World Rapid Chess Championship Day 1 Today: Karjakin, Carlsen Lead After Five Rounds

The world's best players are in Astana for the first-ever World Rapid Chess Championship that began today in Kazakhstan. Five rounds were played on the first day of the tournament. Sergey Karjakin and Magnus Carlsen both notched up four wins and a draw each to lead the field with 4.5 points each.

Karjakin's wins came against Gelfand, Tkachiev, Ismgambetov and Grischuk plus a draw against Topalov in round 5. Carlsen picked up wins against Kazhgaleyev, Morozevich, Bologan, Kurnosov and a draw against Svidler in the third round.

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Pakistan Chess 2012 Round 5 - Defending Champion Lodhi Leads

Nida Siddiqui, Defending
Champion among women

Pakistan national chess champion Mehmood Lodhi is defending his title at the 2012 championship in Karachi and is leading after five rounds. He beat Raees Ansari on the third day of the event and remains unbeaten in the tournament so far. He is followed by Anwar Qureshi in second place with 4.5 points. Eight other players are still vying for third place in the event that features 80 players from four provinces and sports departments of Pakistan. Meanwhile, in the women’s championship, national champion Nida Siddique, Zenobia Wasif and Ghazala have secured two points each.The championships are also being held to select the Pakistan chess team for the forthcoming chess olympiad to be held in Istanbul, Turkey in August.

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World Chess Championship Blitz & Rapid Inauguration Ceremony Today in Astana

The chess world is going to witness the first-ever World Chess Championship in Rapid and Blitz formats of the sport in Astana, Kazakhstan. The head of the country of Kazakhstan Nursultan Nazarbayev will officially declare open the World Rapid and Blitz Championship in Astana today - July 5.

The inauguration ceremony would be held in Astana at the Radisson hotel and would include the drawing of colours for the pairings. Not only is the format exciting, but so is the line-up of players: the strongest in the world.

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Igor Kurnosov, Alexey Dreev, Vladislav Tkachiev Qualify for World Rapid Chess 2012

GM Igor Kurnosov has won the qualifier of the World Rapid Chess Championship in Astana, Kazakhstan. He was already leading on the first day and finished the qualifier with a point ahead of the rest of the field. Second place was shared by four players, but 2nd and 3rd on tiebreak were Alexey Dreev and Vladislav Tkachiev, who also qualified for the World Rapid Chess 2012 finals.

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Gull Rukh Wins Pak Punjab Women's Chess Championship

Gull Rukh

Gull Rukh of Lahore won the Punjab Women's Chess Championship 2012 by upsetting top seed Samina Kanwal of Faisalabad in Lahore on Wednesday. She remained unbeaten in all the five rounds of the championship. Samina Kanwal of Faisalabad was the runner-up while young prodigy Mehak surprised everyone by clinching the third position.

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India's Abhijeet Gupta Wins Philadelphia International Chess; M Venkatesh is India's 28th GM (Video Link Updated)

Chess Video link

GM Abhijeet Gupta

Indian National chess champion GM Abhijeet Gupta has won the Philadelphia Chess Open and $2000 with a clear first ahead of Indian mate IM Marani Venkatesh. IM Venkatesh earned his GM title!

Gupta won his final round game against IM Dean Ippolito for the title. Meanwhile, both IM Marani Venkatesh and WGM Padmini Rout, earned their GM norm and IM norms respectively. There were several other Indians in the line-up who did fairly well. GM SP Sethuraman was fourth, GM Deepan Chakkravarthy was tenth, WGM Eesha Karvade was 16th and Rout was 17th. The opposition Rout faced was strong enough for the norm for her. 

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