The Christmas generation tournament Nutcracker takes place on December 19-26 in Vladimir Dvorkovich Chess Saloon. This year it will include two Scheveningen matches – Kings vs Princes, and Girls vs Boys.
The event is organized by Russian Chess Federation, Fund of Chess Art Support, and businessman Oleg Skvortsov, who also runs traditional Zurich Chess Challenge tournament.
Lineups
Team Kings: World Vice-Champion Boris Gelfand (Israel), World Vice-Champion Peter Leko (Hungary), European Champion Evgeny Najer (Russia), two-time Russian Champion Alexander Morozevich (Russia).
Team Princes: Russian higher league winner Vladislav Artemiev, Russian Cup winner Ivan Bukavshin, World U20 Champion Mikhail Antipov, and Russian Junior Champion Grigory Oparin.
Formula
The format is a double round Scheveningen, the first half being played with a classical time control, and the second one – with a rapid time control.
Classical part: 120 minutes for 40 moves + 60 minutes for the next 20 moves + 15 minutes with 30 bonus second per move for the rest of the game. Draw offers before the move 40 are restricted. Victory gives 2 points, draw gives 1 point.
Rapid part: 15 minutes with 10 bonus seconds per move. Victory gives 1 point, draw gives 0.5 point.
Schedule
The classical chess part is played on December 20-23, the rapid chess part takes place on December 24-25.
Junior Event
The junior tournament between 16-17-year-old girls and 11-12-year-old boys will be played under the same formula.
Girls: Dinara Dordzhieva (Kalmyk Republic), Margarita Potapova (Crimea), Alexandra Dimitrova (Kostroma Region), Olga Mylnikova (Nizhny Novgorod Region).
Boys: Dmitry Tsoy (Moscow), Kirill Shubin (St. Petersburg), Arseniy Nesterov (Novgorod Region), Yaroslav Remizov (Chelyabinsk Region).