Duda Strongest Rising Star At Lake Sevan
In a group of young, talented players it was GM Jan-Krzysztof Duda who proved the strongest. 6.0/9 was enough for the 17-year-old Polish grandmaster to finish in clear first place at the Lake Sevan tournament in Martuni, Armenia.
He was the third-seeded player (behind Vladislav Artemiev and Santosh Vidit) and also the third-youngest (behind Sam Sevian and Artemiev), but topped the final standings: Jan-Krzysztof Duda. In a hard-fought event, where only 17 out of 45 games ended in draws, 6.0/9 was good for clear first.
After three rounds Duda was in shared third place as he had just lost his game with Ter Sahakyan. That would be his last loss.
The Polish GM beat one of the leaders, Santosh Vidit of India, with the black pieces in round four. It was an amazing fight with so many things happening in the endgame; it was incredible. It was a really interesting game that's very suitable for a training session.
That wasn't the last disappointment for Vidit. In the next round he was lured into a theoretical discussion in the 3.Nd2 French by Sam Sevian. The Indian's preparation was more than excellent, but it looks like he couldn't exactly remember everything — a common phenomenon!
And what happened to Vidit in the next round can hardly be described. He reached a very promising position in an Anti-Moscow, only to spoil it in one move: a move that allowed mate in one!
Allowing mate in one is of course very rare for a grandmaster. It brings back memories of Deep Fritz vs. Kramnik, Bonn 2006 or Short-Chiburdanidze, Banja Luka 1985. Chess24 gave these and two similar examples in a nice article here.
Duda drew his first game in round five, and would share the point three more times. He added one win, against Salem Saleh, who would eventually finish last. With two rooks vs a queen, one would expect White to be better, but Duda simply played better moves:
The international Lake Sevan tournament was organized for the seventh time by the Chess Academy of Armenia under the auspices of the Armenian Chess Federation. It took place July 11-21 at the Culture Palace in Martuni, Armenia.
2015 Lake Sevan | Final Standings
| # | Name | Rtg | Perf | Pts | SB | Born |
| 1 | Duda,J | 2632 | 2736 | 6.0/9 | 26 April 1998 | |
| 2 | Anton,D | 2626 | 2695 | 5.5/9 | 23 June 1995 | |
| 3 | Vidit,S | 2643 | 2653 | 5.0/9 | 22.75 | 24 October 1994 |
| 4 | Ter Sahakyan,S | 2593 | 2659 | 5.0/9 | 21.50 | 19 September 1993 |
| 5 | Artemiev,V | 2660 | 2652 | 5.0/9 | 20.75 | 5 March 1998 |
| 6 | Hovhannisyan,R | 2611 | 2618 | 4.5/9 | 18.75 | 23 March 1991 |
| 7 | Gabuzyan,H | 2589 | 2620 | 4.5/9 | 18.50 | 19 May 1995 |
| 8 | Petrosian,TL | 2630 | 2578 | 4.0/9 | 17 September 1984 | |
| 9 | Sevian,Samuel | 2578 | 2502 | 3.0/9 | 26 December 2000 | |
| 10 | Salem,AR | 2615 | 2453 | 2.5/9 | 4 January 1993 |
Previous report
- Rounds 1-3: Attractive Chess By Future Stars At Lake Sevan
Peter Doggers joined a chess club a month before turning 15 and still plays for it. He used to be an active tournament player and holds two IM norms. Peter has a Master of Arts degree in Dutch Language & Literature. He briefly worked at New in Chess, then as a Dutch teacher and then in a project for improving safety and security in Amsterdam schools. Between 2007 and 2013 Peter was running ChessVibes, a major source for chess news and videos acquired by Chess.com in October 2013. As our Director News & Events, Peter writes many of our news reports. In the summer of 2022, The Guardian’s Leonard Barden described him as “widely regarded as the world’s best chess journalist.”
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