Li Chao

Li Chao is the name of:

Magnus Carlsen

Sven Magnus Øen Carlsen (Norwegian: [sʋɛn ˈmɑŋnʉs øːn ˈkɑːɭsn̩]; born 30 November 1990) is a Norwegian chess grandmaster, No. 1 ranked player in the world and reigning World Chess Champion in classical and rapid. His peak rating is 2882, the highest in history.

A chess prodigy, Carlsen became a Grandmaster in 2004, at the age of 13 years, 148 days, making him the third youngest grandmaster in history. On 1 January 2010, at the age of 19 years, 32 days, he became the youngest chess player in history to be ranked world No. 1. In November 2013, Carlsen defeated Viswanathan Anand in the World Chess Championship 2013, thus becoming the new world chess champion. On the May 2014 FIDE rating list, Carlsen reached his top Elo rating of 2882, the highest in history. He successfully defended his title in November 2014, once again defeating Viswanathan Anand. In 2015, he won the inaugural Grand Chess Tour, a series of three supertournaments featuring the 10 best chess grandmasters in the world.

Qatar Masters

The Commercial Bank Qatar Masters is a golf tournament held at the Doha Golf Club in Doha, Qatar. The tournament was established in 1998, and is one of three European Tour golf tournaments which are staged in the countries of the Persian Gulf, the others being the Abu Dhabi HSBC Golf Championship and the Omega Dubai Desert Classic. From 2005 to 2007 the tournament was co-sanctioned by the Asian Tour.

The tournament had modest fields in its early years. In 2005, Ernie Els, one of the biggest stars in golf, was the only player in the world top 50 to take part, for which he acknowledged receiving a large appearance fee. After finishing the first round in a tie for 81st place, he surged through the field over the next three days to win the tournament. By 2007, the tournament had one of the strongest fields on the European Tour, with 48 world ranking points for the winner. In 2015, the prize fund was US$2.5 million.

The tournament holds the European Tour record for the fewest number of shots between the halfway leaders (−6) and the cut mark (−1) – five shots in 2004.

Tal Memorial

The Tal Memorial is a chess tournament played in Moscow each year since 2006, to honour the memory of the former World Champion Mikhail Tal (1936–1992).

It is usually played in the first half of November, with many of the world's strongest players competing. The first three editions all reached Category XX (overall Elo average 2735).

As Mikhail Tal is widely considered to be one of the greatest attacking players of all time, it is common (but in no way required) for this event's competitors to commemorate the event with unusually sharp attacking play.

Tournament details

2009

The 2009 competition was held from 5 to 14 November, with 10 of the 13 highest rated players participating: Viswanathan Anand, then the World Champion, Levon Aronian, Vladimir Kramnik, former world champion, Magnus Carlsen, the world champion of 2013, Peter Leko, Vassily Ivanchuk, Boris Gelfand, Alexander Morozevich, Ruslan Ponomariov and Peter Svidler. The Elo average was 2761 (Cat. XXI), which was the highest ever reached by the tournament. It was won solidly by Vladimir Kramnik with a +3 score, i.e. three wins and six draws. Ivanchuk and Carlsen shared second place with +2.

Vladimir Kramnik

Vladimir Borisovich Kramnik (Russian: Влади́мир Бори́сович Кра́мник; born 25 June 1975) is a Russian chess Grandmaster. He was the Classical World Chess Champion from 2000 to 2006, and the undisputed World Chess Champion from 2006 to 2007. He has won three team gold medals and three individual medals at Chess Olympiads.

In October 2000, he defeated Garry Kasparov in a match played in London, and became the Classical World Chess Champion. In late 2004, Kramnik successfully defended his title against challenger Péter Lékó in a drawn match played in Brissago, Switzerland. In October 2006, Kramnik, the Classical World Champion, defeated reigning FIDE World Champion Veselin Topalov in a unification match, the World Chess Championship 2006. As a result, Kramnik became the first undisputed World Champion, holding both the FIDE and Classical titles, since Kasparov split from FIDE in 1993. In 2007, Kramnik lost the title to Viswanathan Anand, who won the World Chess Championship 2007 tournament ahead of Kramnik. He challenged Anand at the World Chess Championship 2008 to regain his title, but lost.