Capelle-La-Grande Open 2012
The 28th edition of the traditional Capelle-la-Grande tournament is underway in France.
This strong event runs from 3-10 March and features 14 players rated over 2600 Elo. The format is a nine round Swiss Open with a huge field of nearly 500 competing for the €30,000 prize fund.
The time control is 40 moves in 90 minutes, followed by 30 minutes to finish, with a 30 second increment from the start.
Top seed is Frenchman Christian Bauer (pictured). The top players are:
| 1 | GM | BAUER Christian | FRA | 2679 |
| 2 | GM | HARIKRISHNA P | IND | 2678 |
| 3 | GM | GHARAMIAN Tigran | FRA | 2671 |
| 4 | GM | KURNOSOV Igor | RUS | 2657 |
| 5 | GM | LYSYJ Igor | RUS | 2656 |
| 6 | GM |
PETROSIAN Tigran L. | ARM | 2643 |
| 7 | GM | ZHEREBUKH Yaroslav | UKR | 2642 |
| 8 | GM | NEGI Parimarjan | IND | 2639 |
| 9 | GM | FEDORCHUK Sergey | UKR | 2634 |
| 10 | GM | ROMANOV Evgeny | RUS | 2625 |
| 11 | GM | ANDRIASIAN Zaven | ARM | 2616 |
| 12 | GM | GUREVICH Mikhail | TUR | 2611 |
| 13 | GM | AMIN Bassem | EGY | 2608 |
| 14 | GM | SOLAK Dragan | TUR | 2602 |
| 15 | GM | FIER Alexandr | BRA | 2599 |
| 16 | GM | KOVCHAN Alexander | UKR | 2598 |
| 17 | GM | SANDIPAN Chanda | IND | 2595 |
| 18 | GM | BURMAKIN Vladimir | RUS | 2592 |
| 19 | GM | RAMIREZ Alejandro | USA | 2591 |
| 20 | GM | KRAVTSIV Martyn | UKR | 2588 |
| 21 | GM | NYZHNYK Illya | UKR | 2585 |
| 22 | GM | BANUSZ Tamas | HUN | 2583 |
| 23 | GM | VOROBIOV Evgeny | RUS | 2580 |
| 24 | GM | BOROVIKOV Vladislav | UKR | 2579 |
| 25 | GM | SOKOLOV Andrei | FRA | 2577 |
The playing hall in Capelle-la Grande (photo from the official website)
The tournament schedule (start times = UTC+1 hour):
| Date | Round | Start time |
| 03-Mar | Round 1 | 16:00 |
| 04-Mar | Round 2 | 14:00 |
| 05-Mar | Round 3 | 09:00 |
| 05-Mar | Round 4 | 16:00 |
| 06-Mar | Round 5 | 14:00 |
| 07-Mar | Round 6 | 14:00 |
| 08-Mar | Round 7 | 14:00 |
| 09-Mar | Round 8 | 14:00 |
| 10-Mar | Round 9 | 10:00 |
Some games from the opening round:
Live coverage is available at the official website.
