The Last Leg of the FIDE Grand Prix in Berlin is about to start
The third and final leg of the FIDE Grand Prix Series 2022 organized by World Chess kicks off in Berlin. For the next 13 days, the attention of chess fans all over the world will be focused on World Chess Club Berlin, a chess venue in the German capital where the chess superstars will compete for 150,000 euros and more importantly for the last two spots in the upcoming Candidates’ Tournament.
The challenge is not an easy one, as the winner of the second stage, Grandmaster Richard Rapport, has almost secured the first spot, but the strongest chess players competing in the last leg are ready to fight.
The pool stage will start on March 22. This round consists of four groups, and the four winners of the groups move to the semi-finals and then two players go to a final. As the first two stages of the Grand Prix have proved this format should reduce the number of draws to a minimum.
The pairings for Round 1 represent the exciting line-up:
Pool A:
Andrey Esipenko (FIDE), 2723 — Grigoriy Oparin (FIDE), 2674
Levon Aronian (USA), 2785 — Hikaru Nakamura, (USA), 2750
Pool B:
Vincent Keymer (Germany), 2655 — Shakhriyar Mamedyarov (Azerbaijan), 2776
Daniil Dubov (FIDE), 2711 — Leinier Dominguez (USA), 2756
Pool C:
Sam Shankland (USA), 2704 — Wesley So (USA), 2778
Alexandr Predke (FIDE), 2682 — Maxime Vachier-Lagrave (France), 2761
Pool D:
Anish Giri (Netherlands), 2771 — Yangyi Yu (China), 2713
Nikita Vitiugov (FIDE), 2726 — Amin Tabatabaei (Iran), 2623
Due to covid restrictions, only 35 guests per day will be allowed to visit the venue. Tickets for the tournament were sold out in February.
For those who did not manage to buy tickets or cannot attend the tournament for other reasons, the tournament will be broadcast on chessarena.com, the official gaming platform of the Series.
About the tournament:
The three-tournament series which will unfold from February to April features 24 of the world’s best Grandmasters competing in two out of three events. To make the series more exciting with a minimum number of draws, FIDE and World Chess have changed the format. In this series, each event consists of a group stage followed by a knockout semi-final and final.
Two winners of the Series will qualify for the Candidates Tournament that will take place later in 2022. The prize fund for each event is EUR 150,000, which is a EUR 20,000 increase from 2019.
The third leg of the FIDE Grand Prix will take place in the city centre at Unter den Linden 26-30. The rounds start at 3PM Berlin time.
Due to COVID restrictions currently in place, only a limited number of tickets are available. Please note that the 3G rule applies to the event.
The games will be broadcast live.
Leading partners supporting the FIDE Grand Prix Series 2022:
Kaspersky as the Official Cybersecurity Partner;
Algorand as the Official Blockchain Partner;
Prytek as the Technology Transfer Partner;
FIDE Online Arena as the official Partner.
