Around 260 players, including defending champion and fourth seed Grand Master (GM) Tukhaev Adam and 15 other GMs and 18 International Masters (IM), will be fighting it out for top honours at the 10th Chennai Open International Grandmaster Chess Tournament 2018 that starts here on Thursday.
They will be crossing their swords over 64-squares on the chess board for the Sakthi Group Dr.N. Mahalingam Trophy, said an official of Tamil Nadu Chess Association.
The total prize money in the 10 round tournament will be Rs.11 lakh and the winner would take home Rs.200,000 and the runner-up Rs.150,000.
However, the top seed for the tournament is GM Timur Gareyev of the USA with a ELO rating of 2,605, who holds the Guinness record ffor the World Blindfold simultaneous chess.
Russian GM Ivan Rozum (ELO 2,595) and GM Sergei Tiviakov of The Netherlands are the second and third seeds for the tournament.
The Indian contingent will be spearheaded by GM elect and IM P.Karthikeyan (ELO 2,497) and GM Deepan Chakkravarthy (ELO 2,475), GM R.R.Laxman (ELO 2,434) and GM Saptarishi Roy Chowdhury (ELO 2,318).
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Queried about the absence of India's top chess players from the tournament P. Stephen Balasamy, General Secretary of TNCA said almost all of them are playing in various tourneys overseas.
According to the tournament's press officer R.R. Vasudevan, 45 foreign players including 16 GMs, 18 IMs have confirmed their participation.
--IANS
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