Gelfand Shocks Nakamura In London
The opening round of the 2012 FIDE London Grand Prix at Simpson's-In-The-Strand produced plenty of effort and high quality chess, but only one decisive game.
It was top seed Hikaru Nakamura who came to grief with the white pieces against recent world championship challenger Boris Gelfand.
Vassily Ivanchuk fought hard for 110 moves but couldn't make his extra pawn count against Shakhriyar Mamedyarov. Michael Adams was a late replacement for Peter Svidler in the line-up and had a great opening game against Wang Hao, which didn't quite produce a full point..
Hikaru Nakamura lost his opening game to Boris Gelfand
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Vassily Ivanchuk pressed Shakhriyar Mamedyarov hard
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Anish Giri also had the better game with the black pieces against Leinier Dominguez Perez
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Michael Adams had a promising first game against Wang Hao
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Veselin Topalov drew his game with Alexander Grischuk
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Peter Leko was surprised by Kasimdzhanov's choice of 1.e4 and chose the solid Berlin
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The London Grand Prix is the first tournament of the 2012/13 FIDE Grand Prix series. After the first contest in London, the series moves on to Tashkent, Lisbon, Madrid, Berlin and Paris. Each tournament is a single round-robin featuring 12 out of the 18 players in the Grand Prix, and each player competes in four of the six events. Details of dates and participants can be found here.
The overall winner and runner-up of the Grand Prix qualify for the March 2014 Candidates Tournament.
The schedule for the London Grand Prix:
| Arrival & Opening | 20th September |
| 1st Round | 21st September |
| 2nd Round | 22nd September |
| 3rd Round | 23rd September |
| 4th Round | 24th September |
| 5th Round | 25th September |
| Free Day | 26th September |
| 6th Round | 27th September |
| 7th Round | 28th September |
| 8th Round | 29th September |
| Free Day | 30th September |
| 9th Round | 1st October |
| 10th Round | 2nd October |
| 11th round & Closing | 3rd October |
| Departure | 4th October |
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Rounds start at 14:00 local time (13:00 UTC). The time control is 40 moves in 2 hours, followed by 20 moves in 1 hour, then an extra 15 minutes to a finish with a 30 second increment after the second time control.
Draws can only be claimed for triple-repetition of position, theoretical draws, or 50-move rule.
The official regulations for the 2012 FIDE Grand Prix can be found here.
Official website here. Games via TWIC. Photos by Ray Morris-Hill.
Look out for coverage at Chess.com/TV!
