World Rapid Chess Championship
During the World Active Chess Championship the following year, time controls were set at 30 minutes per player per game.
Notable participants included:[5] The event was won by Anatoly Karpov, who edged out GM Viktor Gavrikov on tiebreak points after their 1st-place playoff ended in a 5–5 tie.
The political controversy surrounding the event and the naming of a separate "active chess champion" led to the parallel rapid championship being dropped for future years.
The tournament consisted of a round-robin stage (2 groups of eight players each), followed by a set of knockout matches to determine the winner.
With the Melody Amber rapid chess tournament being held concurrently, the world's top players were split between attending both events.
[8] In group A, Kasparov's domination of his opponents was on display: he scored 5½/7 to finish in clear 1st place, 1½ points ahead of the rest of the field.
However, the position of Kasparov's king gave him a slight advantage, and with only two seconds left on his clock, Bareev could not find the drawing line and was forced to resign.
Hosted by the Caisse Centrale d'Activités Sociales des Electriciens et Gaziers de France (CCAS) on the Mediterranean coast, the 2003 tournament included eleven of the world's 12 top-ranked players along with five wild-cards.
[12] Included in the field were the reigning FIDE and Classical world chess champions, Ruslan Ponomariov and Vladimir Kramnik.
[13] In group B, Peter Svidler finished clear of the field with 5/7 to secure a spot in the quarterfinals; joining him were Alexander Grischuk, Viswanathan Anand, and Judit Polgar.
Na3), Anand was able to use his two knights to infiltrate Kramnik's defence, eventually forcing a queen sac to win the game and the match.
[15] On May 31, 2012, FIDE announced the inaugural World Rapid & Blitz Championships, set to take place in Astana, Kazakhstan from July 1 to 11.
A tie-break match for the gold and silver medals was held between Nodirbek Abdusattorov and Ian Nepomniachtchi due to having the highest Buchholz (Cut 1) scores of the four players.
[36][37][38] Indian grandmaster Viswanathan Anand holds the record for most championship wins, having won the event 11 times in 15 years.
With the addition of Karpov to the field in 1999, the format was temporarily changed to a pure round-robin, with the 1st-place finisher winning the championship.
The following year the field was expanded further to include all ten of the top 10-rated Grandmasters in the world, and was dubbed a Category 21 tournament with an average Elo rating of 2767.
In 2007, with Anand still the rapid champion after six successful title defenses, the event reverted to a double-round robin tournament, with the top two finishers in the semi-finals advancing to the finals.
At stake was a share of the €500,000 prize fund, the largest for any chess event hosted in the Czech Republic, and the EuroTel Trophy.
[43][44] The surprise of the tournament was Anatoly Karpov, who put together an impressive run with wins against Short, Kramnik, Morozevich, and Shirov to reach the finals.
Despite the ACP Cup's status as a non-FIDE event, FIDE President Kirsan Ilyumzhinov was present at the inaugural edition of the tournament and took part in the opening ceremony.
