Armenia, A Small Country By Size, But Big For Chess!

In October I decided to take risks and change my habits a little bit to play in Armenia. I had seen that two big tournaments with good prizes were organized there. The first, the Chess mood Open in Tsakhkadzor, and the second, the Yerevan Open. So I proposed to a friend, GM Christophe Sochacki, to go there, both to discover a new country and to try to come back with good prizes.

Indeed, for the professional player that I am, there are several variables to look at before a tournament: the prize pool, the offered conditions, and the global ranking of the players. All these three conditions were gathered even though I knew that Armenian players were underrated. I will try to be as objective as possible in this report, despite the fact that it was one of my worst periods in terms of chess (-50 points and 0 prizes!).

At the first tournament, I, unfortunately, arrived the same day very early in the morning and I had trouble recovering from tiredness. I must admit I'm not so young anymore!

When we arrived late at the airport, a car was waiting to take us an hour's drive away. In general, they really did their best to make us feel good and that everything went well. The playing hall was very nice, at the Marriot Hotel with a beautiful view of the city. In addition, the organization organized visits, always appreciable to clear your head of chess and discover a little more about the place.

The tournament unfortunately went very badly for me. I drew the first round against a 2200, then lost to another 2200 after a mistake in zeitnot. The rest of the tournament only aggravated my loss of rating points. Young Armenians are very easily underrated by 200 to 300 points, you have to have an Olympic form to hold on for the length of the tournament and keep the motivation. Getting out of this infernal spiral is very difficult, especially since with the new FIDE rule, finding the motivation to play a game to win 0.3 is not an easy task.  

Nevertheless, the atmosphere was very good, the Armenians are very friendly and welcoming. We feel that they want to develop chess as much as possible. On the last evening, I even was invited to a typical Armenian dinner surrounded by many players including GM Smbat Lputian, a co-organizer of the tournament.

Then came the second tournament, in Yerevan a day later, with a certain change of atmosphere. Indeed, Yerevan being the capital, there are suddenly more things to do, to see, to visit, to eat... There were also new foreign players, especially Russian and Iranian, but the top Armenian players of the first tournament were not present because they had team competitions abroad.

Objectively, the conditions of this second tournament were superior to the first for a professional player (which does not put down the quality of the first, which was already good!). The hotel was very good, the food also, and above all there was a starting fee (quite appreciable I must recognize for a professional player because it allows you to leave the country having not lost too much money because of the plane ticket, especially when it goes wrong...). The playing hall was large, but not noisy. The only criticism is the road traffic and therefore the accessibility to the playing hall, but this is obviously not the fault of the organizers.

I also really liked the fact that they organized a blitz tournament with a good prize pool, although again, I still managed to win nothing!

For the opening ceremony, the country's Minister of Education was present as well as many other officials. This attendance shows the importance for them of such an event and their involvement.

I had rested a little more, but unfortunately, the tournament was still hard for me. Although I had found a better level than the tournament before, even if far from my usual level, it did not work. I lacked some luck in some games, but above all I had a kind of "burnout" that simply stopped me from calculating lines precisely, making me make poor decisions. When it doesn't want to work, it doesn't!

Generally speaking, in my opinion, young Armenian players are now more dangerous than young Indian players. Indeed, the local players explained to me that they can’t really play outside Armenia. Consequently, they play a lot between them and improved without “the world knowing”. Their ranking is therefore not adjusted compared to other nations, which explains why they are easily 200 points underrated.

Despite the big disappointment in my playing level, I was able to see a new culture that I did not know—and that we do not talk about enough, in my opinion, especially the subject of the current war with Azerbaijan. These tournaments have also given me a lesson I think (I hope!). I must work on the motivation to play lower-rated players and especially better manage my tiredness. There are no easy victories!

But being quite stubborn and reckless (some would say stupid?), and having appreciated the welcome and the conditions, I hope to have the opportunity to come back next year to take my revenge and prove that I am better than my results this year.

I have no doubt that the Armenian nation will very soon impose itself on the chess scene as India has succeeded in imposing itself. I also hope that France and French organizers will follow the example of this chess nation to develop a little more the quality of chess in my country!