Praggnanandhaa, Martirosyan, Donchenko Star As Biel Chess Festival Begins

Top-seed GM Praggnanandhaa Rameshbabu got off to a winning start on his debut in the 2024 Biel Chess Festival as he won the opening Masters Chess960, edging out GM Haik Martirosyan, whom he beat in their head-to-head clash. Martirosyan then went on to win the Rapid as the main event began, while in the Challengers it was GM Alexander Donchenko who dominated, winning both events. 

The classical games start Tuesday, July 16, at 8 a.m. ET / 14:00 CEST / 5:30 p.m. IST.

• Biel Chess Festival: Tradition And Innovation
• Praggnanandhaa, Donchenko Win Chess960
• Martirosyan, Donchenko Win Rapid

Biel Chess Festival: Tradition And Innovation

The bilingual lakeside Swiss city of two names—Biel in German, Bienne in French—has been hosting top-level chess tournaments for over half a century, with the main event won by World Champions Anatoly Karpov (three times), Magnus Carlsen (three times), Viswanathan Anand, and Hou Yifan.

Instead of sticking to tradition, however, the organizers have focussed on innovation, with a "triathlon" format of different types of chess employed since 2019. This year there are new twists, including two six-player fields.

World number-eight Praggnanandhaa heads the Masters, but he faces tough competition from German number-one GM Vincent Keymer, Armenian number-one Martirosyan, and Vietnamese number-one GM Liem Le, who is looking to win the title for a third year in a row.

2018 U.S. Champion GM Sam Shankland won the accompanying open tournament in Biel in 2016 and ran through the city's fountain—he's promised to do it again if he wins this year!

I'm a sucker for tradition! pic.twitter.com/V6p4GA2MvW

— Sam Shankland (@SamShankland) July 14, 2024

The only player in the field who doesn't have a peak rating above 2700 is GM Abhimanyu Mishra, who holds the record for becoming the youngest grandmaster of all time and is still only 15.  

The Challengers features another 15-year-old, Ukrainian GM Ihor Samunenkov, while 17-year-old Marc'Andria Maurizzi holds the bragging rights for being the youngest-ever French grandmaster. 20-year-old Danish number-one GM Jonas Bjerre is the top seed by classical rating, GM Vaishali Rameshbabu will be looking to challenge herself before playing for India in the upcoming 45th FIDE Chess Olympiad, while 31-year-old GM Saleh Salem, the UAE number-one, is the veteran of the group. The player who would start fastest, however, was 26-year-old German GM Donchenko.

The format of the triathlons may best be digested with a stiff drink, though in essence it's fairly straightforward.

Players compete at three different time controls, with different numbers of points for a win, draw, or loss. In order of when the games are played we have:

• Rapid, 5 rounds, 15 min + a 5-sec increment per move — 2 points for a win/1 for a draw/0 for a loss
• Classical, 5 rounds, 120 min/40 moves + 60/20 + 15 mins to the end, plus a 30-sec increment from move 61 — 4/1.5/0
• Blitz, 10 rounds, 3+2 — 1/0.5/0

As you can see, classical chess, which uses the same long time control as the Ding Liren vs. Ian Nepomniachtchi World Championship match, is by far the most important section, with four-point wins encouraged by giving less than half that number of points for a draw.

We'll also get more classical chess at the end, due to a unique format that will see the bottom two (or three if a long way adrift of first place) eliminated, before the remaining players face each other in another three rounds of classical chess with colors reversed. Here's the schedule:

It all kicked off with another format, Chess960, the results of which serve as a tiebreaker if players are level on points after the main events.

Praggnanandhaa, Donchenko Win Chess960

The Chess960 (so named for the 960 possible starting positions) was played at the same 15+5 time control as the rapid chess, with Praggnanandhaa and Donchenko clinching the top spots. 

If you're wondering how six players in each group managed to play seven rounds, it's because after they'd played all the players in their own group the Challengers players were able to pick players from the Masters to face in the final two rounds.

The Masters group was a very close battle, ultimately decided by the tiebreaker of Praggnanandhaa winning the head-to-head battle against Martirosyan. Opening up the c-file allowed the young Indian to line up all his heavy pieces against Black's king position, when 37.Rc6! was an easy sacrifice to break through.

That was Martirosyan's one loss, while Praggnanandhaa himself blundered a pin and lost to Mishra.

In fact there was chaos all round, and some swift karma. In round three Keymer suddenly got to win a piece against Shankland from what had been a totally-lost position. 52.Kf5?? was the culprit, walking into a fork.  

A round later, however, it was Keymer handing out a free point—to the tournament winner, Praggnanandhaa! 

In the final round, Praggnanandhaa was able to offer a draw on move five to Donchenko. He said afterward: "Just a bit tired, so I decided to offer a draw in the last game." 

Donchenko accepted, since he was sure of first place himself, though it hadn't been quite as easy as the two-point lead in the final standings suggests. He commented: "I just got very unclear or bad positions and then in time scrambles it somehow worked out, but I wouldn’t say it was very convincing!" 

The key game was in round four, when Bjerre was leading on a perfect 3/3 and was two pawns up with a winning position against Donchenko (on 2.5/3) only to lose the thread of the game when he tried to safeguard his king with 28...Kf8?. 

Donchenko never looked back.

Martirosyan, Donchenko Win Rapid 

The main event began with a single day of rapid chess on Sunday. A day earlier, Praggnanandhaa had said of his rivals:

"It’s not going to be easy at all. I think almost all of them had a better rating two months back. They just had one bad tournament. It kind of feels like I have to play them when they’re lower-rated. That’s rating, but we all know how strong they are."

It's not going to be easy at all—I think almost all of them had a better rating two months back.

—Praggnanandhaa Rameshbabu 

We got to see that in action in the rapid as Martirosyan, celebrating his 24th birthday, won his first two games, drew the rest, and cruised to first place on 7/10. 

Praggnanandhaa looked on course to match that score when he found a nice trick to win a pawn against Shankland in the final round, but he went on to lose the game!

Martirosyan, who is currently rated 2661 in classical chess but has been rated as high as 2708, was happy to get preparation for leading Armenia at the Olympiad... and also just to play chess at all. He explained:

"During COVID I didn’t have opportunities to play, and after that I said, OK, I really love this game and I wanted to just play chess. It doesn’t matter how many games I will play. I really wanted to play chess, and even I think last year I played more than this year. I’m always happy in chess, when I’m playing strong tournaments."

I really love this game and I wanted to just play chess.

—Haik Martirosyan

No harm was done to anyone's overall chances in the Masters, however, since the gap from Martirosyan in first place to Mishra and Shankland in last is just three points—less than one win in the upcoming classical games.

It's similar in the Challengers, where the gap is four points, with Donchenko once again finishing in clear first, after winning four games and losing one (to Bjerre). Once again, Donchenko admitted the games hadn't been smooth sailing: "I would say they were at the very best as unclear as yesterday, but generally they should not have gone in my favor several times."

He did note, however, "I basically gave away half a point in one move in the first game," which was true, though he could also have lost to Samunenkov! 

Saleh won three games but lost two, including to Donchenko, while it's notable that Vaishali finished joint third in Rapid, and fourth in Chess960, despite starting as the lowest-rated player. Once again she has a chance to steal the limelight from her brother, Praggnanandhaa.

We now switch to classical chess, with five rounds without a rest, before a day's blitz on Sunday. 

The 2024 Biel Chess Festival runs July 13-26 in Biel/Bienne, Switzerland, and features over 20 individual events. The main ones are the six-player Masters and Challengers GM Triathlons where the players compete in five rounds of Rapid chess (2 points for a win/1 for a draw), five rounds of Classical (4/1.5), and ten rounds of Blitz (1/0.5). The top four then play three more rounds of Classical against each other, with colors reversed. Ties are settled by the standings of the Chess960 tournament held on the opening day.