Elsewhere on the Web : 2005 FIDE World Cup - Introduction

Saturday November 19, 2005

The 2005-2007 cycle of the FIDE World Chess Championship kicks off 26 November in Khanty-Mansiysk, Russia, with the FIDE World Cup opening ceremony. A total of 128 players have qualified to start the seven round knockout tournament. The format and the importance of the event are not the same as the five previous FIDE World Championship knockout events, where half of the players were eliminated in each round and the World Championship title was at stake.

The FIDE World Chess Champion titleholder for the next two years was decided in October at the FIDE World Championship, San Luis, Argentina, after Veselin Topalov ran away with the event. The World Champion title may not be at stake in the World Cup, but there are plenty of other goodies up for grabs.

• Rounds 1-3 : Elimination • The first three rounds of Khanty-Mansiysk, will see half of the remaining players eliminated during each round, until 16 players are left for round four (rd.4). These 16 will remain in the tournament through the last round.
  
  
• Rounds 4-7 : Fight for 16 places • The eight winners of rd.4 will compete in rd.5 for the 1st to 8th places; similarly, the four winners in rd.5 will compete in rd.6 for 1st to 4th places, and the two winners in rd.6 will compete in rd.7 for 1st and 2nd places. Meanwhile, the eight losers in rd.4 will compete in rd.5 for the 9th to 16th places; the four winners from that group will compete in rd.6 for the 9th to 12th places and the four losers will compete for 13th-16th players.

  This means that in addition to the the last round (rd.7) match to determine the overall winner and runner-up, there will be seven other matches. One match will determine 3rd and 4th places, another will determine 5th and 6th places, and so on down to a match to determine 15th and 16th places.
  
  

• Why the change? • This pairing system has two obvious advantages. The first is that all of the top 16 places will be allocated to one and only one player. No tiebreak system will be necessary. The second is that there will be eight matches played in each of the last four rounds. This means more chess, and more chess means more excitement for chess fans worldwide.
  
  
• Regulation games and tiebreaks • The matches in each round will be played over three days. On the first two days, the opponents will play one regulation game per day, each player starting once with the White pieces and once with Black. The time control for a regulation game will be 90 minutes for the first 40 moves followed by 15 minutes for the rest of the game with an addition of 30 seconds per move starting from the first move of the game.

  If a match is tied after the two regulation games, a series of tiebreak matches will be played on the third day. The first match will be two games played with 25 minutes for each player plus an addition of 10 seconds after each move. If that match is tied, a second match of two games will be played with 5 minutes for each player plus 10 seconds per move.

  If the second match is also tied, the players will play one sudden death game with no time increment after each move. The player with the White pieces will get 5 minutes on the clock; the player with Black will get 6 minutes. In case of a draw the player with the Black pieces wins the tiebreak.
  
  

• Schedule and prizes • There will be no rest days during the tournament. The first round will be played 27-28 November, with tiebreaks on the 29th. The last round will be played 15-16 December, with tiebreaks on the 17th, followed by the closing ceremony.

  First prize in the tournament will be $100K, second prize $70K. All players will win some prize money: even players eliminated in the first round will win $6K. (These prizes are all before a payment of 20% to FIDE.)
  
  

There's more at stake than money. The World Cup is the first event in FIDE's plan for their 2005-2007 World Championship cycle. The format of the cycle has changed from the plan we discussed previously (see Elsewhere on the Web : 2005 FIDE World Championship - Introduction, 24 September), so let's take another look.

• Candidate Matches • The first ten players from the World Cup will qualify into a series of Candidate Matches. They will be joined by five players selected by rating plus former FIDE World Champion Rustam Kasimjanov (aka Kasimzdhanov).
  
  
• World Championship tournament • The top four players from the Candidate Matches will qualify for the next World Championship tournament. They will be joined by the first four players from the previous World Championship tournament, the San Luis event.
  
  
• Schedule • FIDE's current plans are for the Candidate Matches to be held September - October 2006. The World Championship tournament, which will have the same double round robin format used at San Luis, is scheduled for September - October 2007.
  
  

For more information on this exciting event, see the World Chess Cup 2005 official site, and our ChessChrono : 2005 FIDE World Cup.

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