Russian Higher League 2012 Qualifiers
The 65th Russian Higher League Championship was held from 16-27 June in Tyumen, Siberia.
The "Higher League" serves as a qualification event for the main Russian Chess Championships in August, where the top players are seeded directly into the event.
The format was an 11-round Swiss with 46 players, and the top five qualified through to the Russian Championships. They were the three players that tied for first with 7½/11 points - Dmitry Andreikin, Daniil Dubov and Nikita Vitiugov, with Sanan Sjugirov and Vladimir Potkin joining them thanks to having the best tie-break scores among the group half a point behind.
One of the qualifiers deserves special mention - Daniil Dubov is just 16 years old, but he was the long-time leader of the competition, only losing his last round game with black to be denied an outright victory!
A name for the future...Daniil Dubov
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The top standings were:
| # | Name | Elo | Pts | TB |
| 1 | Andreikin, Dmitry | 2700 | 7.5 | 70.0 |
| 2 | Dubov, Daniil | 2569 | 7.5 | 69.0 |
| 3 | Vitiugov, Nikita | 2703 | 7.5 | 68.5 |
| 4 | Sjugirov, Sanan | 2625 | 7.0 | 70.5 |
| 5 | Potkin, Vladimir | 2642 | 7.0 | 68.0 |
| 6 | Alekseev, Evgeny | 2677 | 7.0 | 65.0 |
| 7 | Demchenko, Anton | 2575 | 7.0 | 62.0 |
| 8 | Bocharov, Dmitry | 2600 | 6.5 | 69.5 |
| 9 | Prizant, Jaroslav | 2524 | 6.5 | 67.0 |
| 10 | Panarin, Mikhail | 2538 | 6.5 | 66.5 |
| 11 | Grachev, Boris | 2680 | 6.5 | 65.5 |
| 12 | Timofeev, Artyom | 2641 | 6.5 | 64.0 |
| 13 | Ovetchkin, Roman | 2501 | 6.5 | 63.5 |
| 14 | Khairullin, Ildar | 2631 | 6.5 | 62.5 |
| 15 | Matlakov, Maxim | 2668 | 6.5 | 61.5 |
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There was also a women's event in the same format with 32 players taking part which was won by Baira Kovanova with an excellent score of 9/11, a point ahead of second placed Natalia Pogonina.
Baira Kovanova dominated the women's event
The top standings in the women's event:
| # | Name | Elo | Pts | TB |
| 1 | Kovanova, Baira | 2391 | 9.0 | 73.0 |
| 2 | Pogonina, Natalija | 2447 | 8.0 | 73.5 |
| 3 | Ubiennykh, Ekaterina | 2336 | 7.5 | 71.5 |
| 4 | Ovod, Evgenija | 2410 | 7.5 | 70.5 |
| 5 | Girya, Olga | 2414 | 7.0 | 72.5 |
| 6 | Timofeeva, Ekaterina | 2273 | 7.0 | 71.0 |
| 7 | Bodnaruk, Anastasia | 2394 | 7.0 | 70.5 |
| 8 | Vasilevich, Irina | 2375 | 6.5 | 68.0 |
| 9 | Severiukhina, Zoja | 2337 | 6.5 | 63.5 |
| 10 | Shadrina, Tatiana | 2359 | 6.0 | 70.0 |
| 11 | Schepetkova, Margarita | 2181 | 6.0 | 65.5 |
| 12 | Sukhareva, Evgeniya | 2236 | 6.0 | 58.0 |
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The time control was 90 minutes for the first 40 moves, then 30 minutes to a finish with a 30 second increment from the start. No draw offers were permitted before move 40.
