Edouard wins Inventi, Timman solid second
Photo © Schaakfabriek.be
Romain Edouard won the Inventi GM Tournament in Antwerp, Belgium on Sunday. The French grandmaster finished on 7/9, half a point more than the legendary Jan Timman who was the only player to stay undefeated.
The 6th InventiChess tournament took place September 3-11 in the office space of the sponsor in Antwerp, Belgium.
Inventi, a sales and management consultancy company, has a strong link with chess in Belgium. In July they were the main sponsor of the Belgian Championships for the second time, and last week they sponsored their own main tournament for the sixth time.
They are approaching chess sponsorship in quite a unique way with what they call 'CEO-InventiChess': four times a year 'CEO Chess' events are organized, where CEOs meet each other to play some chess, enjoy a nice dinner and thereby have lots of chances to network in a pleasant environment.
The main tournament was a 10-player round robin (FIDE category IX) and the rate of play was 40 moves in 90 minutes plus 30 minutes to finish the game, with 30 seconds increment from move 1.
Like every year, the tournament combines local heros with a number of interesting players and outsiders from different countries. The locals this year were Bart Michiels, Mher Hovhanisian en Stefan Docx. Michiels, for the first time playing with a 2500+ rating, was playing for his third GM norm; Hovhanisian for his second and Dutch IM Benjamin Bok for his first.
There were three ladies: GM Ketevan Arakhamia-Grant and IMs Anastasia Savina and Elisabeth Paehtz. Against the latter, Van der Wiel drew in the second round and then he said: "Ouch, I really have to fight to avoid losing against these ladies, this was very different 20-30 years ago."
20-year-old Romain Edouard was the only player rated higher than 2600, and indeed finished clear first. He started strongly with four out of four and was already a full point ahead of Timman, but in the next round the legendary Dutchman defeated the French GM to catch him in the standings.
Jan Timman | Photo © De Schaakfabriek
They were still sharing the lead after eight rounds, and so they both needed a win with the black pieces in the last round. Timman didn't get any chances against Docx and drew quickly in a Caro-Kann. Edouard then beat Savina in an ending to finish clear first. Timman didn't lose one game, Edouard didn't draw one game!
Selection of games
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There was one strange thing about the tournament: except for a few invited spectators, visitors were not allowed, so that the Iventi employees in the same building wouldn't be disturbed. However, during the event there were several network events with lots of drinks and food, so that the players did have to endure quite a bit of noise!
Thanks to Schaakfabriek.be who have excellent round reports in Dutch and many photos.
Links
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.”
In October, Peter's first book The Chess Revolution will be published!
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