Morozevich Wins Vladimir Petrov Memorial

The Vladimir Petrov Memorial took place from 15-20 February in Jurmala, Latvia.

Vladimir Petrov (pictured) was a talented Grandmaster from Latvia, who achieved great success in the 1930's. He won the Latvian national championships twice (1935 and 1937) and tied for first place with Sammy Reshevsky and Salo Flohr at the Kemeri 1937 tournament, finishing ahead of Alexander Alekine, Paul Keres, Reuben Fine and Saviely Tartakower.

Petrov's life ended much to early when he sadly died in a Soviet labour camp in 1943, aged just 35.

The memorial competition opened with a 9-round rapid Swiss event from which the top 4 finishers qualified to compete in a rapid round-robin final with 4 invited star GMs - Vassily Ivanchuk, Alexander Morozevich, Shakhriyar Mamedyarov and Alexei Shirov.

Alexander Morozevich emerged victorious with a score of 5/7, half a point clear of Alexei Shirov and Igor Kovalenko.  All games were played at 15 minutes plus 6 second increment.

The final standings and a selection of games are below, but first a game from Petrov himself...