Indian Grandmasters Koneru Humpy, Vaishali Rameshbabu and Praggnanandhaa Rameshbabu are set to compete in the 12th edition of the Norway Chess scheduled to take place from May 27 to June 7 at SR-Bank’s main building in Stavanger, Norway.
The event will feature World No.1 Magnus Carlsen (Norway), World No.3 Hikaru Nakamura (USA), current World Champion Ding Liren (China), Women’s World Champion Ju Wenjun (China), Lei Tingjie (China) among others.
Norway Chess annually extend invitations to top Grandmasters from the world rating list. However, within the top 100 players globally, no women are listed. Hence the tournament has introduced world’s first-ever equal female tournament this year.
The Norway Chess Women’s Tournament, to be held in the same hall concurrently, with the same number of players as the men’s, will have same format and an equivalent prize fund.
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In this edition, the brother-sister duo of Praggnanandhaa and Vaishali will make their debut in the Norway Chess and the Norway Chess Women’s Tournament respectively.
While Praggnanandhaa is only the second Indian to reach the final of the FIDE Chess World Cup, Vaishali is the third woman in India to achieve the Grandmaster title. Both are the first brother-sister duo to earn this distinction.
Notably, Praggnanandhaa was the winner of the 2022 Norway Chess International Open Tournament. He remained unbeaten throughout the nine rounds, recording 7.5 points to clinch the title.
Koneru Humpy is the current World No.2 in women’s category. | Photo Credit: Special Arrangement
Koneru Humpy the current World No.2 in women’s category and India’s No.1 woman chess player who won the FIDE Women’s rapid chess championship in 2019 will be vying for top honours at the inaugural women’s tournament.
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