Grand Prix Staggers Onwards

Following on from FIDE's devaluing of the Grand Prix series of tournaments by the introduction of a new Candidates Tournament, and Magnus Carlsen's subsequent withdrawal from the series, Michael Adams (pictured) has also decided to quit.  Chess seems to be full of 'open letters' at the moment, and Mickey's is below.

Nevertheless, the FIDE Grand Prix series staggers onwards, with a change of venue and many different participants.  In addition to the withdrawal of Carlsen and Adams, Yannick Pelletier and Mohamad al Modiahki are also out of the competition because they were the nominated players from Switzerland and Qatar (and those events will now not take place in those countries).  Very tough luck for them!  The official website for the event is here.

At the moment, it seems that there are four new players that will be taking part in the third Grand Prix starting tomorrow in Elista.  they are Evgeny Alekseev, Vladimir Akopian, Pavel Eljanov and Rustam Kasimdzhanov.  The full line up is:

Open Letter from Michael Adams

I have regretfully withdrawn from the whole Grand Prix series. Some of the reasons I took this decision are the sudden switch of venues at very late notice, the replacement of players whose results thus far will affect the results of the whole Grand Prix both in terms of prize money and World Championship qualification and the fact that when I made my decision the status of some of the future GP events was still unclear.

The changes to the World Championship cycle also concern me as making major changes to a cycle in progress in such a sudden manner is very undesirable. There also seems to be no guarantee that further changes will not be made in a similar manner in the future. The changes are obviously immediately very negative for all Grand Prix participants but also in general it seems to me that the rewards for success in such tough events as the Grand Prix or the World Cup are now much too minimal.

Michael Adams