Tomashevsky new European Champion

Phew - after some huge technical problems ChessVibes is back online. In the meantime, Evgeny Tomashevsky won the gold medal at the European Championship in Budva, Montenegro. The Russian grandmaster defeated his compatriot Vladimir Malakhov in the final of the tiebreak matches; Baadur Jobava (Georgia) won bronze.

The 10th European Chess Championship, an 11-round Swiss, took place in Budva, Montenegro from March 5th (day of arrival) until March 19th (day of departure) 2009. It was organized by the Montenegro Chess Federation under the auspices of the City of Budva and the European Chess Union.

After no less than 11 grandmaster had finished on shared first position (scoring 8/11), yesterday the tiebreaks were played to decide on the medals, and on who would qualify for the FIDE World Cup. The six players with the lowest tiebreak points played a minimatch  with 15 minutes + 5 seconds increment and then an armageddon game (White five minutes on the clock, Black four, and White must win) in case of a tie. The winners would then play against the three players with the highest tiebreak points, while the two players in the middle (Tomashevsky and Navara) played against each other.

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Tiebreak games

The European Championship is a qualification event for the next World Cup. According to FIDE regulations and the decision of the ECU Board, 22 players would qualify, and for this tiebreaks were necessary as well. Boris Savchenko, Konstantin Sakaev, Nikitia Vitiugov, Tigran L. Petrosian, Liviu-Dieter Nisipeanu, Constantin Lupulescu and Alexander Motylev qualified. Georg Meier, Friso Nijboer, Sergey Fedorchuk, Artyom Timofeev, Sanan Sjugirov, Mateusz Bartel and Rauf Mamedov qualified directly.

Photos © Nebojsa Baralic

Links:

• Official website
• Games in PGN
• Tiebreak games in PGN