Chess digest, Nov. 4–7: four junior world titles in Al Ain, Ding out in Shaoxing, Budapest opens a Candidates route | Chess World Digest

Four under-20 world titles in Al Ain, Yu Yangyi's Chinese Rapid win after Ding Liren's quarterfinal exit, and a Budapest series that now carries two places in the 2028 Candidates.

View the full story on Neodrop →

Coverage window: after 10:45 Sofia time on November 4 through 10:45 on November 7, 2026.

A week of under-20 chess in Al Ain produced four world champions, all of them different players. The Chinese Rapid Championship in Shaoxing went to Yu Yangyi after Ding Liren and Wang Hao left in the quarterfinals. Budapest opens the Total Chess World Championship Tour pilot on Tuesday, and that series now carries two places in the 2028 Candidates. In Vrnjačka Banja, five players share the lead in the 50+ open three rounds into the World Senior Championships.

Al Ain hands out four under-20 world titles

The World Junior Rapid and Blitz Championships for players under 20 ran from November 1 to 7 at the Danat Al Ain Resort in the United Arab Emirates, organised by the Al Ain Chess & Mind Games Club with the UAE federation. 1

FIDE put the field at 185 players from 40 countries across open and girls' sections. 2

The rapid championship was nine rounds from November 2 to 4 at 15 minutes plus 10 seconds. Khumoyun Begmuratov of Uzbekistan won it unbeaten on 7½/9, with six wins and three draws. 2

Pranav V of India took silver on 7 and Raad Samadov of Azerbaijan bronze, also on 7, split by tiebreak. 2

Eline Roebers of the Netherlands won the girls' rapid on 7/9. Umida Omonova of Uzbekistan took silver and Marina Kuznetsova, playing under the FIDE flag, bronze, both on 6½. 2

The blitz followed on November 5 and 6 over 13 rounds at 3 minutes plus 2 seconds. Pranav won it with 10½/13, a day after his rapid silver. 3

Eldiyar Orozbaev of Kyrgyzstan, Robert Piliposyan of Armenia and Mazen Fandi of Syria finished level on 9½ behind him. Begmuratov, the rapid champion, came eighth on 9. 3

Valeria Kleymenova, also under the FIDE flag, won the girls' blitz on 10/13. Afruza Khamdamova of Uzbekistan and Veronika Iudina finished on 9½; Roebers was eighth on 8. 4

Title	Champion	Score	Runner-up
Open rapid	Khumoyun Begmuratov (UZB)	7½/9	Pranav V (IND), 7 2
Girls rapid	Eline Roebers (NED)	7/9	Umida Omonova (UZB), 6½ 2
Open blitz	Pranav V (IND)	10½/13	Eldiyar Orozbaev (KGZ), 9½ 3
Girls blitz	Valeria Kleymenova (FID)	10/13	Afruza Khamdamova (UZB), 9½ 4

Medallists from the four under-20 events at the closing ceremony in Al Ain, with Khumoyun Begmuratov holding the open rapid trophy at centre. Photo: official championship website.

Shaoxing: Yu Yangyi wins after Ding and Wang Hao go out

The fifth Chinese Rapid Championship ran in Shaoxing from November 2 to 6: 24 players in a knockout, four rapid games per match at 15 minutes plus 10 seconds, then blitz tiebreaks and an Armageddon game. The prize fund was ¥371,000, about $55,500. 5

All eight seeds reached the round of 16, and Ding, Yu Yangyi and Wang Hao each won inside three games. Song Yuxin, the only woman in the main draw, lost 2½–½ to Ding. 6

The quarterfinals removed three of the four highest-rated players. Xiao Tong beat Ding after four drawn rapid games and a drawn first blitz game; Ding held a clear advantage with black in the second blitz game and let it slip with both players short of time. 6

Wang Hao lost 2½–1½ to Xu Xiangyu, and Bu Xiangzhi went out by the same score to Lu Shanglei. Yu Yangyi, the only favourite left, beat Bai Jinshi 2½–1½. 6

Yu then beat Xu Xiangyu 3–0 in the semifinal, and Xiao beat Lu Shanglei 3½–2½. 5

The final went the full seven games. Yu beat Xiao 4–3, with the last game an Armageddon decider, and took ¥160,000, about $23,900; Xiao took ¥80,000. Lu Shanglei beat Xu Xiangyu 4–2 for third. 5

Song Yuxin, the only woman to reach the main draw in Shaoxing, lost to Ding Liren in the round of 16. Photo: Chinese Chess Association, via ChessBase.

Budapest starts Tuesday, and the series buys two Candidates places

Total Chess is FIDE's name for a tournament that mixes three time controls. The pilot runs in Budapest from November 10 to 20 at the Anantara New York Palace Hotel, with 24 players, Magnus Carlsen and Vincent Keymer among them. 7

An opening blitz tournament settles the tiebreaks, then four groups of six play off, with the four group winners into semifinals and a final. 8

A knockout match is one fast classic game at 45 minutes plus 30 seconds, two rapid games at 15+10 and four blitz games at 3+2. Wins count 8, 4 and 2 points respectively, so a match carries 24 points. 8

The series is three tournaments, with tour points awarded by finishing position; the top four overall meet in a Grand Final, whose winner is crowned FIDE World Combined Champion. 8

The top two in the final tour standings qualify for the 2028 Candidates, a route the FIDE Council approved in July. 9

That cycle's eight places now come two each from the 2027 Grand Swiss, the 2027 World Cup, the two-year FIDE Circuit and this tour. The rating place has been dropped, and World Cup places were cut from three to two. 9

ChessBase noted that the format resembles the "triathlon" Biel has run for years, and that two names, Total Chess and Combined, now describe one title. 8

Vrnjačka Banja: four senior titles, five players on 3/3

The World Senior Championships opened on November 3 in Vrnjačka Banja, Serbia, and run to November 14 at the Hotel Zepter. 10

385 players from 65 federations, among them 44 grandmasters and eight women grandmasters, contest four titles: open and women's, 50+ and 65+. 10

Each section is an 11-round Swiss at 90 minutes for 40 moves, then 30 minutes, with a 30-second increment from move one. Rounds start at 15:00 local time and the last round an hour earlier, with a rest day on Sunday, November 8. 10

The prize fund is €50,000, including prizes for players aged 75 and over. The field includes Pia Cramling, Kiril Georgiev, Zurab Sturua and former women's world champion Nona Gaprindashvili. 10

After three rounds five players lead the 50+ open on 3/3: Petr Kostenko, Mikheil Kekelidze, Pavel Kotsur, Suat Atalik and Kiril Georgiev. Murtas Kazhgaleyev, the top seed at 2532, is on 2½. 10

In the women's 50+, Inga Khurtsilava leads on 3/3, with Cramling half a point back. Sturua leads the 65+ open on 3 and Galina Strutinskaia the women's 65+, also on 3. 10

Round three at the Hotel Zepter, where four senior sections play one round a day until November 14. Photo: official championship website, via ChessBase.

Gmund: Gopal alone at the top with two rounds left

The 29th Bavarian Championship in Gmund am Tegernsee has 548 players and runs nine rounds from October 31 to November 8. 11

G.N. Gopal of India leads on 5½/6, with a performance rating of 2734. He is 37, was Kerala's first grandmaster in 2007 and finished fourth at Tegernsee in 2023. 11

His fifth win came against 15-year-old Hussain Besou, who had joined the leading group a day earlier by beating Peter Acs. The defeat ended Besou's run of 15 tournament games without a loss and reduced his chances of a GM norm here. 11

Twelve players sit half a point behind, among them top seed Frederik Svane, who beat Klaudia Kulon, plus Krishnan Sasikiran, Kacper Piorun and Raja Rithvik. Third seed Alexander Donchenko is on 4½ after a draw with Gerlef Meins. 11

G.N. Gopal, left, against Hussain Besou in round six; the win put Gopal alone on 5½/6. Photo: Sandra Schmidt, via ChessBase.

Also this window

• FIDE Enterprises. On November 5 FIDE named Emil Sutovsky chief executive of FIDE Enterprises, a Swiss company it wholly owns, alongside his role as chief executive adviser to president Timur Turlov. 12 The same day it added Håkan Jalling as representative for Olympic Games inclusion, Darcy Lima for institutional dialogue and Alexander Martynov as senior adviser to the president. 13
• Esports World Cup 2027. Chess returns to the Riyadh event in July and August 2027. Carlsen is the only player guaranteed a place, as defending champion, and 12 places come through the Champions Chess Tour leaderboard, which runs to May 25. 14 Automatic qualification for Speed Chess Championship and Chess.com Open top-three finishers has been removed; those events now feed points into the leaderboard. 14
• Freestyle Friday, November 6. Nodirbek Yakubboev won on 9½, clear of Ian Nepomniachtchi's 9, for his second title after April 24; Nils Grandelius and Artin Ashraf filled the top four on 8. 15 Oleksandr Bortnyk leads the championship standings on 69 with four tournaments left, ahead of Pranav V on 65 and Yakubboev on 64. 15
• 3 0 Thursday, November 5. Hikaru Nakamura won the first tournament on 10/11, beating Carlsen in round eight after Carlsen had won six straight. Parham Maghsoodloo took the second on 9½ and Sina Movahed the third on 9. 16
• Titled Tuesday, November 3. Alireza Firouzja won on 10/11, and the eight Speed Chess Championship XI places that come through the Titled Tuesday standings went to Nakamura, Firouzja, Movahed, Hans Niemann, Dmitry Andreikin, Wesley So, Denis Lazavik and Vladislav Artemiev. 17
• Geneva commentary. Peter Leko and Peter Svidler will commentate the 14-game Gukesh Dommaraju–Javokhir Sindarov match, which starts on November 24 in Cologny. 18

What to watch next

Date (Europe/Sofia)	Event and location	Checkpoint
November 7	The 100-0 Project, online	Josh Smith, an amateur rated in the 1800s, plays Daniil Dubov 100 games of 1+0 bullet; Dubov is guaranteed $10,000 and gets another $10,000 only by winning all 100. 19
November 7	Bullet Brawl, online	The first edition since Firouzja ended Nakamura's run of seven straight wins.
November 7–8	Bavarian Championship, Gmund am Tegernsee	The last two rounds; Gopal leads by half a point. 11
November 9–14	World Senior Championship, Vrnjačka Banja	Rounds six to eleven after Sunday's rest day; the four titles are decided on November 14. 10
November 10–20	Total Chess World Championship Tour pilot, Budapest	24 players; the blitz tournament opens it and sets the tiebreaks, then four groups of six. 8
November 22 – December 13	World Championship match, Cologny, Geneva	Gukesh Dommaraju defends against Sindarov; the first classical game is November 24. 20
November 24 – December 7	XTX London Chess Classic, London	Nodirbek Abdusattorov defends the Masters title he won in 2025. 21
December 26–30	World Rapid and Blitz Championships, Istanbul	Four titles; Carlsen defends both open championships. 22
December 27	FIDE Extraordinary General Assembly, online	Delegates meet at 14:30 CET; the agenda is due by November 27. 23

References

1FIDE: Continental Chess Presidents Inaugurate World Junior Rapid & Blitz Championships in Al Ain

2FIDE: World Junior Rapid Championship 2026 — Begmuratov and Roebers capture titles

3Chess-Results: World Junior Blitz Championship U20 — Open, final ranking

4Chess-Results: World Junior Blitz Championship U20 — Girls, final ranking

5Liquipedia: 5th Chinese Chess Rapid Tournament 2026

6ChessBase: Chinese Rapid Championship — Ding Liren and Wang Hao exit in quarterfinals

7ChessBase: Total Chess World Championship Tour announces six more stars for pilot

8ChessBase: Who will become the FIDE World Combined Champion?

9FIDE: FIDE Council approves qualification paths for 2028 Candidates Tournaments

10ChessBase: World Senior Championships underway in Serbia

11ChessBase: Bavarian Championship — Gopal emerges as sole leader

12FIDE: FIDE appoints Emil Sutovsky CEO of FIDE Enterprises

13FIDE: FIDE strengthens its presidential representation and advisory team

14Chess.com: Chess Returns To Esports World Cup In 2027 As Carlsen Targets Third Title

15Chess.com: Yakubboev Continues Freestyle Friday Championship Push

16Chess.com: Nakamura, Maghsoodloo, Movahed Take 3 0 Thursday Titles

17Chess.com: Firouzja Wins Titled Tuesday As Speed Chess Championship Qualifiers Confirmed

18ChessBase: Peter Leko and Peter Svidler to commentate on the Gukesh v. Sindarov Geneva match

19Chess.com: Dubov Accepts $20,000 100-Game Challenge From 'Bullet Grandpa'\

20ChessBase: Salesforce FIDE World Championship Match 2026\

21ChessBase: Stellar line-up for 2026 XTX London Chess Classic\

22Chess.com: Istanbul To Host 2026 World Rapid & Blitz Championships\

23FIDE: Invitation — FIDE Extraordinary General Assembly 2026\

How to return to the Generative State mid-game

So the flow is gone. You lost it somewhere around move 25.

What do you do?

Most players push harder. They stare at the board more intensely, calculate deeper, try to force the answer.

It rarely works.

Here is what does:

Stop. Just for a moment.

- Take one conscious breath — slow, deep, complete
- Feel the chair beneath you and your feet on the floor
- Look away from the board for three seconds
- Ask yourself one simple question: "What is actually happening in this position?"

Not "what should I do" — that is anxiety talking.
Not "what did I miss" — that is the past.

Just: "What is actually here, right now?"

That question brings you back to the present. And the present is where your best chess lives.

Try it next game. 👇

Chess digest, Oct. 31–Nov. 4: Lazavik takes Almaty, Firouzja ends Nakamura's streak, Sindarov enters the title match 72 points clear | Chess World Digest

Denis Lazavik wins Almaty unbeaten while 14-year-old Mark Smirnov earns a first GM norm, Alireza Firouzja ends Hikaru Nakamura's Bullet Brawl run, and Javokhir Sindarov goes into the world title match 72 rating points and 22 places clear of Gukesh Dommaraju.

View the full story on Neodrop →

Coverage window: after 10:45 Sofia time on October 31 through 10:45 on November 4, 2026.

Denis Lazavik won the KazChess Masters in Almaty without losing a game, and a 14-year-old left the same tournament with his first GM norm. Alireza Firouzja ended Hikaru Nakamura's Bullet Brawl run. The November rating list put Javokhir Sindarov 72 points and 22 places above the man he plays for the world title in three weeks. Chess.com also named the field for the Speed Chess Championship.

Lazavik wins Almaty, Smirnov earns his first GM norm

The KazChess Masters ran October 26 to November 3 in Almaty: ten players, nine rounds, 90 minutes for 40 moves plus 30, a 30-second increment from move one and no draw offers before move 30. 1

Five Kazakhs faced five grandmasters from abroad. The field averaged 2573 and an age of 21. 2

Daniil Dubov led with three rounds to play, on 4½/6, half a point clear of Denis Lazavik and Shamsiddin Vokhidov. 1

Round seven was where the lead first wobbled. Dubov reached a clearly better endgame against Sauat Nurgaliyev and could not convert it; Lazavik beat Alua Nurman with black to draw level on 5/7. 3

A day later Lazavik took the lead outright, beating Nurgaliyev with white while Dubov drew with Aram Hakobyan. Vokhidov stayed in the race by beating Nurman. 3

All three frontrunners had black in Tuesday's last round. Dubov drew Mahammad Muradli in 31 moves. Vokhidov lost to Nurgaliyev, the 16-year-old Kazakh IM who had come into the round without a win. 3

Lazavik needed only a draw. He held Hakobyan's pressure in a minor-piece endgame, and the two agreed a draw after 58 moves. 3

Lazavik is 19 and Belarusian, and he finished on 6½/9 with four wins and five draws. His previous classical title was the 2025 Abu Dhabi Masters; this year he reached the final of the Esports World Cup, where he lost to Magnus Carlsen. 3

Denis Lazavik with the trophy from the 2025 Abu Dhabi Masters, the classical tournament he won before Almaty. Photo: Aditya Sur Roy / ChessBase India, via ChessBase.

Mark Smirnov was the youngest and lowest-rated player in the field, at 14 and 2451. He lost his first-round game to Dubov, then scored four wins and three draws in his remaining eight games, losing only once more, to Vokhidov. 3

His wins over Edgar Mamedov in round seven and Denis Makhnev in round nine both came with black. The 5½/9 finish and a 2666 performance rating gave him his first GM norm, the first of the three the grandmaster title requires. 3

Smirnov won the world under-12 title in 2024. 3

Final standings after nine rounds. Players level on score are grouped, and ordered within a group by rating. 2

Player	Fed	Rating	Score
Denis Lazavik	BLR	2636	6½
Daniil Dubov	FID	2654	6
Shamsiddin Vokhidov	UZB	2649	5½
Mark Smirnov	KAZ	2451	5½
Aram Hakobyan	ARM	2638	4½
Denis Makhnev	KAZ	2581	4½
Edgar Mamedov	KAZ	2474	4½
Mahammad Muradli	AZE	2662	4
Sauat Nurgaliyev	KAZ	2526	3
Alua Nurman	KAZ	2460	1

Firouzja ends Nakamura's Bullet Brawl run

Bullet Brawl on October 31 drew 232 players, seven of them super-grandmasters. Carlsen was among them, logging in from Spain. 4

Nakamura won 14 of his first 15 games, beating Firouzja twice in that stretch, and led by 16 points with a quarter of the arena left. 4

Then he queued for a bullet game outside the arena by mistake and did not notice until the game was over. His lead was down to 13 points. 4

Firouzja scored 13.5/15 over that last quarter. He beat Nakamura in their final meeting, declining the usual 2...d5 in the Caro-Kann for 2...d6!? and an Old Indian set-up. 4

Firouzja finished on 170 points, four clear of Nakamura's 166. Ediz Gurel took third on 159 and Matthias Bluebaum fourth on 136; Melika Mohammadi won the best women's prize. 4

The prize money went $400 to Firouzja, $250 to Nakamura, $150 to Gurel and $100 each to Bluebaum and Mohammadi. 4

Nakamura had won the seven previous editions and 72 Bullet Brawls in all, 23 of them this year. He was chasing a 73rd here. 4

The win is Firouzja's third, which puts him level ninth on the event's all-time list. The next edition is Saturday, November 7. 4

Sindarov goes into the title match 72 points and 22 places clear

The November rating list is the last official measurement before the world title match in Cologny, outside Geneva, which begins on November 22 with the first classical game two days later. 5

Javokhir Sindarov is fourth in the world at 2782. Gukesh Dommaraju, the defending champion, is 26th at 2710. 5

Title matches have carried a 72-point gap before. Carlsen went into his matches against Nepomniachtchi, Karjakin and Anand with leads of 74, 81 and 95 points. 5

The ranking gap is new. No title match since the championship was unified in 2006 has been played across 22 places; the previous widest were 18 places in 2024, when Gukesh played Ding Liren, and 16 in 2012. 5

Gukesh is the lowest-ranked player to reach one of these matches in that period. The lower-rated player has won only twice: Anand against Veselin Topalov in 2010 and Ding against Nepomniachtchi in 2023. 5

Big leads have still left matches open. Carlsen's 81 points on Karjakin in 2016 ended in a playoff, and Gukesh needed the last classical game to beat Ding two years ago. 5

Behind them, Nihal Sarin climbed 11 points to 2720 and from 30th to 19th, a career best. His 5/6 and board-two gold at the European Club Cup in Budva came with a 2859 performance. 5

Hans Niemann dropped 20 points to 2697 and from 22nd to 32nd, out of the 2700s, after losing four games and winning one at the U.S. Championship. 5

Yagiz Kaan Erdogmus lost 12 points to 2719 and sits 21st, having been 15th live during the Club Cup. 5

The women's top ten stood unchanged. Alice Lee rose to 14th on 2474 and took over as the American number one; Carissa Yip fell 31 points to 2453 and 22nd. Rachael Li, the new U.S. champion, gained 50 points to 2430 and 31st, and Bodhana Sivanandan climbed to 39th on 2414. 5

In the FIDE Circuit, which decides two places in the next Candidates, Wesley So's U.S. title earned 17.76 points and left him within a couple of points of Sindarov's lead. Caruana moved up to third. 5

Speed Chess Championship XI names its field

Chess.com announced the eleventh Speed Chess Championship on November 3: 16 players, a $250,000 prize fund, and up to 150 Champions Chess Tour leaderboard points. 6

The season starts this month and ends with a live final at 180 Studios in London on February 5 to 7, 2027. 6

Carlsen and Nakamura have won five titles each and both return. The only players besides Carlsen to have beaten Nakamura in a Speed Chess match, Firouzja and Denis Lazavik, are in the field too. 6

Sindarov makes his debut. Praggnanandhaa, Nihal Sarin, Yagiz Erdogmus, Caruana, So, Abdusattorov, Niemann, Dmitry Andreikin, Sina Movahed and Vladislav Artemiev fill out the line-up. 6

Each match is a knockout tie split into two blitz sections and one bullet section. The winner takes 150 Champions Chess Tour points toward one of the 12 Esports World Cup places that come through the tour. 6

Chess.com's key art for Speed Chess Championship XI, which runs to the live finals in London on February 5-7, 2027. Image: Chess.com.

Budapest names its broadcast team, and Carlsen prepares with Abdusattorov

The Total Chess World Championship Tour pilot runs November 10 to 20 at the Anantara New York Palace Budapest Hotel, with 24 players and Carlsen among them. 7

A blitz Swiss sets the tiebreak rankings, a fast classical group stage follows at 45 minutes plus a 30-second increment, and knockout matches then combine all three formats, with wins in the longer games weighing more. 8

FIDE named the broadcast team on November 3. Anna Rudolf, Fiona Steil-Antoni, David Howell and Jovanka Houska will present and commentate, with Rudolf also reporting from the venue. 7

Levy Rozman, better known as GothamChess, will front a daily highlights show with player interviews, analysis and guests. 7

Carlsen spent the days before Budapest at his holiday home in Spain with Nodirbek Abdusattorov, David Howell and his longtime coach Peter Heine Nielsen. A post on his social accounts on October 31 showed the four of them and a video of the two top-ten players at blitz. 8

"Someone brought a chess board into this house," the caption read. 8

Rivals inside the top five rarely prepare together, and the two could meet in Budapest. Abdusattorov won the London Chess Classic in December, then Tata Steel and the Prague Masters this year. 8

Also this window

• English Championship, Peterborough, October 24 to November 1. Gawain Maroroa Jones won the open unbeaten, with six wins and three draws for 7½/9, a point clear of Michael Adams, who was also unbeaten. It was his fourth English title, after first winning it jointly with Stephen Gordon in 2012; Adams has seven since 2007. Elmira Mirzoeva took the women's event on 7½/9, her second title after 2024, with Anusha Subramanian second on 6½. Both open and women's winners also won the blitz championship on the final day. 9
• World Senior Championship, Vrnjačka Banja, from November 3. The championship has 385 players from 65 federations, among them 44 grandmasters and 8 women grandmasters. Four nine-round classical Swiss events run in the 50+ and 65+ age groups, open and women's, for a €50,000 prize fund and four titles in 11 days. 10
• Bavarian Championship, Gmund am Tegernsee. The 548-player field has 50 players on 2/2 after two rounds, with top seed Frederik Svane and third seed Alexander Donchenko among them. Three top-ten seeds were held to draws by lower-rated opponents: Jaime Santos, Leonardo Costa and Peter Acs. 11

What to watch next

Date (Europe/Sofia)	Event and location	Checkpoint
November 7	Bullet Brawl, online	The first edition since Firouzja ended Nakamura's run of seven straight wins.
November 10–20	Total Chess World Championship Tour pilot, Budapest	24 players; the blitz Swiss opens the event and sets the tiebreaks. 7
November 16 – February 7	Speed Chess Championship XI	The season opens; the live finals are in London, February 5-7. 6
November 22 – December 13	World Championship match, Cologny, Geneva	Gukesh Dommaraju defends against Sindarov; the first classical game is November 24. 12
November 24 – December 7	XTX Markets London Chess Classic, London	Nodirbek Abdusattorov defends the Masters title he won in 2025. 13
December 26–30	World Rapid and Blitz Championships, Istanbul	Four titles; Carlsen defends both open championships. 14
December 27	FIDE Extraordinary General Assembly, online	Delegates meet at 14:30 CET; the agenda is due by November 27. 15

References

1ChessBase: KazChess Masters — Dubov moves ahead with consecutive wins

2Chess-Results: KazChess Masters Almaty 2026, pairings and results

3ChessBase: KazChess Masters — Lazavik takes title, Smirnov earns GM norm

4Chess.com: Firouzja Snaps Nakamura's Streak, Outscores Six Super-GMs

5Chess.com: November FIDE Rating List — Nihal Enters Top 20, Sindarov Leads Gukesh By 72 Points

6Chess.com: Speed Chess Championship XI Announced — Prize Fund, Dates

7FIDE: Total Chess unveils star-studded broadcast team and new highlight show for Budapest Pilot

8Chess.com: Carlsen Trains With Abdusattorov In Spain Ahead Of Total Chess Debut

9ChessBase: Gawain Maroroa Jones wins English Championship 2026

10FIDE: FIDE World Senior Chess Championship 2026 begins in Vrnjačka Banja, Serbia

11ChessBase: Bavarian Championship — Few surprises in the opening rounds at Tegernsee

12ChessBase: Salesforce FIDE World Championship Match 2026\

13ChessBase: Stellar line-up for 2026 XTX London Chess Classic\

14Chess.com: Istanbul To Host 2026 World Rapid & Blitz Championships\

15FIDE: Invitation — FIDE Extraordinary General Assembly 2026\