Al Ain: Grandmaster Salem A.R. Saleh of the UAE won the Al Ain Rapid Chess Championship at the Hili Rayhaan by Rotana hotel in Al Ain on Thursday.
Seventy players from 17 countries, including 25 Grandmasters, took part in the one-day precursor to the December 19 to 26 Al Ain Classic Chess Championship.
Saleh finished undefeated with six points from seven rounds. He beat Vugar Asadli of Azerbaijan, Armenians FM Manuel Petrosyan, GM Arman Pashikian and GM Samuel Ter-Sahakyan, GM Rauf Mamedov of Azerbaijan and drew with GM Yuriy Kryvoruchko of Ukraine and GM Mikheil Mchedlishvili of Georgia.
After his fourth-round loss to Saleh, Ter-Sahakyan caught up to tie with six points, but Saleh emerged first in the tie-break.
Kryvoruchko finished third with 5.5 points ahead by tie-break over Mchedlishvili and GM Levon Babujian of Armenia.
Seven players followed with five points each. Finishing in tieb-reak order were GM Miknailo Oleksienko of Ukraine in sixth followed by Marin Kravtsiv, also of Ukraine, GM Viktor Moskalenko of Spain, GM Alexander Kovchan of Ukraine, GM Arman Pashikian of Armenia and IM Amierreza Pourrameezanali of Iran.
Mokal Amruta Sunil of India won the award for best female player, while IM Omar Noaman received the prize for Emirati player and FM Mayed Al Rashedi won the best Al Ain player award.
Many more players are expected to arrive for the Al Ain Chess Classic at the same venue. At stake is $50,000 (Dh 183,000) in cash prizes, with a top prize of $11,000 (Dh40,000), and various category prizes.
Two rounds are scheduled on Saturday at 10am and 5pm. From Sunday, games start at 4pm daily except for the last round, which starts at 2pm. All games will be broadcast live at the alainchess.com website.
