The first day of the 51st International Dortmund Chess Days started on Saturday with the first round of the B-Open and A-Open. For the most part, the favourites prevailed, but there were also some initial surprises.
In the A-Open, GM Anton Korobov (photo) and GM Frederik Svane played the games on stage at the Alte Schmiede cultural centre. Korobov had travel problems due to a cancelled flight, and was completely convincing despite the stressful journey. He convincingly outplayed his opponent Levi Malinowsky and won his white game convincingly.
The German national player Svane had already been in Dortmund the evening before and dropped in on the SC Hansa Dortmund chess club. He had a much tougher time against Luk Zimmermann at the Chess Days. Zimmerman had a promising middlegame position in the meantime, but spent too much time so that he lost the thread and the game from move 28 with little time left to think.
At board 3, shooting star GM Christopher Woojin Yoo (17 years young) played against the even younger Jan Morawski (13 years). The 2600 grandmaster from the USA Yoo had an extra pawn, but Morawski's queen + knight tandem was very solid. After 5 hours, Yoo was able to break through the defence and win the game. The tournament favourites thus got through the first round unscathed. However, Fabian Schaller, among others, was able to achieve a success against a strongly rated opponent by securing a draw against GM Yahli Sokolovsky.
There was a wild game at the top board in the B-Open, in which the first seed Bernhard Zoremba from Dortmund club SV Eichlinghofen prevailed in the end.
The first surprise came from Helge Prause on board 6, who outplayed his opponent, who was rated 250 TWZ points higher. The first 20 boards of the two open tournaments will be broadcast live this year so that the games can also be replayed afterwards.
The good atmosphere at the Chess Festival on the first day was particularly positive: bright sunshine, a punctual start to the tournament, a large foyer with opportunities to analyse and relax and a barbecue in the outdoor area awaited visitors to the Chess Days.
Spectators are also welcome over the coming days. Tomorrow, the match between the German grandmasters Elisabeth Pähtz and Dinara Wagner will start on stage. From the second day of the tournament, GM Artur Jussupow will also accompany the top games live in the upper tier of the foyer from 4 pm.
