Upcoming: Grand Prix!
It has been very quiet until today, but now that both websites are up, it's about time for the announcement of the first Grand Prix tournament, which starts next Monday already: Baku 2008. And: ChessVibes will be there. Yes yes.Probably you now think: What? Monday already? Because indeed, it has been quiet for a long time. But Monday it all starts: then, in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan, the first moves of a 2-year series of tournaments will be played.Sunday I'll fly to Baku myself, because I've accepted an invitation by Global Chess BV to cooperate in the tournament website team. As a team of four, among them top commentator Sergey Shipov, we'll take care of daily reports, photos, videos and analysis. The tournament finishes May 6th.A great job, I think, in a famous chess city, so I'm really looking forward to it. The good thing for ChessVibes is that I'll be right in the middle of everything, and you'll get the news first hand, straight from Baku! 
Bay of BakuGrand Prix Series Six identical events will be held, with the same time schedule of seventeen days, in Baku, Azerbaijan (April-May 2008), Sochi, Russia (August 2009), Doha, Qatar (December 2008), Montreux, Switserland (April-May 2009), Elista (August 2009) and Karlovy Vary, Czech Republic (December 2009).The total number of participants in this first FIDE Grand Prix Series is 21, and in each tournament 14 will play. Each individual player plays four of the six tournaments. Their specific final standings will gain them Grand Prix points (just like in Formula 1) and at the end of 2009, the points collected by the players in their best three tournaments will count. The eventual winner gains the right to challenge the winner of the 2009 World Cup in a match, to determine the challenger of the World Champion in a match in 2010. (Still there?)OK, it's very complicated, but it's a fact that next Sunday a very interesting tournament will be officially opened. The birth place of Kasparov, and Radjabov too by the way, will be the host city for the following players:
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Peter Doggers joined a chess club a month before turning 15 and still plays for it. He used to be an active tournament player and holds two IM norms. Peter has a Master of Arts degree in Dutch Language & Literature. He briefly worked at New in Chess, then as a Dutch teacher and then in a project for improving safety and security in Amsterdam schools. Between 2007 and 2013 Peter was running ChessVibes, a major source for chess news and videos acquired by Chess.com in October 2013. As our Director News & Events, Peter writes many of our news reports. In the summer of 2022, The Guardian’s Leonard Barden described him as “widely regarded as the world’s best chess journalist.”
Peter's first book The Chess Revolution is out now!
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