yAravindh benefits from Fedoseev's slip
Against Saleh Salem, the leader of the GMT-Masters, Vladimir Fedoseev, who was defending with black, found himself on the defensive early on. Salem did not let the advantage slip away and was able to continuously improve his position, forcing Fedoseev to resign after 55 moves. After four games, Salem, last year's winner of the Biel Challenger and nominally the weakest player in the 2025 Masters, has the best record in the classical games with two wins and two draws. It is only due to his weak performance in the rapid games that he is not at the top of the rankings.
Aravindh Chithambaram, who drew against Radoslaw Wojtaszek today, has regained the lead. Although the Pole was able to gain a slight advantage with White, he ultimately settled for a draw by repetition. Frederik Svane and Volodar Murzin faced each other on the third board. Here, too, Svane was able to gain an advantage with White – but was unable to hold on to it. For birthday boy Murzin, who turned 19 on Friday, the resulting draw was certainly not too bad a result.
GMT-Masters: Interim Ranking
| Rank | Name | Games | Classical | Rapid | Blitz | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | GM ARAVINDH Chithambaram | 9 | 8 ½ | 7 | 15 ½ | |
| 2 | GM Vladimir FEDOSEEV | 9 | 7 | 7 | 14 | |
| 3 | GM Saleh SALEM | 9 | 11 | 2 | 13 | |
| 4 | GM Volodar MURZIN | 9 | 6 | 5 | 11 | |
| 5 | GM Radoslaw WOJTASZEK | 9 | 4 ½ | 6 | 10 ½ | |
| 6 | GM Frederik SVANE | 9 | 3 | 3 | 6 |
The Challengers neutralise each other
No movement in the Challengers at the Grandmaster Triathlon in Biel: the three games between Dardha and Theodorou, Hakobyan and Jumabayev, and Navara and Ma Qun all ended in draws today. In other words: A round for the leaders, who have come one step closer to their goal, a missed opportunity for the players in the basement of the table to realise their ambitions after all. Nikolas Theodorou and Aram Hakobyan remain in first and second place respectively, with a comfortable gap between them and the following players, and are very likely to progress to next week's final phase. The question of who will follow them there will be more exciting. Jumabayev, Ma Qun and Navara are within two points of each other in places 3–5, and with a further two points between them, nothing is lost for Dardha, who is bottom of the table – provided he can score some decent points over the next two days. These four will meet tomorrow at the end of the five rounds of classical chess and are therefore well advised to play for victory: Jumabayev with White against Navara, and Ma Qun against Dardha.
GMT-Challengers: Interim Ranking
| Rank | Name | Games | Classical | Rapid | Blitz | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | GM Nikolas THEODOROU | 9 | 11 | 8 | 19 | |
| 2 | GM Aram HAKOBYAN | 9 | 8 ½ | 7 | 15 ½ | |
| 3 | GM Rinat JUMABAYEV | 9 | 7 | 4 | 11 | |
| 4 | GM MA Qun | 9 | 4 ½ | 5 | 9 ½ | |
| 5 | GM David NAVARA | 9 | 7 | 2 | 9 | |
| 6 | GM Daniel DARDHA | 9 | 3 | 4 | 7 |
MTO: An Indian triple leadership
After five of the ten rounds of the Biel Master Tournament MTO, a trio from India now greets as the leaders. The previous leader GM Pranav Anand played to a draw today against GM Mustafa Yilmaz, allowing his compatriots GM Karthikeyan Murali and GM Sasikiran Krishnan to catch up with him with victories in their games today. Half a point behind this trio, ten players are currently on 4 points, including WGM Evgeniya Doluhanova, the best woman in the tournament. The best Swiss player is IM Fabian Bänziger in 15th place, a further half point behind.
Interim Ranking MTO:
🔗 https://s3.chess-results.com/tnrWZ.aspx?lan=1&art=1&rd=5&SNode=S0&tno=1215291
Swiss double leadership in the ATO
After four rounds of the Amateur Tournament ATO, the two Swiss players Simon Kuenzli and Roman Tkhoruk are at the top of the rankings after four wins in a row. They will therefore meet tomorrow and the streak of at least one of them will come to an end.
Interim Ranking ATO:
🔗 https://s1.chess-results.com/tnrWZ.aspx?lan=1&art=1&rd=4&SNode=S0&tno=1215292
FSC: An open race
In today's top match of the freestyle tournament, WGM Evegniya Doluhanova and GM Alexander Raetsky drew. Evangelos Kostopoulos was able to benefit from this, and thanks to a win in his game he now has 4 points, just like the two previous leaders. These three are followed by another trio half a point behind, meaning that the race for the first Biel freestyle victory is still very much wide open with two rounds to go.
Interim Ranking FSC:
🔗 https://s2.chess-results.com/tnrWZ.aspx?lan=0&art=1&rd=5&SNode=S0&tno=1215326
Adewumi wins the SZB U20 Blitz tournament
The Biel Hospital Centre U20 Blitz tournament was held for the first time at the Biel Chess Festival this Friday. FM Tanitoluwa Adewumi came out on top in this elimination tournament. The 15-year-old Nigerian, who learnt to play chess as a refugee child in New York and is on his way to becoming a top player, showed no weaknesses and prevailed against 23 competitors. He was followed on the podium by Anuar Tureshbayev (IRL) and CM Leonardo Vincenti (ITA). The lower-ranked Challengers section was won by CM Honi Arora (IND).
Final Ranking SZB U20 Blitz:
🔗 https://www.bielchessfestival.ch/Tournaments/Open-Tournaments-one-day/Biel-Hospital-Center-Blitz-U20.html
Outlook
On Saturday, the last round of classical chess will be played in the GMT Triathlons – for the time being. This will be followed on Sunday by the blitz games, in which there is a maximum of 10 more points to be won. After that, the results will be calculated and only the top four finishers in the GMT-Masters and GMT-Challengers will qualify for the final phase, in which they will play three more classical games next week.
In tomorrow's round:
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Masters: Aravindh vs. Salem, Fedoseev vs. Svane, Murzin vs. Wojtaszek
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Challengers: Theodorou vs. Hakobyan, Jumabayev vs. Navara, Ma Qun vs. Dardha
Announcement
On Sunday at 12 a.m., there will be another innovation at the Biel Chess Festival: the problem-solving tournament organised by the Swiss Association of Art Chess Friends. For once, this competition does not pit two opponents against each other – instead, the aim is to solve tricky chess problems individually. Registration is possible online or on site up to a quarter of an hour before the start of the tournament.
Beauty Award MTO, ATO
Every day, the best games from MTO and ATO are voted for on social media.
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Winner MTO RD4: No submissions
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Winner ATO RD3: No submissions
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Winner ATO RD2:
Didier Casner ( - ) vs. Friedrich Guenther Klas (1686)
0 – 1
Pictures
Pictures of the Biel International Chess Festival are available under the following link:
🔗https://www.flickr.com/photos/143150736@N02/collections/72157723948559844/
On the evening of each day of the Festival, the OC sends out a media report on the day's events.