The Absence of Praggnanandhaa from the Freestyle Chess Grand Slam Tour Following His Recent Triumph at Tata Steel Chess Masters
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Praggnanandhaa Rameshbabu will not participate in the inaugural event of the Freestyle Chess Grand Slam Tour, which is scheduled to take place in Weissenhaus, Germany, this month. This comes despite his remarkable achievement at the Tata Steel Chess Championship in Wijk aan Zee, Netherlands, where he secured the most significant victory of his career to date.
His inability to qualify through the online qualification tournament for Freestyle held last month has resulted in his exclusion from the inaugural event, which will feature ten players selected based on various criteria.
The Freestyle Tour, led by German entrepreneur Jan Henric Buettner and endorsed by world number one and five-time world champion Magnus Carlsen, is poised to commence following a contentious and tumultuous dispute with FIDE. The Tour will utilize the Chess960 variant, also referred to as the Fischer Random Variant, where the arrangement of back-rank pieces is randomized.
Carlsen has advocated for the Fischer Random Variant as a viable alternative to traditional chess, arguing that the advent of chess supercomputers has rendered high-level games overly predictable. Nevertheless, he has encountered conflicts with the governing body FIDE, particularly regarding the rights of Freestyle to establish its own world champion.
Gukesh India's sole flagbearer for first Freestyle round
The sole Indian representative at the inaugural round of the five-legged tour in Germany will be world champion Gukesh D. He secured his position in this event by winning the World Chess Championship final against China's Ding Liren last year.
Although legendary Indian grandmaster Viswanathan Anand was initially slated to compete, he has since withdrawn due to his obligations as deputy president of FIDE. Pragg made history by becoming only the second Indian champion at Tata Steel, achieving this through a blitz tiebreak victory over Gukesh in Wijk aan Zee.
The Freestyle Tour will commence this week on the northern coast of Germany, followed by four additional rounds to complete the tournament's inaugural edition. Subsequent rounds are scheduled to take place in Paris in April, New York City in July, New Delhi in September, and will conclude with a final leg in Cape Town, South Africa, in December.
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