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PRESS RELEASE - Five top GM's from the Netherlands (Nijboer, l'Ami, Stellwagen, Werle and Smeets) are challenging the international world subtop in a very strong Grandmastergroup B of the Corus Chess Tournament 2007. Dmitry Jakovenko (Russia) and Bu Xiangzhi (China) are the rating favourites. With an average rating of 2589 it is again a strong field, with five players from the Top-100. Among them Dutch GM Friso Nijboer, who made a spectacular jump on the latest FIDE-rating list (1st of October 2006). Traditionally there are several youngsters in the B-tournament. Youngest player is Maxime Vachier-Lagrave (16) from France, who will make his debut in Wijk aan Zee. Eleven players of the 14 participants are under 25 years of age. Two women from Russia will appear in Wijk aan Zee: Alexandra Kosteniuk, ranked nr. 3 on the Women Top-100, and the youngster Tatiana Kosintseva, who is coached by Yuri Dokhoian, former second of Gary Kasparov. PARTICIPANTS CORUS GROUB B 2007
NAME (COUNTRY) BIRTH RATING RANKING
YEARGM Bu Xiangzhi (China) 1985 2671 38
GM Dmitry Jakovenko (Russia) 1983 2671 38
GM Gabriel Sargissian (Armenia) 1983 2667 43
GM Pavel Eljanov (Ukraine) 1983 2658 49
GM Friso Nijboer (Netherlands) 1965 2641 68
GM Erwin L'Ami (Netherlands) 1985 2593 152
GM Suat Atalik (Turkey) 1964 2583 187
GM Maxime Vachier-Lagrave (France) 1990 2579 209
GM Dani?ɬ´l Stellwagen (Netherlands) 1987 2576 220
GM Jan Werle (Netherlands) 1984 2551 311
GM Alexandra Kosteniuk (Russia) 1984 2534 414
GM Vladimir Georgiev (Macedonia) 1975 2532 437
GM Jan Smeets (Netherlands) 1985 2525 487
IM Tatiana Kosintseva (Russia) 1986 2458 1121
The winner of the Grandmaster group B will qualify for the Grandmaster group A in 2008. The dates of the Corus Chess Tournament 2007 are: 12?¢‚Ǩ‚Äú28 January 2007. The names of participants in the Grandmaster group C will be published after the
Cultural Village Tournament (20?¢‚Ǩ‚Äú29 November in Wijk aan Zee). The winner of this event qualifies for the C-group. An article about the participants in the Grandmaster group A can be found
here.For people who have a difficult time waiting for Corus, I added a 'Corus Countdown' in my grey sidebar. There you can see that today we have to sleep another 64 nights before the tournament begins. For every night a square on the chess board!