FIDE approves five Grand Prix rapid tournaments

By P. K. Ajith Kumar

KOZHIKODE, AUG. 3. After the success of the World chess championship in the classical format, FIDE, the world chess governing body, is focussing on a series of Grand Prix rapid tournaments, culminating in the World rapid chess championship. A proposal for the five Grand Prix tournaments of rapid chess was approved by the presidential board of FIDE, which met in Dubai recently.

``Rapid chess has its own following around the world and FIDE thinks it is high time a series of quality official tournaments was conducted before the World rapid championship,`` FIDE vice president Mr. P. T. Ummer Koya, who attended the Dubai meeting, told The Hindu here on Thursday.

The Grand Prix tournaments, proposed by Mr. Willy Iclicki, chairman, World Championship Cycle Committee, are scheduled to be held from April till the end of March (or from February till November).

These events would serve the purpose of qualifying tournaments to select the players for the World championship. Players who take the top places in each of the tournaments would be awarded points and 16 of them with the highest number of points would qualify for the World championship.

Four venues have already been identified for the Grand Prix - Cannes, Corsica, Warsaw and Frankfurt. The fifth one has not yet been decided. India is a candidate for that slot.

``The All India Chess Federation would try its best to bring one Grand Prix tournament to the country,'' Mr. Koya, who also holds the office of the AICF secretary, said.

``Our players have shown that they could tackle the reduced time control well and there is no reason why they should not excel in rapid tournaments. The fact that our own World champion Viswanathan Anand is the world's best player in rapid chess is also one reason why we would like to have the tournament in India,'' he added.

Participants: The qualifiers for the first Grand Prix tournament of the year will be the best eight players from the last World rapid championship, six players qualified through a pre-Grand Prix tournament, one nominee by the FIDE president and one nominee by the organisers of the tournament.

For the first tournament of the first Grand Prix, the top eight seeded players shall be nominated according to the 2002 January rapid rating list published by FIDE.

The World Rapid Chess Grand Prix Committee will publish the list of participants and the player contract one month before the commencement of the first tournament on the FIDE website. Before every tournament, an open rapid tournament would be conducted to identify the top six, who would qualify for the Grand Prix (every qualifier will receive $500 to meet his expenses).

Prize-money: For each of the tournament, there would be a prize fund of $77,000, with the winner taking $10,000 and the runner-up $8,500. The third-placed player will be richer by $7,500 and those who are knocked out in the first round itself are guaranteed $3,000.

Prize fund proposed for the World rapid championship is $120,000, with the champion's share being $20,000. The second place is worth $12,000 and third place $10,000. The player finishing 16th, in the field of 16, will get $3,000.

Format: All the Grand prix tournaments, as well as the World rapid championship, will be played on a knock-out basis. Each round will consist of two games. In the case of a tie, the sudden-death games will begin 15 minutes after the second game is over. The play-offs to determine the third to 16th places would also be conducted over two games, with the provision of the sudden-death.

Venues: At the end of November every year, FIDE and World Rapid Chess Grand Prix Committee will close a bidding process and announce the competing venues for the tournaments for the following year. After the last presidential broad meeting of the year, the selected venues of each tournament would be announced.

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