Dear Chess friend!
It’s our pleasure to invite you to participate in the 7th international chess festival „Riga Technical University Open 2017”, which will take place on August 7th – 13th in already traditional venue - international exhibition centre “Kipsala” (8 Kipsalas Street) located across the bridge from the city center. This year we are improving several things and hope that you will enjoy them.
We have added one more tournament to the program of the festival. Tournament E will be played in 3 days (Friday evening-Sunday) with time limit 30 minutes + 30 seconds per move and will be for players with ELO below 1600. This allows for the festival to be more open than ever for amateurs of various ages, including those that cannot miss a single day at work. This addition will make a total of six tournaments, including five ELO tournaments and a blitz tournament. The tournament A – the Grandmaster Open will have GM, IM, WGM and WIM norms. Last year the biggest names of the festival were Martyn Kravtsiv, who won the tournament, Axel Bachmann, Hrant Melkumyan and Daniel Fridman. Many other strong GMs participated, including Daniel Naroditsky, Arturs Neiksans, Hovhannisyan Robert and many others. The main tournament gathered 184 players from 31 countries including 21 GMs and 99 titled players. Overall more than 380 participants took part in the festival.
This year we have slightly increased the total prize fund that is planned to be 20 000 EUR with the 1st prize in the tournament A of 2500 EUR.
As there are six tournaments organized this year, everyone can participate in a tournament suitable for their strength and time frame. Tournament A will be 7 days long, the same for tournament B (ELO until 2299 and Latvian rating until 2399) which is named according to our supporter – Baltic Law Offices Open, but Tournaments C (ELO until 2199 and Latvian rating until 2299) and D will take place during weekend – Thursday-Sunday and will be 4 days long. Due to the introduction of Tournament E, the rating limit of tournament D is increased and will be ELO until 1899 and Latvian rating until 1999. Tournament F is a blitz tournament and will be held Sunday evening. Entries for the ELO tournaments should be sent before 17th of July.
Another improvement is playing schedule in Tournaments A and B. Rounds 4, 7 and 8 will start 2 hours earlier to give you some more time for a nice dinner.
Looking forward to see you in Riga!
