Fesoseev is getting serious

Written by Georgios Souleidis on 17 April 2017.

Vladimir Fedoseev took over the lead after the 7h round and is now sole leader of the GRENKE chess open. The Russian grandmaster beat Nils Grandelius and now at 6,5/7 points. Eight players follow with 6/8 points. Among them is Nikita Vitiugov who is ranked no 1 on the starters list in this tournament.

After Meilis Annaberdiev and Richard Rapport agreed to a draw at the top board , Vladimir Fedoseev had the chance to fight for the sole lead. The 22-year old grandmaster from St. Petersburg chose an interesting line in the scotch game against Nils Grandelius with where he castled queen-side. From the beginning he put pressure on his opponent and used the king side weaknesses to get an decisive advantage. It took him 53 moves to convert his advantage in the endgame. Fedoseev has now a good chance for another big tournament score after winning the Aeroflot-open in February.

Annaberdiev against Rapport was a quick draw

An important win with the black pieces celebrated Nikita Vitiugov against Gabor Papp. The no.1 ranked player in this tournament will now face Fedoseev in round 8 and can fight for winning the tournament. Richard Rapport also still has an eye on becoming first despite his draw against Annaberdiev.

Nikita Vitiugov (on the right) beat Gabor Papp

The 7. round saw a lot of action in the pursuing group. A lot of grandmasters who didn't had a good tournament so far won a couple of games in a row and now follow closely the leading group of players. These players are Yuriy Kuzubov, Konstantin Landa und Zdenko Kozul. The Croatian grandmaster won against Rasmus Svane and ended his very good run. As for the German players in general the tournament is not running particularly well. Andreas Heimann is the best local player and is now on 26th place with 5,5 points.

In the category for the best woman Sarasadat Khadealsharieh und Swaminathan Soumya are in front with 5 points. The Indian WGM seems finally to gather momentum and is playing better than before. In the 7th round she beat the higher rated grandmaster Philipp Schlosser.

Also at 5 point is grandmaster Ivan Farago who is leading in the best seniors category.

Ivan Farago chasing another senior prize