The 16th edition of Tradewise Gibraltar, one of the strongest open tournament over the years, starts tomorrow at Caleta Hotel, in Gibraltar.
The festival features five main events with participation of almost 600 players coming from 60 federations. Besides the main events: Masters, Challengers A, Challengers B, Amateurs A and Amateurs B competitions, various evening activities will be organized, such as Masterclasses with top players, two Blitz events and Battle of Sexes with top women and men players playing against each other.
This year, the Masters event gathered 259 players coming from 50 federations, along with World top players, 91 Grandmasters, 58 International masters, 7 WGM, 8 WIM and in total 201 titled players.
Among the top world players who will compete for the crown of this very high leveled competition are: last three years winner of the event and world #8Nakamura Hikaru (USA, 2781), top seeded and World #4Aronian Levon (ARM, 2797), #5Vachier-Lagrave Maxime (FRA, 2793), #17Navara David (CZE, 2749), #20Harikrishna P (IND, 2745), #23Le Quang Liem (VIE, 2737), #25Vitiugov Nikita (RUS, 2732), #27Ivanchuk Vassily (UKR, 2726) etc.
The very strong line-up of the championship is completed with entry of seven of the ten top world women players: #2Ju Wenjun (CHN, 2572), #3Muzychuk Anna (UKR, 2571), #4Alexandra Kosteniuk (RUS, 2561), #5Lagno Kateryna (RUS, 2556), #7Muzychuk Marya (UKR, 2540), #8Lei Tingjie (CHN. 2531), #10Dzagnidze Nana (GEO, 2522).
The event will be played in 10 rounds, Swiss system, with time-control 100 minutes for 40 moves, plus 50 minutes for the next 20 moves, plus 15 minutes for the rest of the game with an increment of 30 seconds per move starting from the move one.
Starting list of the Masters event
The event will be opened with Amateur and Challenger events on 22nd of January, while the 1st round of Masters competition will start on 23rd of January. The organizers increased the total prize fund of the event which reaches 200.000£, with 25.000£ reserved for the Winner of the Master event, and 50.000£ reserved for the best women players.
All the games will be live transmitted and the live broadcast of the games can be followed through the official website of the Championship together with live commentary given by GM Simon Williams and IM Jovanka Houska. Evening Masterclasses will also be broadcast live, and like the afternoon shows, can be watched through the official website.
Starting lists of the main events
Photographs from the Official Website, credits to: Sophie Triay