World Blitz Chess Championship 2009

Anand, Aronian, Carlsen, and Kramnik top seeded

The World Blitz Chess Championship 2009 will take place after the Tal Memorial, completing a series of very strong events in Russia for this year. The playing site is Moscow, and the blitz championship dates are 16-18.11.2009.

The field includes 22 grandmasters. Top seeded is the World Champion Viswanathan Anand, who will be joined by two other ex world champions - Vladimir Kramnik and Anatoly Karpov. The young talents Carlsen, Gashimov, and Mamedyarov will try to edge out the experience. The Moscow blitz champion Grischuk and his runner ups Karjakin and Morozevich will be there as well.

Defending champion Leinier Dominguez Perez and the World Women Champion Alexandra Kosteniuk are among the invited players.

All live games will be at the Chessdom live arena.

Here is the full list of participants:

1. Viswanathan Anand
2. Levon Aronian
3. Magnus Carlsen
4. Vladimir Kramnik
5. Peter Leko
6. Boris Gelfand
7. Vassily Ivanchuk (world blitz champion 2007)
8. Alexander Morozevich
9. Peter Svidler
10. Ruslan Ponomariov

(qualificants from Aeroflot blitz)

11. Sergey Karjakin
12. Vugar Gashimov
13. Shakhriyar Mamedyarov
14. Evgeny Bareev
15. Vladislav Tkachiev
16. Arkadij Naiditsch

(invited by organizers)

17. Anatoly Karpov
18. Alexander Grischuk - world blitz champion for 2006
19. Alexandra Kosteniuk - present world women chess champion
20. Leinier Dominguez Perez - present world blitz champion 21. Judit Polgar 22. Dmitry Jakovenko