Bazna Kings Tournament 2011
The 5th edition of the Bazna Kings Tournament runs from 11-22 June in Medias, Romania.
Despite being a relatively new event, Bazna Kings has established itself as a firm favourite in the chess calendar.
The competition is a six-player double round-robin, with a mouth-watering line-up of some of the strongest and most exciting players in the world.
At the head of the field is Magnus Carlsen (pictured), playing in his first rated event since Tata Steel in January, where he finished third behind Hikaru Nakamura and Vishy Anand.
Carlsen is the defending champion, having won last year's Bazna in stunning style by 2 clear points!
The full line-up in Bazna 2011:
| Magnus Carlsen (NOR) |
2815 |
| Vassily Ivanchuk (UKR) | 2776 |
| Sergey Karjakin (RUS) | 2776 |
| Hikaru Nakamura (USA) | 2774 |
| Teimour Radjabov (AZE) | 2744 |
| Liviu-Dieter Nisipeanu (ROU) | 2662 |
Games start at 15:30 local time (12:30 UTC) except the last round which is 2 hours earlier. The two rest days are on 15 and 20 June.
The time control is 2 hours for the first 40 moves, 60 minutes for the next 20 moves, then 15 minutes to finish with a 30 second increment after move 60.
"Sofia" style anti-draw rules are in operation. The official site is here.
The first round draw pits Carlsen with white against Nakamura! Who is your money on? And who will win the tournament?
The full draw can be found here. Look out for updates at Chess.com!
