Nikita Vitiugov wins GRENKE Chess Open 2017

Written by Georgios Souleidis on 18 April 2017.

Nikita Vitiugov is the winner of the GRENKE Chess Open 2017. The 30-year old grandmaster from St. Petersburg scored 7,5 points out of 9 rounds. Three other players scored 7,5 points as well, but due to a better Buchholz, Vitiugov clinched the title. Maxim Matlakov landed on place two, Etienne Bacrot and Zdenko Kozul also scored 7,5 points and landed on place three and four.

Nikita Vitiugov

Before the last round, Nikita Vitiugov and Zdenko Kozul had 7,0 points. It did not took long before the players shared the point. After 11 moves, the players called it a day and secured an attractive piece of  the prize cake.On the other boards, players fought for their chance. Maxim Matlakov and Etienne Bacrot won their games with the black pieces. Matlakov won against Hrant Melkumyan and Bacrot won agianst Konstantin Landa.

Sven Noppes, Maxim Matlakov, Nikita Vitiugov, Zdenko Kozul, Etienne Bacrot, Christia Bossert

No less than 23 players scored 7,0 points. One of them is the young German player Alexander Donchenko – he did not lose a single game, although he faced some tough opponents on the final day. Another pleasant surprise was the performance by Alexander Seyb, who drew his game against the experienced grandmaster Yuriy Kuzubov and scored a GM norm.

Alexander Seyb

Best female player from Iran

Sarasadat Khademalsharieh was the best female player in the Open. She is a women grandmaster and scored 6,5 points without losing a game. She started with two wins, scored four draws in a row, but ended the tournament with an excellent 2,5/3 sprint. Second prize was won by Swaminathan Soumya with 6,0 points, the third prize was taken home by Elena Levushkina (5,5).

Sven Noppes, Swaminathan Soumya, Sarasadat Khademalsharieh, Elenva Levushkina, Christian Bossert

Farago wins the seniors

Ivan Farago from Hungary is the best senior player of the event. He played a solid tournament and scored 6/9. There is a long list of special prizes in many categories, also in the B and C groups. 12 year old Leon Wu from Mannheim won the B group, Krister Haas from Gernsheim won group C.

Norm tournament

13 players scored a highly desired norm at the GRENKE Chess Open. Noel Studer (Switzerland), Meilis Annaberdiev (Turkmenistan) and Alexander Seyb (Germany) scored a GM norm. There were IM norms for Davide Arcuti (Switzerland), Liam Vrolijk (Netherlands), Ashot Parvanyan (Armenia), Martin Bruedigam, Bernhard Sinz, Johannes Carow, Mark Kvetny and Emil Schmidek (Germany). The young German players Fiona Sieber and Jana Schneider scored a WIM-norm.