For more information, please contact:
Rebecca Buffington
GCT Public Relations
Email: press@grandchesstour.org
The Superbet Chess Classic Romania & Superbet Rapid & Blitz Poland Wildcards Announced
The First Two Legs of the 2022 Grand Chess Tour Will See Seven Wildcard Players
Saint Louis, MO, April 12, 2022 – The Grand Chess Tour (GCT) has confirmed the seven wildcard players for the Superbet Chess Classic Romania and the Superbet Rapid & Blitz Poland.
The first leg of the GCT, the Superbet Chess Classic Romania will include all nine full tour players and one wildcard player, Romanian Grandmaster Bogdan-Daniel Deac. The Superbet Chess Classic Romania is sponsored by Superbet Foundation, One United and First Bank and features a 10 player round-robin battle for a total of $350,000 in prize money.
The Superbet Rapid & Blitz Poland, the newest stop on the Tour, will feature four full-tour players and six wildcard players. This will be the first time for Grandmasters Kirill Shevchenko from Ukraine and Radoslaw Wojtaszek from Poland. Rounding out the wildcards will be former World Champion Viswanathan Anand from India, 2021 World Cup winner, Grandmaster Jan-Krzysztof Duda from Poland, Grandmasters Anton Korobov from Ukraine, and Constantin Lupulescu from Romania. The tournament is sponsored by the Superbet Foundation. The first rapid and blitz leg of the tour will feature a 10 player round-robin battle for a $175,000 prize fund.
“We are thrilled to partner once again with The Grand Chess Tour,” said Augusta Dragic, President of the Superbet Foundation. “This year, the Superbet Foundation has expanded their role and become the Grand Chess Tour’s strategic global partner in its worldwide endeavor to popularize the game of chess. We are pleased that the two of the best Romanian Grandmasters Bogdan-Daniel Deac and Constantin Lupulescu will join the other Grandmaster wildcards in these two upcoming tournaments and we look forward to presenting a show of bright minds within the elite chess world for the third consecutive year to Romania and for the first time to Poland.”
The field for the two upcoming international events are finalized and are as follows:
Super Chess Classic Romania May 4 - May 14, 2022
| Player Name | Player Type | Country | FIDE Rating | URS Rating | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Alireza Firouzja | Full Tour Player | FRA | 2804 | 2781 |
| 2 | Levon Aronian | Full Tour Player | USA | 2785 | 2776 |
| 3 | Fabiano Caruana | Full Tour Player | USA | 2781 | 2793 |
| 4 | Wesley So | Full Tour Player | USA | 2778 | 2797 |
| 5 | Shakhriyar Mamedyarov | Full Tour Player | AZE | 2776 | 2768 |
| 6 | Ian Nepomniachtchi | Full Tour Player | FIDE | 2773 | 2792 |
| 7 | Richard Rapport | Full Tour Player | HUN | 2762 | 2775 |
| 8 | Maxime Vachier-Lagrave | Full Tour Player | FRA | 2761 | 2751 |
| 9 | Leinier Dominguez | Full Tour Player | USA | 2756 | 2748 |
| 10 | Bogdan-Daniel Deac | Wildcard | ROU | 2656 | 2652 |
Superbet Rapid & Blitz Poland May 18 - May 23, 2022
| Player Name | Player Type | Country | FIDE Rating | URS Rating | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Levon Aronian | Full Tour Player | USA | 2785 | 2776 |
| 2 | Fabiano Caruana | Full Tour Player | USA | 2781 | 2793 |
| 3 | Wesley So | Full Tour Player | USA | 2778 | 2797 |
| 4 | Richard Rapport | Full Tour Player | HUN | 2762 | 2775 |
| 5 | Viswanathan Anand | Wildcard | IND | 2751 | 2751 |
| 6 | Jan-Krzysztof Duda | Wildcard | POL | 2750 | 2870 |
| 7 | Anton Korobov | Wildcard | UKR | 2695 | 2722 |
| 8 | Radoslaw Wojtaszek | Wildcard | POL | 2694 | 2710 |
| 9 | Kirill Shevchenko | Wildcard | UKR | 2652 | 2673 |
| 10 | Constantin Lupulescu | Wildcard | ROU | 2622 | 2638 |
The confirmed fields for the Superbet Rapid & Blitz Croatia, Saint Louis Rapid and Blitz, and the Sinquefield Cup will be announced when they become available.
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About the Grand Chess Tour™
The Grand Chess Tour is a circuit of international events, each demonstrating the highest level of organization for the world's best players. The legendary Garry Kasparov, one of the world's greatest ambassadors for chess, inspired the Grand Chess Tour and helped solidify the partnership between the organizers. All Grand Chess Tour 2021 events will comply with local and regional COVID-19 restrictions. For more information about the tour, visit grandchesstour.org.
About the Superbet Foundation
Founded in 2019, Superbet Foundation is a nonprofit organization. Its role is to coordinate Superbet Group’s CSR activities and to connect with civil society organizations and the general public. Through its activity, the Foundation strives for a better world, with healthy and educated people and by supporting various projects it wants to inspire people to hold unbreakable moral values. It supports projects in domains like education, health, culture, performance in sport and, most notably, in chess. Since 2019, chess has become one of the backbones of Superbet Foundation by organizing its first tournament of the Grand Chess Tour in Bucharest. The Foundation is committed to turning GCT tournaments into a tradition for the Romanian and Polish chess communities. For more information, visit superchess.ro.
About the Saint Louis Chess Club
The Saint Louis Chess Club is a non-profit, 501(c)(3) organization that is committed to making chess an important part of our community. In addition to providing a forum for the community to play tournaments and casual games, the club also offers chess improvement classes, beginner lessons and special lectures.
Recognizing the cognitive and behavioral benefits of chess, the Saint Louis Chess Club is committed to supporting those chess programs that already exist in area schools while encouraging the development of new in-school and after-school programs. For more information, visit saintlouischessclub.org.