Speed Chess Championship Grand Prix Launches
Beginning June 2, Titled Tuesday will be part of the Speed Chess Championship Grand Prix as a direct path to qualify for the 2020 Speed Chess Championship. The SCC GP is presented by Gambit, where you can play classic games like Reversi, Backgammon and Oh Ship by playing with players from around the world! Over the next five months, titled players around the world will earn grand prix points each week to inch closer to one of four coveted spots in the Speed Chess Championship.
Titled Tuesdays will have a $50,000 prize fund spanning 20 weeks, and will take place every Tuesday from June 2 through October 13. As an enhancement to the existing Titled Tuesday format, the 10-round Swiss tournament will now be followed by an eight player bracket to award bonus points and cash prizes.
With $2,500 in cash prizes available every week, players will look to improve their season score, as their eight best individual performances and all bonus points will count towards the Speed Chess Championship Titled Tuesday standings. At the end of the season, the players with the four best grand prix scores will advance to the Speed Chess Championship to be hosted later this year.
Players that win at least one of the twenty Titled Tuesday events but fail to finish in the top four will receive an automatic invite to a special qualification event, which will award one spot to the Speed Chess Championship this fall.
As a Fair Play measure, all competitors in this event are required to have their full legal name in their Chess.com profile. Anonymous titled player accounts or accounts found to be using a fake name will not be eligible to win prizes or earn points during the event.
All players are to abide by all rules and site policies found at Chess.com/agreement and cooperate fully with Chess.com's fair play detection team. Participants should be prepared to join a ZOOM call for proctoring at the arbiter's discretion.
You can find quick links to important event information below:
- Identification Requirements and Fair Play
- Format
- Cash Prizes
- Points Awarded
- Results and Standings
Like Titled Tuesday, Chess.com will offer special cash prizes for streamers every week during the event. For tips on how to stream your games and the best ways to get more viewers, see these articles:
Identification Requirements and Fair Play:
- Per our standard identification rules for all cash-prize events, we require all players in any Speed Chess Championship Titled Tuesday events to identify themselves on their Chess.com profile. This must be done before registering for the event.
- Anonymous players cannot earn prizes in Speed Chess Championship Titled Tuesday, or enter the post-tournament bracket.
- Players must have access to a webcam in order to participate in the Titled Tuesday post-tournament bracket. Players that are not on the official ZOOM call are not eligible to win prizes or earn grand prix points.
- Participants should be prepared to join a ZOOM call for proctoring at the arbiter's discretion.
- All players are to abide by all rules and site policies found at Chess.com/agreement and cooperate fully with Chess.com's fair play detection team.
If your account is further convicted of fair-play violations, your account will be closed and you will be subject to Chess.com's private proceedings. You can find here more information on Chess.com's Fair Play and Cheat Detection methods.
Speed Chess Championship Titled Tuesday:
- Tuesdays at 10 am PT
- 3+1 time control
- 10-round Swiss Tournament, top eight players advance to the post-tournament bracket
- Tiebreak: Sonneborn-Berger
- Live broadcast on Chess.com/tv
Chess.com reserves the right to shift an event's start time should it conflict with another event.
Titled Tuesday Post-Tournament Bracket:
- Tuesdays, 10 minutes after the conclusion of Titled Tuesday
- Eight-player knockout bracket
- Quarterfinals: Single 3+1 game where higher seed plays White. 1+0 sudden death bullet tiebreaks, colors will alternate in sudden death with the higher seed playing White in the first 1+0 game.
- Semifinals and Finals: Two 3+1 games, 1+0 sudden death bullet tiebreaks. Higher seed picks color in the first 3+1 game, and plays White in the first 1+0 game. Colors will alternate in sudden death if extra games are needed.
- Live broadcast on Twitch.tv/chess
An example of the KO bracket format can be found below:
Tournament information and details regarding the special qualification event will be released later this summer as the end of the Speed Chess Championship Titled Tuesday approaches.
This qualifier will see one top Titled Tuesday performer qualify directly into the Speed Chess Championship due to their clutch performance finishing first in one of the 20 Titled Tuesday events.
All players must identify themselves in their Chess.com profile to win prizes. This must be done before the first round starts. See further requirements above.
Cash prizes are distributed among the top eight players, pending participation in the Titled Tuesday Post-Tournament Bracket.
Points will be awarded to the top finishers each week. All players who finish in the top 20 during each Titled Tuesday (including players tied for 20th place) will earn points based on their score out of ten rounds. With each win being worth one point, and each draw being worth half a point, this means a player cannot earn more than 10 points in any given Titled Tuesday.
Speed Chess Championship Grand Prix | Standings After June 30 (Top 20)
| # | Country | Title | Name | Username | Swiss Points | Bonus Points | Overall Points |
| 1 | GM | Vladislav Kovalev | @vladislavkovalev | 41 | 6 | 47 | |
| 2 | GM | Vladislav Artemiev | @Sibelephant | 25 | 16 | 41 | |
| 3 | GM | Vladimir Fedoseev | @Bigfish1995 | 25.5 | 14 | 39.5 | |
| 4 | GM | Parham Maghsoodloo | @Parhamov | 34 | 4 | 38 | |
| 5 | GM | Haik Martirosyan | @Micki-taryan | 25.5 | 10 | 35.5 | |
| 6 | GM | Grigoriy Oparin | @OparinGrigoriy | 17.5 | 16 | 33.5 | |
| 7 | IM | Tuan Minh Le | @wonderfultime | 25 | 4 | 29 | |
| 8 | GM | Dmitry Andreikin | @2Vladimirovich90 | 17 | 12 | 29 | |
| 9 | GM | Alireza Firouzja | @Firouzja2003 | 17.5 | 10 | 27.5 | |
| 10 | IM | Hans Niemann | @IMHansNiemann | 24.5 | 2 | 26.5 | |
| 11 | GM | Sergey Karjakin | @SergeyKarjakin | 17 | 8 | 25 | |
| 12 | GM | Anish Giri | @AnishGiri | 17 | 4 | 21 | |
| 13 | GM | Maxime Vachier-Lagrave | @LyonBeast | 9 | 12 | 21 | |
| 14 | GM | Maxim Matlakov | @Borsch7 | 16.5 | 4 | 20.5 | |
| 15 | GM | Hikaru Nakamura | @Hikaru | 17.5 | 2 | 19.5 | |
| 16 | GM | Vincent Keymer | @VincentKeymer | 16.5 | 2 | 18.5 | |
| 17 | GM | Andrey Esipenko | @Andreikka | 16.5 | 2 | 18.5 | |
| 18 | GM | Alexander Zubov | @Alexander_Zubov | 8.5 | 8 | 16.5 | |
| 19 | GM | Salem AR Saleh | @Arabicfalcon | 8.5 | 8 | 16.5 | |
| 20 | GM | Eltaj Safarli | @Eltaj_Safarli | 8.5 | 8 | 16.5 |
The top eight players that advance to the post-tournament bracket can earn additional points on top of what they earned in Titled Tuesday. Players earn two points for reaching the quarterfinals, four points for reaching the semifinals, eight points for finishing second place, and 12 points for winning the event.
Throughout the season, a player's Titled Tuesday grand prix score is comprised of a combination of select Titled Tuesday performances and post-tournament bracket points. Each player's eight best Titled Tuesday performances will be added together for their Swiss grand prix score. All additional points earned during the post-tournament bracket will be added to each player's Titled Tuesday score to determine their total Titled Tuesday grand prix points.
This means that while a player's final score can only include eight Titled Tuesday performances, they can earn additional post-tournament bracket points from more than eight events.
Tune into this Tuesday's all-new Titled Tuesday on Chess.com/tv beginning this upcoming Tuesday, June 2 at 10 am PT.
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