The elite Tata Steel tournaments in Wijk aan Zee are underway and take place from January 13-29, with two main tournaments, the Masters with both Magnus Carlsen and Serget Karjakin as headliners, as well as Wesley So, Levon Aronian, Anish Giri, Baskaran Adhiban, Radoslaw Wojtaszek, Ian Nepomniachtchi, Richard Rapport, Dmitri Andreikin, Wei Yi, Pavel Eljanov, and Loek van Wely. All rounds in Wijk aan Zee begin at 1.30pm, except for the last round on 29 January 2017, which begins at 12.00pm. Both rounds on the Chess On Tour days start at 2.00pm.

Preceding the start of the tournament was the Opening ceremony, or rather ceremonies with an ‘S’. The Challengers enjoyed their own get together joined by the other participants, many of whom are friends, at a dinner where the drawing of lots was held.

The first round of the Wijk aan Zee tournament was more than simply the opening round, at least symbolically. It brought with it the promise of a bit of history on several levels. On the one hand, Magnus Carlsen has now tied Vishy Anand with five tournament wins, the current record, and while tying the record is certainly wonderful, beating it is even more so. Will he be able to show his magic and some of his legendary fighting spirit for a sixth title? Then there is the matter of Sergey Karjakin, his recent rival. Although Carlsen eventually prevailed in his title defense during the rapid games, the fact is he was unable to show his superiority in the traditional standard games. Now, one and a half months later, they are scheduled to face off once more, in what some may see as a potential tiebreaker.

read more on chessbase

The people in the province of Guadalajara live from agriculture and cultivate rye, potatoes and other vegetables. Hinojosa is one these small villages in the province. “Driving” through the village with the help of Google Streetview shows that Hinojosa probably does not suffer from overpopulation.

But the few inhabitants of Hinojosa seem to like chess. For the seond time this year they invited two juniors to play a game of chess, the moves of which were transmitted live by radio to… their field! Now tractors, harvesters and other agriculturual machines turned into chess pieces and replayed the game live on the field.

The starting position. The machines and their drivers are ready for battle.

It is easy to distinguish the rooks……but which piece is attacking here?

The two juniors make the machines move

Arturo Fernandez plays chess and he knows why.

The game was won by Arturo Fernandez. In an interview he explained his passion for chess: “Chess brought me a lot. Chess helps me thinking in school. Chess is good for everything in life.”

With the unique chess game between agricultural machines the people of Hinojosa wanted to make their village and the province of Guadalajara better known. They succeeded!

Chess Base

Below we’ve gathered together all the info about the major chess events already scheduled for 2022, though we’ll be updating it during the year as more events are announced or plans change. Let us know in the comments below if there’s something we’re missing!

Current and future events:

March 2022

March 19 – 26 | Charity Cup | chess24

The second of six Regular events on the $1.6 million 2022 Meltwater Champions Chess Tour is being held as a fundraiser for UNICEF and their work helping children in and around Ukraine. Magnus Carlsen, Ding Liren and Richard Rapport are the Top 10 stars in action, with Richard making his debut on the Tour. There are also debuts for David Navara and Lei Tingjie.

Links: official website, Charity Cup Prelims

 

March 21 – April 4 | FIDE Grand Prix 3 | Berlin, Germany

The 3rd and final event of the 24-player Grand Prix series, that determines the final two places in the 2022 Candidates Tournament.

Links: official website

March 27 – April 6 | European Individual Chess Championship | Terme Catez, Slovenia

The European Chess Championship is a prestigious title to win, but for many players the event functions mainly as a qualifier for the FIDE World Cup. There are 20 places in that event up for grabs.

Links: official website

April 2022

April 6 – 12 | Reykjavik Open | Reykjavik, Iceland

The Reykjavik Open had to be cancelled in 2020, while in 2021 it functioned as the European Championship. In 2022 it’s returning to its old format as an Open tournament and also plans to return to its traditional venue, the Harpa Music and Conference Centre.

Links: official website

April 9 – 10 | Chess Bundesliga | Germany

This German Chess League is the strongest season-long team event in chess, featuring 16 teams who play each other over 15 rounds spread over a number of weekends in venues across Germany. The planned January start for this year’s event was put back to March over Coronavirus concerns.

Links: official website, chess24

April 20 – 28 | Meltwater Champions Chess Tour 3: 1st Major | chess24

The Meltwater Champions Chess Tour is back with Magnus Carlsen looking to defend the title he won in the inaugural $1.6 million tour. This is the first Major on the 2022 Tour, which also features six Regular events and two more Majors. More details soon.

Links: official website

April 20 – 29 | The American Cup | Saint Louis, USA

A new event featuring two 8-player knockout tournaments, with the twist that players are only knocked out if they lose two matches. If they lose one they drop down to an elimination bracket but still have a chance to win the tournament.

Links: official website

April 27 – May 8 | Mitropa Chess Club Cup | Corte, Corsica, France

The Mitropa Chess Club Cup is an annual team tournament organised by ten chess federations in Central Europe.

April 30 – May 4 | World Youth Rapid and Blitz Championship | Greece

The World Youth Rapid and Blitz Championship will be held in Under 8, U10, U12, U14, U16 and U18 age categories.

May 2022

May 1 – 10 | Russian Team Championships | Sochi, Russia

The Russian Team Championships in Sochi are traditionally one of the world’s strongest team events, though in 2021 it was notable that the top tournament featured no players at all from outside Russia. That’s likely to change in 2022, if the pandemic allows.

Links: official website

May 3 – 9 | Tepe Sigeman & Co Chess Tournament | Malmo, Sweden

The 8-player single round-robin is back with Swedish no. 1 Nils Grandelius joined by the likes of David Navara, Alexei Shirov, Jorden van Foreest, Salem Saleh and Arjun Erigaisi.

Links: official website

May 4 – 14 | Superbet Chess Classic Romania | Bucharest, Romania

The first event on the 5-event $1.4 million Grand Chess Tour is a 10-player classical round-robin with a $350,000 prize fund.

Links: official website

May 5 – 16 | World Senior Team Championship | Acqui Terme, Italy

The World Senior Team Championship for teams in 50+ and 65+ age categories was postponed from 2021 to 2022 due to the pandemic.

May 18 – 23 | Superbet Rapid & Blitz Poland | Warsaw, Poland

The second tournament of the 5-event $1.4 million Grand Chess Tour is a 10-player event featuring three days of rapid chess (25+10) followed by two days of blitz (3+2), with a $175,000 prize fund.

Links: official website

May 19 – 26 | Meltwater Champions Chess Tour 4 | chess24

The Meltwater Champions Chess Tour is back with Magnus Carlsen looking to defend the title he won in the inaugural $1.6 million tour. This is the third of six Regular events on the 2022 Tour, which will also feature three Majors. More details soon.

Links: official website

May 30 – June 11 | Norway Chess | Stavanger, Norway

Norway Chess is one of the few major international chess events to continue during the pandemic, though with a reduced 6-player field in both 2020 and 2021. If Magnus Carlsen plays he’ll be bidding for a 5th Norway Chess title, and a 4th in a row.

Links: official website

June 2022

June 7 – 17 | Prague International Chess Festival | Prague, Czech Republic

This will be the 4th edition of the Prague Chess Festival, one of the brightest recent additions to the chess calendar. As well as the Masters, won in 2020 by Alireza Firouzja and in 2021 by Sam Shankland, there’s likely to be a Challengers, Futures and also an Open.

Links: official website

June 17 – July 5 | Candidates Tournament | Madrid, Spain

The Candidates Tournament is an 8-player, 14-round event that will decide who earns the right to face Magnus Carlsen in the 2023 World Chess Championship match. A welcome change this year is that a tie for 1st place will be decided by a playoff and not by mathematical tiebreakers, though it’s worth noting that if Magnus decides not to play the match, then a tie for 2nd place would matter more, since the top two will go on to play the match.

The tournament will feature Ian Nepomniachtchi (2021 runner-up), Jan-Krzysztof Duda (World Cup winner), Sergey Karjakin (World Cup runner-up), Alireza Firouzja (Grand Swiss winner), Fabiano Caruana (Grand Swiss runner-up), Teimour Radjabov (wildcard after turning down his chance to play in 2020) and two players from the FIDE Grand Prix.

June 25 – July 6 | Russian Championship Higher League | Bryansk, Russia

The top five Open and Women’s players from this formidable open qualify for the Russian Chess Championship Superfinals later in the year.

Links: official website

July 2022

July 10 – 17 | Meltwater Champions Chess Tour 5 | chess24

The Meltwater Champions Chess Tour is back with Magnus Carlsen looking to defend the title he won in the inaugural $1.6 million tour. This is the fourth of six Regular events on the 2022 Tour, which will also feature three Majors. More details soon.

Links: official website

July 11 – 22 | Biel International Chess Festival | Biel/Bienne, Switzerland

The 55th edition of the Biel International Chess Festival will again have as its centrepiece a grandmaster tournament where the players will compete in classical, rapid and blitz chess, with points combined, while a Chess960 event acts as the tiebreaker.

Links: official website

July 16 – 24 | Dortmund Sparkassen Chess Trophy | Dortmund, Germany

The headline tournament of this traditional event will again this year feature No Castles Chess, with Vladimir Kramnik and Vishy Anand joined by Krishnan Sasikiran and Daniel Fridman for the No Castling World Masters. There will also be a strong 8-player German Grand Prix as well as open tournaments.

Links: official website

July 19 – 26 | SuperUnited Croatia Grand Chess Tour Rapid & Blitz | Zagreb, Croatia

The third tournament on the 5-event $1.4 million Grand Chess Tour is a 10-player event featuring three days of rapid chess (25+10) followed by two days of blitz (3+2), with a $175,000 prize fund.

Links: official website

July – August | World Chess Olympiad | Chennai, India

The World Chess Olympiad has been a biennial event since 1950, but the pandemic prevented it being held over-the-board in 2020 or 2021, so that the 2022 Olympiad will be the first since 2018 in Batumi, Georgia. Between the Open and Women’s events there are likely to be over 300 teams and more than 1500 players involved. Minsk, Belarus was originally awarded the tournament, but that was then changed to Moscow, Russia and later Chennai, India.

China are the defending champions in both the Open and the Women’s sections, but the addition of Levon Aronian will give the USA a boost, while France now have both Alireza Firouzja and Maxime Vachier-Lagrave. Perennial top seeds Russia look set to be excluded after the war in Ukraine.

August 2022

August 12 – 20 | Meltwater Champions Chess Tour 6: 2nd Major | chess24

The Meltwater Champions Chess Tour is back with Magnus Carlsen looking to defend the title he won in the inaugural $1.6 million tour. This is the second Major on the 2022 Tour, which will also feature six Regular events and another Major. More details soon.

Links: official website

August 13 – 21 | British Championship | Torquay, England

The 118th British Chess Championship is taking place at the seaside resort of Torquay.

Links: official website

August 20 – 31 | European Women’s Chess Championship | Prague, Czech Republic

The European Women’s Individual Chess Championship both decides the European Women’s Champion and acts as a qualifying event for the FIDE Women’s World Cup.

August 24 – 30 | Saint Louis Rapid & Blitz | Saint Louis, USA

The fourth tournament on the 5-event $1.4 million Grand Chess Tour is a 10-player event featuring three days of rapid chess (25+10) followed by two days of blitz (3+2), with a $175,000 prize fund.

Links: official website

September 2022

September 1 – 15 | Sinquefield Cup | Saint Louis, USA

The fifth and final event on the $1.4 million Grand Chess Tour is the Sinquefield Cup, a 10-player classical round-robin with a $350,000 prize fund.

Links: official website

September 5 – 18 | World Youth (U14-18) Championship | Mamaia, Romania

These will be the first World Youth Championships held over-the-board since 2019, after the pandemic pushed the 2020 and 2021 events online.

September 11 – 23 | Russian Chess Championship | Cheboksary, Russia

The Open and Women’s Russian Chess Championships are both 12-player round-robins.

Links: official website

September 10 – 25 | Asian Games | Hangzhou, China

Chess will feature as one of the mind sports in this major Asian sporting event held once every four years.

Links: official website

September 18 – 25 | Meltwater Champions Chess Tour 7 | chess24

The Meltwater Champions Chess Tour is back with Magnus Carlsen looking to defend the title he won in the inaugural $1.6 million tour. This is the fifth of six Regular events on the 2022 Tour, which will also feature three Majors. More details soon.

Links: official website

October 2022

October 2 – 10 | European Chess Club Cup | Mayrhofen, Austria

The annual European Chess Club Cup, which in 2018 and 2021 was the last classical event Magnus Carlsen played before a World Championship match, is a 7-round event for teams that have previously competed in European national leagues.

October 13 – 20 | Russian Rapid and Blitz Championships | Sochi, Russia

Russian players compete for rapid and blitz titles both individually and in team competitions.

Links: official website

October 14 – 21 | Meltwater Champions Chess Tour 8 | chess24

The Meltwater Champions Chess Tour is back with Magnus Carlsen looking to defend the title he won in the inaugural $1.6 million tour. This is the sixth and final Regular event on the 2022 Tour, which also features three Majors. More details soon.

Links: official website

October 23 – 26 | European Women’s Rapid & Blitz Championship | Kyiv, Ukraine

Female players from European Chess Federations compete in rapid and blitz chess.

November 2022

November 11 – 20 | Meltwater Champions Chess Tour 9: 3rd Major | chess24

The Meltwater Champions Chess Tour is back with Magnus Carlsen looking to defend the title he won in the inaugural $1.6 million tour. This is the 3rd and final Major and will bring an end to the 2022 Meltwater Champions Chess Tour. More details soon.

Links: official website

November 15 – 28 | World Senior Championship | Assisi, Italy

The World Senior Chess Championship for 50+ and 65+ players are planned to be held for the first time since 2019.

November 30 – December 4 | Russian Rapid Grand Prix Final | Khanty-Mansiysk, Russia

A knockout tournament among the best performing players in the Russian Rapid Grand Prix series of events.

Links: official website

December 2022

December 4 – 13 | Russian Cup Final | Khanty-Mansiysk, Russia

Open and Women’s knockout tournaments featuring the top players in the Russian Cup series of events.

Links: official website