The European Individual Chess Championship 2012 takes place in Plovdiv (Bulgaria), March 19 – April 1, 2012. It is part of the World Chess Championship cycle as the top 23 players qualify for the World Cup.
For that reason we see a total of 300 titled players, 175 of which GMs and 70 IMs. Top seeded is GM Fabiano Caruana, who was also one of the main participants at the same venue during the 2008 edition of the competition (photo here). Scroll down for the full list of participants.
Expect live games daily with analysis by Houdini and special photo reports, as well as the most interesting news from the championship on the pages of Chessdom.com.
Note: See photo galleries of EICC 2008 in Plovdiv here and the ECC 2010 here, while detailed view of the venue is at this gallery.
The championship will be organized in 11-round Swiss system in accordance with the ECU Tournament Rules and FIDE Laws of Chess. The rate of play will be 90 minutes for 40 moves plus 30 minutes for the rest of the game with an increment of 30 seconds per move, starting from move one.
A kind of Sofia rules have been implemented as communication between players (the offer of draw) is forbidden until the 40th move has been played.
The prize fund is comparable to the EIWCC women prizes in Turkey, and amounts to 100 000 eur.
Tiebreak
The order of players that finish with the same number of points shall be determined by application of the following tie-breaking procedures in sequence, proceeding from (a) to (b) to (c) to (d) the extent required:
(a) Performance Rating, the highest number wins;
(b) Buchholz cut-1, the highest number wins;
(c) Buchholz, the highest number wins;
(d) Number of wins, the highest number wins.
In the case of unplayed games for the calculation of (a), (b) and (c) the current FIDE Tournament Rules shall be applied.
In the case there are less than 75% rated players, the following criteria will be applied:
(a) Buchholz cut-1, the highest number wins;
(b) Buchholz, the highest number wins;
(c) Number of wins, the highest number wins.
Participants
1 | GM | Caruana Fabiano | ITA | 2767 |
2 | GM | Mamedyarov Shakhriyar | AZE | 2752 |
3 | GM | Jakovenko Dmitry | RUS | 2729 |
4 | GM | Giri Anish | NED | 2717 |
5 | GM | Riazantsev Alexander | RUS | 2710 |
6 | GM | Vitiugov Nikita | RUS | 2709 |
7 | GM | Bacrot Etienne | FRA | 2706 |
8 | GM | Jobava Baadur | GEO | 2706 |
9 | GM | Grachev Boris | RUS | 2705 |
10 | GM | Malakhov Vladimir | RUS | 2705 |
11 | GM | Laznicka Viktor | CZE | 2702 |
12 | GM | Movsesian Sergei | ARM | 2702 |
13 | GM | Naiditsch Arkadij | GER | 2702 |
14 | GM | Navara David | CZE | 2700 |
15 | GM | Sutovsky Emil | ISR | 2700 |
16 | GM | Dreev Aleksey | RUS | 2698 |
17 | GM | Efimenko Zahar | UKR | 2695 |
18 | GM | Inarkiev Ernesto | RUS | 2695 |
19 | GM | Volokitin Andrei | UKR | 2695 |
20 | GM | Fressinet Laurent | FRA | 2693 |
21 | GM | Vallejo Pons Francisco | ESP | 2693 |
22 | GM | Andreikin Dmitry | RUS | 2689 |
23 | GM | Areshchenko Alexander | UKR | 2688 |
24 | GM | Bologan Viktor | MDA | 2687 |
25 | GM | Akopian Vladimir | ARM | 2684 |
26 | GM | Berkes Ferenc | HUN | 2682 |
27 | GM | Vachier-Lagrave Maxime | FRA | 2682 |
28 | GM | Korobov Anton | UKR | 2679 |
29 | GM | Sargissian Gabriel | ARM | 2674 |
30 | GM | Georgiev Kiril | BUL | 2671 |
Where is sweet Judit? She could win this.
Too bad Hou Yifan is not European – given her recent performance, she probably WOULD win this!