Indian grandmaster Pranesh Munirethinam (2630) provisionally leads the VI El Llobregat Open Chess Tournament (PHOTO: David Llada)
The Indian Pranesh Munirethinam arrived at the Llobregat Open Chess Tournament with the ambition of winning the tournament. His Elo, 2630 FIDE, put his name at the top of the ranking and, having reached Round 5, he is already the provisional leader of the classification.
Since the arrival of Indian players to the Catalan tournaments became usual (more than a decade ago), the name of the portent Pranesh has become common for everyone. His participations in different events have left palpable signs of his brilliance in the game-science, so it was not surprising that he arrived at the VI El Llobregat Open Chess Tournament at its peak of form. In fact, Pranesh has just won the 2025 Chennai Grand Masters in August, getting 6.5 points out of a possible 10.
The Kazakh Kamalidenova is being, for the moment, the revelation of the tournament (PHOTO: David Llada).
Another of the topics we wish to tell you about in this chronicle is the surprise victory of Kazakhstan’s Meruert Kamalidenova (2343) over the legendary Michal Krasenkow (2490), with the white pieces. Kamalidenova, as noted by the reputed official photographer of the tournament, David Llada, has so far a performance of 2600, scoring 4 points out of a possible 5.
As you well know, chess is one of the most egalitarian sports, as men and women compete in the international open without gender restrictions. It is true that, if we look only at the top 100 ranking in the world, the male presence is overwhelming, but the global trend indicates that women’s chess is expanding in quantity and quality. Looking for a healthy and exciting extracurricular activity for your daughter? Think chess: it’s an investment in training that will pay off handsomely.
In this fifth round of the VI El Llobregat Open Chess Tournament, the bell that starts the games was rung by Adinur Adilbek, U8 world blitz champion; Danis Kuandykuly, U12 world runner-up and Mark Smirnov, U14 world runner-up. Remember we told you that the Llobregat Open Chess Tournament is the cradle of the future?
Adinur Adilbek, U8 blitz world champion; Danis Kuandykuly, U12 world runner-up and Mark Smirnov, U14 world runner-up, ringing the traditional bell that starts the games of the Llobregat Open Chess Tournament (PHOTO: David Llada).
In sporting terms, Pranesh has cut short the streak of local grandmaster José Manuel López, which puts him at the top of the provisional standings with 4.5 points, followed by Cristóbal Henríquez… and 10 other players with 4 points! Henríquez’s own draw with the Chinese Zhang Di, who still has no international qualification (but an absolutely formidable chess level), caught our attention. The other surprise of the day, as we told you, was the victory of the Kazakh Kamalidenova over Krasenkow.
https://s1.chess-results.com/tnr1149162.aspx?lan=2&art=1&rd=5&turdet=YES&flag=30&SNode=S0
In Group B, the Catalan Joana Ros leads the provisional classification with 4 points, followed by Daniel Santos, with 3.5 and 7 players with 3 points.
https://s1.chess-results.com/tnr1223188.aspx?lan=2&art=1&rd=4&turdet=YES&flag=30&SNode=S0
Alua Nurman, from Kazakhstan (PHOTOGRAPH: David Llada)
For fans of the history of the sport, we will be unveiling in these chronicles the milestones achieved by the Llobregat Open Chess Tournament in the five previous editions:
- Best open held in Spain in the 2022 and 2023 editions, as certified by the Consejo Superior de Deportes and the FEDA (Spanish Chess Federation).
- We had more than one thousand participants; 50% international graduates.
- An average of 45 countries are represented at each edition.
- EL LLOBREGAT played: Gukesh, Narayanan, Abdusattorov, Mateusz Bartel, Erijaisi, Muraliu Karthikeyan, Puranik, Alvar Alonso, Maxime Lagarde, Kulkarni Bhakti, Mobina Alinasab, Rakshitta Ravi, Savitha Shri Baskar, Privanka Nutakki, Jaime Santos, Sara Khadem, Sabrina Vega, Lucas Van Foreest, Francisco Vallejo, Yangyi Yu, Ivan Cheparinov, Vladimir Fedoseev, Kiriil Alekseenko, Jaime Santos, Ponomariov, Amin Tabatabaei, Matthias Bluebaum, Vahap Sanal, Antoaneta Stefanova, Hans Niemann, Alain Pichot, Fernando Peralta… and so on up to more than a hundred grandmasters.
- The participants, MI and MF, have achieved that we awarded 47 mastery standards.
We would like to thank our sponsors: El Llobregat (magazine), Ajuntament de Sant Boi, Generalitat de Catalunya, Aigües de Barcelona and Diputació de Barcelona, without whose invaluable help an event of this magnitude would not be possible.
You can follow the games (from 4 p.m. onwards) daily on the web:https://www.elllobregat.com
