Carlsen has won the world championship 15 times in the standard, rapid and blitz categories, not to mention the Chess World Cup. Last year in Almaty, Kazakhstan, the Norwegian won the rapid and blitz double. This time, he is the top seed again at the 2023 World Rapid and Blitz Championship in Samarkand, Uzbekistan.

The rapid chess tournament will take place over three days, from December 26 to December 28, with 13 games, Swiss system. In each game, players will have 15 minutes, plus 10 seconds after each move. The tournament starts today, December 26, at 5:00 p.m., Hanoi time.

Carlsen is the only player in the tournament with a rapid chess Elo rating above 2,800. The current world standard chess champion Dinh Lap Nhan has the highest rapid chess Elo, but is not going to Uzbekistan this time.

In addition, the tournament also lacked the Top 10 world standard chess players such as Hikaru Nakamura, Alireza Firouzja, Wesley So, Sergey Karjakin and Leinier Dominguez. The reason given by Nakamura was that the travel from the US to Uzbekistan was expensive, and he also wanted to spend the vacation with his family.

Firouzja's reason is that he is focusing on playing standard chess to improve his Elo rating and earn a place in the 2024 Candidates, although the French player originally registered for Uzbekistan. Karjakin, on the other hand, has not focused on his chess career since being banned from competing last year for political reasons.

However, it will not be easy for Carlsen to defend his title, as the tournament still has names such as world runner-up Ian Nepomniachtchi, world number two Fabiano Caruana or former champion Nodirbek Abdusattorov. Dutch player Anish Giri also has ambitions to win the championship, to compete for a place in the 2024 Candidates.

Vietnam did not have any players participating in the tournament due to travel costs. Last year, only Le Tuan Minh represented Vietnam in Kazakhstan, when he ranked 22nd in rapid chess and 55th in blitz chess. The prize fund for the rapid chess tournament is 350,000 USD, of which 60,000 USD goes to the champion, and 1,500 USD goes to the player ranked 35th.

The 2023 World Blitz Chess Championship will also take place at the same venue, from December 29 to December 30, with 21 games, Swiss system. Players will have three minutes per game, plus two seconds after each move.

Xuan Binh