Groningen Chess Festival

12/31/2013 – The Groningen Chess Festival has concluded. Attractions included several amateur tournaments, many scholastic events, simultaneous exhibitions and book signings. However the two obvious main events were the Open section and the rematch between Karpov and Timman, replaying the FIDE World Championship of 1993 in which the Russian convincingly won. See Karpov's repeat.

 

The Groningen Chess Festival took place from December 21st to December 30th. Many events took place, including scholastic events, amateur tournaments and even puzzle solving competitions. However the main attractions were surely the Open tournament and the match between to legendary chess players: Anatoly Karpov and Jan Timman.

Karpov-Timman

The match was held in the Groningen Museum of Art and it was played to four games. The first three games were relatively uneventful draws. However, in the night before the fourth game, Timman suffered quite an accident! He fell and broke his hand, which had him most of the morning before his fourth round in the hospital. Incredibly he decided to play regardless, but Karpov proved to be too much for him during the last round

A lively commentary room followed the games closely

Karpov does a little post-mortem from one of the drawn games

Karpov and Timman played a World Championship match in 1993, which Karpov won convincingly 12.5-8.5 However this match was overshadows by what many consider to be the actual World Championship match of that year, the PCA's Kasparov vs. Short.

Two of the great legends of chess!

Player	Rtg	G1	G2	G3	G4	Pts
Jan Timman	2600	½	½	½	0	1.5
Karpov Anataloly	2619	½	½	½	1	2.5

Open Section

The open section brought many grandmasters from all over the World. The tournament ended in a four way tie between Erwin L'Ami, Zaven Andriasian, Benjamin Bok and Sipke Ernst.

Peng Zhaoqin had an unbelievable event and won
approximately 25 rating points with a 2570 performance

Erwin L'Ami, spouse of the globetrotter Alina L'Ami,
clinched first by quickly drawing Bok in the last round

Danielian shoots a smile to her opponent and fellow Armenian player...

Zaven Andriasian. One of the four winners of the event.

Benjamin Bok secured his third GM norm with a round to spare,
but he will need yet another norm to complete his title

Ernst has always been a strong player in the Netherlands

These girls warm up by playing some four way chess! Look at the determination on the game...

The scholastic section brought together hundreds of players

But let us not forget the legends of old!

Alina L'Ami had another good performance with 6.0/9

Final Rankings

Rank	Name	Score	Fed.	Rating	TPR	W-We
1	GM Andriasian, Zaven	7.0	ARM	2610	2709	+1.13
2	GM L'Ami, Erwin	7.0	NED	2645	2723	+0.93
3	IM Bok, Benjamin	7.0	NED	2540	2695	+1.81
4	GM Ernst, Sipke	7.0	NED	2566	2577	+0.29
5	GM Romanov, Evgeny	6.5	RUS	2654	2656	+0.18
6	GM Rodshtein, Maxim	6.5	ISR	2683	2634	-0.38
7	GM Greenfeld, Alon	6.5	ISR	2531	2528	+0.23
8	GM Michalik, Peter	6.0	SVK	2577	2630	+0.73
9	IM Stukopin, Andrey	6.0	RUS	2509	2624	+1.44
10	GM Kovchan, Alexander	6.0	UKR	2562	2526	-0.24
11	GM Novikov, Stanislav	6.0	RUS	2556	2527	-0.23
12	IM Simonian, Tigran	6.0	ARM	2401	2485	+1.06
13	GM Peng, Zhaoqin	6.0	NED	2369	2570	+2.43
14	IM Svane, Rasmus	6.0	GER	2472	2458	-0.05
15	FM Goudriaan, Etienne	6.0	NED	2429	2420	+0.00
16	FM Beukema, Stefan	6.0	BEL	2280	2428	+1.84
17	GM Garcia Palermo, Carlos	6.0	ITA	2450	2389	-0.48
18	IM Arslanov, Shamil	6.0	RUS	2403	2444	+0.59
19	WGM L'Ami, Alina	6.0	ROU	2390	2394	+0.28

Photos by Harry Gielen, Ab Scheel and Bart Beijer, taken from the official website

Source: Here