Naiditsch superb at Neckar Open, tough weekend for Bacrot
The 15th Neckar Open took place April 21st till 25th, 2011 in the Public Hall and the Gymnasium of Deizisau (Stuttgart Region), Germany. As always, the tournament was held during the long Easter weekend and to keep open the possibility of scoring norms, nine rounds were held in just five days. There were three independent tournaments (A/B/C-Open), all with the time control of 2 hours 40 moves + half an hour to finish the game. The prize fund for the A group was 11,600 Euro.
This year the Deizisau story was the story of one man: Arkadij Naiditsch. The Dortmund resident won the largest open chess tournament in Germany with the outstanding score of 8.5 out of 9. He started with 7/7, including victories against GMs Arik Braun and Alon Greenfeld. Only then did he play a quick draw to blow off some steam, against David Baramidze.
In the last round, the German number one faced Falko Bindrich. A draw was enough to win the tournament outright, but Naiditsch continued press from a slightly better position. Eventually he won a rook ending and the winner's check of 3000 Euro.
Top seed Etienne Bacrot from France didn't go so well. After winning three games, the French top grandmaster was just outplayed by Dutch IM Twan Burg (2432). Bacrot then repaired the damage somewhat with two White wins, only to lose yet again with the black pieces against an IM: Oleg Spirin of Russia. The story got even worse for Bacrot when he drew with FM Christian Schramm in round 8 and then finished with another draw against Dutch FM Raoul van Ketel. A tough schedule led to the loss of 19 valuable rating points in one (long) weekend for the French top player, if we may believe this chart. Ouch.
On the other hand, with this strong performance, Naiditsch got his rating over 2700 Elo, proving once again that he is the best player in Germany. The other places on the podium were taken by two other local grandmasters: Arik Braun and David Baramidze, who both scored 7.5 points.
The ladies prize was won by Joanna Majdan-Gajewska. Before the last round, the Polish lady was half a point behind three competitors. These players all lost, while Majdan-Gajewska could defeat her opponent. Her reward for a good performance in Deizisau was 500 Euro.
The 15th edition of the Neckar Open had 753 participants playing in Deizisau, which was a new record. It's certainly one of the biggest opens in the world, if not the biggest.
Selection of games
Game viewer by ChessTempo
Videos
A number of videos were made during the tournament. Here's one that gives a good idea about the atmosphere in Deizisau.# | Player | Ti | Rtg | Fed | W | D | L | Pts | Buchh |
1. | Naiditsch,Arkadij | GM | 2684 | GER | 8 | 1 | 0 | 8.5 | 56.0 |
2. | Braun,Arik | GM | 2542 | GER | 7 | 1 | 1 | 7.5 | 57.5 |
3. | Baramidze,David | GM | 2554 | GER | 6 | 3 | 0 | 7.5 | 56.5 |
4. | Huschenbeth,Niclas | IM | 2465 | GER | 6 | 2 | 1 | 7.0 | 54.5 |
5. | Erdös,Viktor | GM | 2597 | HUN | 6 | 2 | 1 | 7.0 | 54.0 |
6. | Greenfeld,Alon | GM | 2571 | ISR | 6 | 2 | 1 | 7.0 | 53.5 |
6. | Gajewski,Grzegorz | GM | 2567 | POL | 6 | 2 | 1 | 7.0 | 53.5 |
8. | Shytaj,Luca | IM | 2475 | ITA | 6 | 2 | 1 | 7.0 | 52.0 |
9. | Schneider,Ilja | IM | 2511 | GER | 5 | 4 | 0 | 7.0 | 51.0 |
10. | Epishin,Vladimir | GM | 2567 | RUS | 5 | 4 | 0 | 7.0 | 50.5 |
10. | Prohaszka,Peter | GM | 2545 | HUN | 5 | 4 | 0 | 7.0 | 50.5 |
12. | Piorun,Kacper | IM | 2521 | POL | 6 | 2 | 1 | 7.0 | 50.0 |
13. | Svetushkin,Dmitri | GM | 2543 | MDA | 6 | 2 | 1 | 7.0 | 48.5 |
14. | Heimann,Andreas | IM | 2491 | GER | 5 | 4 | 0 | 7.0 | 47.5 |
15. | Bindrich,Falko | GM | 2523 | GER | 5 | 3 | 1 | 6.5 | 54.0 |
16. | Burg,Twan | IM | 2432 | NED | 6 | 1 | 2 | 6.5 | 52.5 |
17. | Spirin,Oleg | IM | 2474 | RUS | 5 | 3 | 1 | 6.5 | 51.0 |
18. | Yemelin,Vasily | GM | 2575 | RUS | 6 | 1 | 2 | 6.5 | 50.5 |
18. | Grimberg,Boris | FM | 2333 | GER | 6 | 1 | 2 | 6.5 | 50.5 |
20. | Moor,Roger | IM | 2395 | SUI | 5 | 3 | 1 | 6.5 | 50.0 |
21. | Rombaldoni,Axel | IM | 2449 | ITA | 5 | 3 | 1 | 6.5 | 49.5 |
21. | Hirneise,Tobias | IM | 2431 | GER | 5 | 3 | 1 | 6.5 | 49.5 |
23. | Raykhman,Alexander | FM | 2372 | GER | 6 | 1 | 2 | 6.5 | 49.0 |
24. | Skembris,Spyridon | GM | 2461 | GRE | 5 | 3 | 1 | 6.5 | 48.5 |
25. | Kotainy,Jens | 2370 | GER | 5 | 3 | 1 | 6.5 | 48.0 | |
26. | Lobzhanidze,Davit | IM | 2489 | GEO | 5 | 3 | 1 | 6.5 | 47.5 |
27. | Bogner,Sebastian | GM | 2541 | GER | 4 | 5 | 0 | 6.5 | 47.5 |
28. | Petr,Martin | IM | 2499 | CZE | 6 | 1 | 2 | 6.5 | 47.0 |
29. | Fedorovsky,Michael | IM | 2411 | GER | 5 | 3 | 1 | 6.5 | 46.5 |
30. | Blübaum,Matthias | 2246 | GER | 5 | 3 | 1 | 6.5 | 45.5 | |
31. | Rietze,Clemens | 2226 | GER | 6 | 1 | 2 | 6.5 | 45.0 | |
32. | Van Ketel,Raoul | FM | 2285 | NED | 6 | 1 | 2 | 6.5 | 44.5 |
33. | Banusz,Tamas | GM | 2563 | HUN | 6 | 1 | 2 | 6.5 | 41.5 |
34. | Dausch,Rene | FM | 2371 | GER | 6 | 0 | 3 | 6.0 | 54.0 |
35. | Abel,Dennes | 2411 | GER | 4 | 4 | 1 | 6.0 | 54.0 | |
36. | Renner,Christoph | IM | 2431 | GER | 5 | 2 | 2 | 6.0 | 53.5 |
37. | Lubbe,Nikolas | 2396 | GER | 5 | 2 | 2 | 6.0 | 53.0 | |
38. | Majdan-Gajewska,Joanna | WGM | 2325 | POL | 4 | 4 | 1 | 6.0 | 51.5 |
39. | Bacrot,Etienne | GM | 2718 | FRA | 5 | 2 | 2 | 6.0 | 51.0 |
40. | Trella,Thomas | FM | 2400 | GER | 4 | 4 | 1 | 6.0 | 51.0 |
Photos © Georgios Souleidis