Levon Aronian won the World Chess Cup 2005, being held at Khanty-Mansiysk, Russia (see an earlier report ). Although he was regarded as a favorite throughout the tournament, his opponents were of no less strength. For Mr. Aronian, this was perhaps the biggest international tournament up-to-date, and he performed very well. You can read interviews and replay the games by visiting the official site (there are also plenty of photos to enjoy).

This is a great day for chess, and even a greater one for the Armenian chess. Congratulations to all of us.

Now that we are passed the referendum and post-referundum turbulences, allow me to bring to your attention a major chess tournament that’s taking place in Khanty-Mansiysk, Russia. It has a prize sack of $1.5 mil… not only it is a major tournament in and of itself [it began with the world’s top 128 players], it is also to produce the contender of the World Championship against Mr. Topalov (the current FIDE world champion).

Armenians began the tournament with 5 players (ELO rating): Levon Aronian (2724), Vladimir Akopian (2707), Karen Asrian (2645), Rafael Vaganian (2614), Artashes Minasian (2581). For some unknown reasons Vladimir Akopian didn’t even begin the tournament, but the others did. This is a knock-out tournament, which means after each round half of the players are eliminated. So after the first round all but Levon Aronian were “knocked-out”. Note that Levon Aronian is in the top 10 of the strongest players in the world, so naturally he’s considered a favorite.

Now in the third round, Mr. Aronian is still going strong (5.5 out of 6 points) and there are only 18 players left. You can follow the tournament at http://www.worldchesscup2005.com/main.asp, you can also watch the games live at the site (as far as I am able to understand the games begin around 5am EST).

In chess there is an opening called “King’s Gambit”. It is one of the oldest of openings (chess openings are the moves that are played in the initial phase of the game, usually up to 12-15 moves), and as the name suggests, this opening is also very risky and is usually avoided by grandmasters and chess experts. Now, you may ask yourself, why in the world are you reading about a chess opening? Well, for one, it is related to chess and you’re reading the newly opened section on Chess on blogrel.com, but for the sophisticated audience that frequents this site, that answer won’t suffice. So here’s the other answer: by taking on this responsibility I’m “gambitting” in a way, and because I am not a “grandmaster” at writing or being a reporter, I can gambit!

Before I begin, let me say that I will report on chess events that are directly related to Armenia and chess players of Armenian decent. With that rather long and cumbersome introduction let’s get to work.

The first event that I’ll cover is the World Junior Chess Championship.

As a background, that title has been held by two fellow Armenians: in 1991 it was the young Vladimir Akopian, then Levon Aronian in 2002. Thus far the Armenians have produced in total: two “regular” world champions (Tigran Petrosian and Garry Kasparov) and recently two juniors’ champion (Vladimir Akopian and Levon Aronian).

The current championship is taking place in Istanbul. The Armenians are represented by Levon Babujian. He’s currently in 8th place and there is still plenty of playing to go. You can follow the match by visiting: http://www.tsf.org.tr/worldchess/index.htm

I will update you every few rounds, or if anything significant occurs.

But for now, let me again extended a warm welcome to all of you and a big “thank you” to the Blogrel admins for initiating this opportunity!

Here’s Levon Babujian probably thinking: “When is Blogrel going to start covering chess seriously?” Think no more, Mr. Babujian… Blogrel’s here!

As requested, we’re opening up a new category here at Blogrel: chess! Armenians seem to be quite good at chess and our readers’ interest in chess-related posts has certainly reflected that.

As such, please welcome our chess-blogger, Levon to the fold.

The Armenian chess team took a bronze in the World Team Chess Championship third time in a row. I am proud we have such a strong team in chess.

More on this:
Armenian Chess Federation.

from ArmeniaNow
AP report
Some Photos: 1, 2