2018 Tata Steel Chess (Wijk aan Zee)

One of the marquee tournaments kicked off today in Wijk ann Zee with the opening of the 80th Tata Steel Chess Tournament. World Champion Magnus Carlsen is coming off of his 2017 Grand Tour win and the recent Blitz title to play in his 14th Tata tournament. He won in 2016 and will be looking to take the crown from Wesley So who won it last year.

The field will feature a number of players who are poised for the Candidates tournament in March. 2018 participants Fabiano Caruana, Shakhriyar Mamedyarov, Vladimir Kramnik, and Sergey Karjakin will join So in London for a right to challenge Carlsen in the World Championship this year. Veterans Viswanathan Anand and Peter Svidler are going to cause some problems for the young crop of stars in the field. Wei Yi, at 18 years old, is perhaps one of the most highly-touted teens.

Other interesting additions will be Hou Yifan who was former Women’s Champion and has announced she is going to attend Oxford University for graduate studies. Baskaran Adhiban is making a return appearance after being the darling of last year’s event with +2. Debutante Maxim Matlakov has gotten his first invitation at age 26 and is the reigning European Champion. Last by not least is the Challengers winner Gawain Jones got the better tiebreaks over Markus Ragger. Both ended on 9/13.

The Challengers tournament will be led by Indian sensation Vidit Santosh Gujrathi touted by Anand as the future of Indian chess. The field includes the last two World Junior Champions in Norway’s Aryan Tari (2017) and Jeffery Xiong (2016). Four-time African champion Bassem Amin of Egypt is making his first appearance at Tata Steel. He recently broke the 2700 barrier becoming the first African player to do so.

Two women will provide lots of excitement as the congenial Harika Dronavali returns to Wijk to compete along with her colleague Olga Giriya who is making her first trip. There are a number of young Dutch talents in the field including the van Foreest brothers Jorden (18) and Lucas (16) and Benjamin Bok (23). Erwin L’Ami will most likely be the pacesetter for the Dutch side to protect home turf. Russia’s 21-year old Dmitri Gordievsky rounds out the field.

Tata Steel is an Indian multinational conglomerate consisting of a number of industries. Those following the tournament from the early days will remember it as the Hoorgovens, a Dutch steel company that would later merge with British steel to form the Corus Group. When Tata steel purchased Corus in 2007, the tournament took on the name of Indian conglomerate.

Video by Tata Steel

Official Site: https://www.tatasteelchess.com/
Schedule: https://www.tatasteelchess.com/visit/tata-steel-chess/program
Videos: (YouTube)

2018 Tata Steel Tournament January 13th-28th, 2018 (Wijk aan Zee, Netherlands)
Masters
#	Name	Title	Federation	Flag	Rating
1	Carlsen, Magnus	GM	Norway		2834
2	Caruana, Fabiano	GM	USA		2811
3	Mamedyarov, Shakhriyar	GM	Azerbaijan		2804
4	So, Wesley	GM	USA		2792
5	Kramnik, Vladimir	GM	Russia		2787
6	Svidler, Peter	GM	Russia		2768
7	Anand, Viswanathan	GM	India		2767
8	Karjakin, Sergey	GM	Russia		2753
9	Giri, Anish	GM	Netherlands		2752
10	Wei, Yi	GM	China		2743
11	Matlakov, Maxim	GM	Russia		2718
12	Hou, Yifan	GM	China		2680
13	Adhiban, Baskaran	GM	India		2655
14	Jones, Gawain	GM	England		2640
Challengers
#	Name	Title	Federation	Flag	Rating
1	Vidit, Santosh Gujrathi	GM	India		2718
2	Amin, Bassem	GM	Egypt		2693
3	Krasenkow, Michal	GM	Poland		2671
4	Bluebaum, Matthias	GM	Germany		2640
5	Korobov, Anton	GM	Ukraine		2652
6	Xiong, Jeffery	GM	USA		2634
7	L’Ami, Erwin	GM	Netherlands		2634
8	van Foreest, Jorden	GM	Netherlands		2629
9	Gordievsky, Dmitry	GM	Russia		2622
10	Bok, Benjamin	GM	Netherlands		2608
11	Tari, Aryan	GM	Norway		2599
12	Harika, Dronavalli	GM	India		2497
13	Girya, Olga	WGM	Russia		2489
14	Van Foreest, Lucas	IM	Netherlands		2481
Official Site