Commonwealth & South African Open
The 2011 Commonwealth & South African Open Chess Championships will run from 25 June - 3 July.
The venue is the grandly titled Emperors Palace Hotel Casino & Convention Resort in the city of Ekurhuleni, and the prize fund is R205,000 (approx USD30,000).
The main event is an 11-round Swiss open, with the top seed being English GM Nigel Short, who is also giving an hour-long lecture on the eve of the championships.
The time control is 90 minutes for the first 40 moves, then 30 minutes to finish plus a 30 second increment from the start.
The top 20 ranked players in the Championship Open:
| 1 | Short, Nigel D | ENG | 2682 |
| 2 | Gupta, Abhijeet | IND | 2604 |
| 3 | Jones, Gawain CB | ENG | 2596 |
| 4 | Lafuente, Pablo | ARG | 2555 |
| 5 | Kunte, Abhijit | IND | 2526 |
| 6 | Smerdon, David | AUS | 2520 |
| 7 | Harika, Dronavali | IND | 2520 |
| 8 | Huschenbeth, Niclas | GER | 2502 |
| 9 | Grover, Sahaj | IND | 2485 |
| 10 | Laxman, Rajaram R | IND | 2446 |
| 11 | Sachdev, Tania | IND | 2416 |
| 12 | Mokal, Prathamesh S | IND | 2405 |
| 13 | Ringoir, Tanguy | BEL | 2399 |
| 14 | Kobese, Watu KW | RSA | 2355 |
| 15 | Jere, Daniel | ZAM | 2344 |
| 16 | Karavade, Eesha | IND | 2343 |
| 17 | Ghate, Swati | IND | 2317 |
| 18 | Subbaraman, Meenakshi | IND | 2317 |
| 19 | Van Der Nat, Nicholas P | RSA | 2308 |
| 20 | Cawdery, Daniel J | RSA | 2274 |
For more information visit the official website.
