Grand Prix 2016-7

[Wayne Komer]

Grand Prix 2016-7

May 30, 2016

The Grand Prix is a series of four tournaments and is an important part of the World Championship cycle. The top two finishers in the Grand Prix are seeded into the Candidates tournament.

The qualifiers for the Grand Prix will be the World Champion and his opponent (Magnus Carlsen and Viswanathan Anand); the four semifinalists from the 2015 World Cup (Sergei Karjakin, Peter Svidler, Pavel Eljanov and Anish Giri); eight players based on rating; the highest rated participant in the ACP tournaments, who has not already qualified; and nine players invited by FIDE and Agon, based on regulations of the Grand Prix and proposals from national federations.

Any players who decline to play in the Grand Prix, will be replaced by another player whose rating is over 2700.

The other major change will be in how the tournaments are sponsored. Instead of looking for a major sponsor, or sponsors, for each event, individual sponsors will be recruited for each player.

http://worldchess.com/2016/04/27/the-grand-prix-remade/
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FIDE Press Release:

FIDE Grand-Prix 2016-2017 Announcement

FIDE announces the first qualifiers for the Grand-Prix 2016-2017, from which the first two (2) winners will advance to the FIDE Candidates Tournament of the World Chess Championship Cycle 2017-2018:

01. Carlsen, Magnus (NOR, World Champion)
02. Anand, Viswanathan (IND, World Ch. runner-up 2014)
03. Karjakin, Sergey (RUS, World Cup winner 2015)
04. Svidler, Peter (RUS, World Cup runner-up 2015)
05. Giri, Anish (NED, World Cup semi-finalist 2015)
06. Eljanov, Pavel (UKR, World Cup semi-finalist 2015)
07. Nakamura, Hikaru (USA, Average 12m Std Ratings 6/2015 to 5/2016)
08. Caruana, Fabiano (USA, Average 12m Std Ratings 6/2015 to 5/2016)
09. Topalov, Veselin (BUL, Average 12m Std Ratings 6/2015 to 5/2016)
10. Kramnik, Vladimir (RUS, Average 12m Std Ratings 6/2015 to 5/2016)
11. Aronian, Levon (ARM, Average 12m Std Ratings 6/2015 to 5/2016)
12. So, Wesley (USA, Average 12m Std Ratings 6/2015 to 5/2016)
13. Ding, Liren (CHN, Average 12m Std Ratings 6/2015 to 5/2016)
14. Vachier-Lagrave, Maxime (FRA, Average 12m Std Ratings 6/2015 to 5/2016)
15. Tomashevsky, Evgeny (RUS, ACP Tour qualifier)

The first three (3) reserves in case of replacements needed:

01. Grischuk, Alexander (RUS, Average 12m Std Ratings 6/2015 to 5/2016)
02. Li, Chao (CHN, Average 12m Std Ratings 6/2015 to 5/2016)
03. Harikrishna, P (IND, Average 12m Std Ratings 6/2015 to 5/2016)

The schedule of the four (4) FIDE Grand-Prix events is the following, in venues to be announced soon:

a.) 12 - 23 October 2016 / GP tournament 1
b.) 10 - 21 February 2017 / GP tournament 2
c.) 11 - 22 May 2017 / GP tournament 3
d.) 5 - 16 July 2017 / GP tournament 4

In total 24 players will participate, 15 qualifiers listed above as per regulations plus 9 nominees from the organiser AGON (to be announced). Each player will play in 3 tournaments and all his results will be taken into account for the overall final standings of the Grand-Prix. FIDE will soon publish the exact venues and the player's participation documents to be signed.

The full regulations of the Grand Prix 2016-2017 can be downloaded from the FIDE website here:

http://fide.com/fide/handbook.html?id=31&view=article

[Gordon Ritchie]

Re: Grand Prix 2016-7

Agon obviously has not yet found a formula that works. Individual sponsorships? That should be fun. With venues "to be announced soon".

[Wayne Komer]

Re: Grand Prix 2016-7

Grand Prix 2016-7

December 7, 2016

From the FIDE site:

http://www.fide.com/component/conten...confirmed.html

Dates and venues for the 2017 Grand Prix events confirmed.

Sharjah, Moscow, Geneva and Palma De Mallorca in Spain will host the four revamped World Chess Grand Prix events in 2017.

The new-look Grand Prix series will be contested by 24 players, rather than 12 as had previously been the case, with 18 players in each tournament.

The dates are as follows:

Sharjah, UAE: February 17-28
Moscow, Russia: May 11–22
Geneva, Switzerland: July 5-16
Palma De Mallorca, Spain: November 15-26

The prize fund for each Grand Prix will be 130,000 euros and chess fans will be able to view the action exclusively at www.worldchess.com.

Players qualify to the Grand Prix series by rating or by being nominated by Agon Ltd, with one addition coming from the Association of Chess Professionals (ACP) or FIDE.

Ilya Merenzon, Chief Executive of World Chess by Agon Limited, said: “The new look Grand Prix series simplifies the previously overcrowded calendar for these events and is designed to increase the commercial footprint of the Championship cycle. The significant change is that now World Chess Championship cycles do not overlap and one begins only after the previous one ends.”

Georgios Makropoulos, FIDE Deputy President, said: “With interest in chess at an all time high, the Grand Prix events will provide a hugely exciting series between the world’s best players that will be watched by an ever-increasing global audience of chess fans.”

Brands will for the first time be able to sponsor the world’s elite chess players as they take part in the Grand Prix series.
The move is part of a range of changes introduced by Agon, the organizer of the World Chess Championship cycle, to make the top echelons of the sport more accessible for corporate sponsors.

Traditionally, chess sponsorship was focused around the host city for World Championship “Grand Prix” events. However, the changes made by Agon mean that brands will be able to select specific players to associate with.

Each sponsor will receive their logo on the player’s jacket, a branded space on worldchess.com and a customised hospitality programme at each Grand Prix event, as well as a range of other benefits.

The cost of a contract for a two-year Grand Prix cycle will be 100,000 euros, of which 20 per cent goes to the player, 15 per cent to the player’s federation and the rest towards organizing costs.

Agon will work with corporate partners and players to create a customised benefits package, which can include above the line advertising opportunities.

The full list of qualified players will be announced by the end of December at www.fide.com.
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Comments from the EC Forum:

- I've no idea how a tournament of 18 players will be completed in 12 days but I guess all will become clear.......

- They announced some while ago that they would be running the Grand Prix as a Swiss. 18 players over 11 rounds doesn't always work very well. If they are using software, you would hope that it checks that a pairing for round n, doesn't leave rounds n+1 or n+2 impossible to pair.

[Wayne Komer]

Re: Grand Prix 2016-7

Grand Prix 2016-7

February 6, 2017

Details were announced today about the Grand Prix.

The unveiling of the partnership took place at the Sharjah Cultural and Chess Club, the venue for the first Grand Prix in the 2017 cycle.

The venues and dates for the forthcoming Grand Prix cycle in 2017 will be as follows:

· Sharjah, UAE: February 18-27
· Moscow, Russia: May 12-21
· Geneva, Switzerland: July 6-15
· Palma De Mallorca, Spain: November 16-25

Salem Saleh from Sharjah will become the first Grandmaster from UAE to take part in a World Championship event when he competes in the Sharjah Grand Prix.

In total, 18 players will participate in each Grand Prix and contest a prize fund of 130,000 euros. Players qualify to the Grad Prix series by rating or by being nominated by World Chess by Agon Ltd, with one addition coming from the Association of Chess Professionals (ACP) or FIDE.

All the Grand Prix will be exclusively broadcast at www.worldchess.com

The full list of players taking part in the 2017 World Chess Championship Grand Prix series is as follows:

Peter Svidler (RUS), Anish Giri (NED), Pavel Eljanov (UKR), Hikaru Nakamura (USA), Levon Aronian (ARM), Ding Liren (CHN), Maxime Vachier-Lagrave (FRA), Alexander Grischuk (RUS), Harikrishna Pentala (IND), Shakhriyar Mamedyarov (AZE), Dmitry Jakovenko (RUS), Boris Gelfand (ISR), Michael Adams (ENG), Evgeny Tomashevsky (RUS), Li Chao (CHN), Teimour Radjabov (AZE), Ernesto Inarkiev (RUS), Francisco Vallejo Pons (ESP), Salem Saleh (UAE), Wei Yi (CHN), Jon Ludvig Hammer (NOR), Ian Nepomniachtchi (RUS), Alexander Riazantsev (RUS), Richard Rapport (HUN).

http://www.fide.com/component/conten...rld-chess.html

[Wayne Komer]

Re: Grand Prix 2016-7

Grand Prix 2016-7

February 7, 2017

By Peter Doggers at:

https://www.chess.com/news/view/mvl-...rand-prix-9256


Sharjah, UAE: February 17-28
Moscow, Russia: May 11-22
Geneva, Switzerland: July 5-16
Palma De Mallorca, Spain: November 15-26

Unlike in previous Grand Prix, these four tournaments will be nine-round Swisses, and not round robins. The first prize for each event is €20,000; the total prize fund per GP is €130,000.

This makes the total Grand Prix prize fund €520,000, which is much less than that of the 2008-2010 GP (€1,272,000) or the 2012-2013 GP (€1,440,000) but more than the previous in 2014-2015 (€480,000).

This Grand Prix series was originally intended for 2016-2017. In an interview on the FIDE website posted May 26, 2016, Agon's Ilya Merenzon stated:

"We finalized the dates, and setting up the list of players and we are working with sponsors and organizers right now, so I hope in two weeks we will be able to announce the venues, as well as other issues about the Grand Prix Cycle."

However, this never materialized in 2016 as Agon mainly focused on the Carlsen-Karjakin world championship. The sparse amount of information that has been published by Agon so far suggests that the organizers are getting into time trouble for this Grand Prix Series.

According to the official regulations (still called "Grand Prix 2016-2017" in this PDF), "[t]he assignment of players to tournaments will be announced in a timely manner before the Grand Prix Series begins." However, 10 days before the start of the Sharjah leg, the specific list of 18 participants for that particular event still hasn't been published.

[Wayne Komer]

Re: Grand Prix 2016-7

Grand Prix 2016-7

February 10, 2017

From chess-results.com

FIDE Grand Prix Series. Sharjah 2017.
Last update 10.02.2017

Starting rank

No. Name FED Rtg

1 Vachier-Lagrave Maxime FRA 2796
2 Aronian Levon ARM 2785
3 Nakamura Hikaru USA 2785
4 Mamedyarov Shakhriyar AZE 2766
5 Ding Liren CHN 2760
6 Eljanov Pavel UKR 2759
7 Adams Michael ENG 2751
8 Nepomniachtchi Ian RUS 2749
9 Grischuk Alexander RUS 2742
10 Wei Yi CHN 2725
11 Li Chao B CHN 2720
12 Tomashevsky Evgeny RUS 2711
13 Jakovenko Dmitry RUS 2709
14 Vallejo Pons Francisco ESP 2709
15 Rapport Richard HUN 2692
16 Riazantsev Alexander RUS 2671
17 Salem A.R. Saleh UAE 2656
18 Hammer Jon Ludvig NOR 2628

http://chess-results.com/tnr262596.aspx

[Wayne Komer]

Re: Grand Prix 2016-7

Grand Prix 2016-7

February 13, 2017

World Chess says that the broadcast of the Grand Prix series will be exclusive to them. Therefore, if you wish to see it, you must subscribe.

Part of their blurb:

As a member of the Club you will receive a whole host of exclusive benefits that get you closer to the action than ever before.
These include live video broadcasts and archives of the World Championship cycle (four Grand Prix events, the Candidates Tournament and the Championship Match) (and more…)

Membership to the World Chess Club costs $30 per year. So this year, that works out at $7.50 per Grand Prix broadcast. Or, if you prefer, $0.09 per game. Trust us, we did the maths so you didn’t have to! We are helpful like that.

And we pledge that 10% of all Club membership fees will go to bolster the prize fund for the World Championship cycle of events.
Subscribe now to follow the first leg of the 2017 Grand Prix cycle that starts in Sharjah on February 18.
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I wonder how long paying to watch will go on? Recently chess24 required you to have a premium membership to watch Jan Gustafsson commentate on the games of Tata Steel 2017. See post #10 in the thread:

http://forum.chesstalk.com/showthrea...ght=gustafsson