 17 on Friday

A chess cake and chocolate pieces

GM Elisbar Ubilava (right) with his latest prodigy: GM Parimarjan Negi, 13
("Ubi" used to be Anand's second, now he trains the Indian team)

Pretty darn strong: the Kosintseva sisters Tatiana and Nadezhda

Silvio Danailov and Veselin Topalov with chief organiser Jeroen van den Berg.
Please find a caption to this picture yourself [Buffer overflow, too many lines]

The games can begin...

Chess Vibes Videos

The Dutch site Chessvibes, the creation of Peter Doggers, will be providing video films and pictures from the Wijk aan Zee tournament. For starters here are three (the third fully in Dutch), showing the drawing of lots at the openings ceremony, interviews with Alexei Shirov, Parimarjan Negi, Viswanathan Anand, Jan Werle and Loek van Wely. Unfortunately the sound is not great (a lot of noise in the background), but that is expected to improve in the future.

Drawing of lots – 6'30"

Interviews with Shirov, Parimarjan Negi, Anand – 4'23"

Interviews with Dutch players Jan Werle and Loek van Wely – 9'01"

• Live coverage with commentary by GM Yasser Seirawan is available on the Playchess server.
• Beautiful dia show of the village of Wijk aan Zee
• Official web site