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Lichess Official Blog

Announcing the 2019 Antichess World Championship

@ProgramFOX Announcements

It's on its way!

The 2019 Antichess World Championship (ACWC) is going to start on Monday 30th September! Last year, FM Vladica Andrejić (@arimakat) took the trophy home after a tense final match against @Ogul1. Will he keep the Antichess World Champion title, or will someone else take the crown? We'll find out soon...

If you're unfamiliar with Antichess, you can read the rules here: https://lichess.org/variant/antichess

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Who's the Boss?

Lichess Team Chess

IM Saveliy Golubov's the Boss

The September edition of the Lichess Titled Arena took place yesterday and we were treated to a whole host of streamers in a whole host of languages! Of course a notable mention is World Champion Magnus Carlsen (@DrNykterstein) who streamed in Norwegian throughout. Joining him in the non-English streams were GM Sergei Zhigalko (@Zhigalko_Sergei - stream), GM Alexander Zubov (@Alexander_Zubov - stream), GM Sergey Shipov (@Crest64 - stream) in Russian, and Sabri Can Onay Yontar (@Satranc Medya) in Turkish , and many more - post your favourite non-English streams in the comments! Joining them were the usual suspects of NM Jerry of Chess-Network fame following Magnus's games, IM Eric Rosen (@EricRosen), and a Fionchetta/Astaneh double-act.

Back to the chess, and it seemed to be business as usual for the World Champion, who was looking to regain his crown after coming second to GM Alireza Firouzja (@alireza2003) last time out. He kicked things off with a win against GM Daniel Naroditsky (@RebeccaHarris) followed by strings of wins over the next hour and a had comfortable lead. However, things were not all smooth sailing and as the halfway point approached, he faltered with 0.5 from 4 games in a row. In fact, GM Naroditsky was his kryptonite, with a tournament score of 6-1 over Carlsen - continually extinguishing the crucial fire. This allowed the rest of the field to stay close and with 30 minutes to go, IM Saveliy Golubov (@Boss1005) was only a few points behind despite scoring "just" 0.5 out of 4 against the leader.

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Announcing the 2019 Atomic World Championship

@Chronatog, @ijh Announcements

The 2019 Atomic World Championship is here!

The 2019 Atomic World Championship is now accepting entrants. The 66 best players as judged by a rating formula plus the winners of two scheduled AWC Qualifier tournaments on August 17, 2019 will be guaranteed entry into the tournament.

The tournament kicks off on Monday, September 9 at 00:00 UTC. The deadline for registration is Sunday, September 1st at 00:00 UTC. If any qualifying matches need to be played, they will be played in the time between September 1 and September 9. Full details about the tournament and rules, including how to enter, can be found at chronatog.com/2019/07/the-2019-atomic-world-championships/.

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Young Blood

Lichess Team Chess

A Tense Titled Arena and a Titillating Twist

Yesterday's Titled Arena got off to a quick start, and to no-one's great surprise Magnus Carlsen (@DrNykterstein) took an early lead, stringing together 13 wins - maybe this is what happens when you forsake 1. g4? Also with a strong start was GM Daniel Naroditsky (@RebeccaHarris), with 11/11. The anticipated meeting of the two leaders was a very surprising King's Gambit - a theme to continue throughout the tournament for this pairing. The second of their pairings lead to the impressive victory including 14. Kxe4. However, their first result was a draw, extinguishing both leaders' fire and giving the rest of the field a chance to catch up. After the first 30 minutes, Carlsen was out in front, followed by Naroditsky and the 16 year old Iranian GM Alireza Firouzja (@alireza2003).

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Lichess Montréal Meetup Recap

Lichess Team Announcements

Chess fun in the sun (and rain)

This past Saturday, Lichess held its second Montréal meetup in the beautiful Mount Royal Park. The sun was shining and the chess fans were out in force, playing some casual blitz, rapid and even bughouse, as well as a 3+2 tournament organised by @Toscani (who also kindly provided most of the boards and clocks). Over the course of the afternoon, around 60 people stopped by, until eventually the forecast rain drove us inside towards the end of the schedule.

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