The Tata Steel Chess Tournament, which ends today in Wijk aan Zee, Netherlands, drew five participants in the world’s top ten, according to the International Chess Federation (FIDE) rating system.
The group of five is headed by Magnus Carlsen, world champion from Norway, 2859; number two Ding Liren, China, 2811; number six Fabiano Caruana, USA, 2766; number seven Anish Giri, Netherlands, 2764 and number eight Wesley So, USA, 2760. There was no Russian player in the tournament.
However, the chess battleground was filled with alternative stars especially in the Masters category.
Participation was by invitation only for both the Masters and Challengers. When the Masters began, it was the dark horse from Uzbekistan Nodirbek Abdusattorov, 19, and FIDE rated at 2713, who surged into the lead following his defeat of Carlsen. Abdusattorov, who is ranked number 32 worldwide, was just one point ahead of the world champion as of Thursday. This was titleholder Carlsen’s 19th appearance at Tata. He has won eight times: in 2008, 2010, 2013, 2015, 2016, 2018, 2019 and 2022.
The other competing participants who won the Tata tournament are Levon Aronian of Armenia/USA (four times) and Caruana, So and Jorden van Foreest of the Netherlands once each. Becoming a Tata champion is prestigious because one gets to compete and beat some of the foremost chess brains worldwide.
In the Challengers section, there are two women competitors among the other 12 grandmasters and international masters. One is Vaishali Rameshbabu (2425), grandmaster of India, and Eline Roebers (2361) of the Netherlands. They both celebrated wins against two grandmasters: Vaishali against the Brazilian champion Luis Paulo Supi and Roebers against Erwin l’Ami of the Netherlands.
