Tsolakidou, Zhu Jiner Grab Wins As Nicosia Women's Grand Prix Begins

IM Stavroula Tsolakidou pounced on a mistake by GM Elisabeth Paehtz to pick up a full point as the 2025 Nicosia FIDE Women's Grand Prix began. She was joined in the early lead by GM Zhu Jiner, who replaces her Chinese compatriot GM Lei Tingjie in the series. Zhu defeated IM Olga Badelka, who herself is a late replacement for WGM Regina Theissl Pokorna.

Round two starts on Sunday, March 16, at 9 a.m. ET / 15:00 CET / 6:30 p.m. IST.

The Nicosia leg of the FIDE Women's Grand Prix is the fourth of six taking place in 2024 and 2025.

FIDE Women's Grand Prix 2024-5 Schedule

Each player competes in three legs, where they battle for a maximum 130 points and €18,000 ($18,900). The points are combined, with the top two players at the end of the series qualifying for the 2026 FIDE Women's Candidates Tournament that will select the next world championship challenger.  

FIDE Women's Grand Prix 2024-5 Standings Before Nicosia

IM Alina Kashlinskaya won the first leg in Tbilisi, but did it as a wildcard and is currently not expected to play in more legs of the series.

Goryachkina then took sole first place in Shymkent, before tying for first place in Monaco with IM Batkhuyag Munguntuul and GM Koneru Humpy. Goryachkina will be playing her third and final Grand Prix in Cyprus and knows that another win will guarantee her a spot in the Candidates. Tsolakidou is also playing her final event and would gain chances of finishing in the overall top two with a victory.

Now let's get to the action from round one.

Nicosia FIDE Women's Grand Prix Round 1 Results

Those results mean that Tsolakidou and Zhu took the very early lead.

Nicosia FIDE Women's Grand Prix Standings After Round 1

As always in the first round of a Grand Prix, players from the same country were paired against each other. In this case that also meant two players from the same family, GMs Anna and Mariya Muzychuk. Their clash took a bit longer than might have been expected, but it finished in the same way all of their clashes in tournaments that aren't knockouts have finished—as a draw.

IM Divya Deshmukh vs. GM Harika Dronavalli was the other clash of players from the same country, but while their Berlin never sparked into life, you couldn't accuse the Indian stars of a lack of fighting spirit—they played the longest game of the day.

The other draw was the heavyweight clash between Grand Prix leader Goryachkina and GM Nana Dzagnidze. While the early skirmishes in the game were sharp, it ended up in a drawish four-rook endgame.  

There were two decisive games.

Stavroula Tsolakidou 1-0 Elisabeth Paehtz

The Greek number-one admitted after the game that her time management had been shaky, since she spent almost 27 minutes on her 14th move.

That left her down to two minutes to her opponent's 15 when a critical situation arose, but Tsolakidou noted, "I feel like I got a bit lucky in the end!" Paehtz went after White's c2-pawn, but 39.Bh6! (Tsolakidou: "She probably missed that!") was the coldest of cold showers. Suddenly Black was lost.

Tsolakidou was matched only by Zhu.

Zhu Jiner 1-0 Olga Badelka

Women's world number-four Lei Tingjie was supposed to play the last three Grand Prix events, but when she pulled out, Zhu got that chance instead.

The 22-year-old is the Chinese number-five, which doesn't sound that impressive until you realize she's also the world number-seven on the live rating list after her round-one win. "I think it’s a very nice opportunity to play here," she said after the game.

Zhu took on another 22-year-old late replacement, Badelka, who will be able to play in just two Grand Prix legs, in Cyprus and then Austria, so that she's not competing for the FIDE Candidates spots.

Their clash was an Anti-Berlin where Badelka's 7...Re8!? was an almost new move. Zhu didn't immediately punish it, but later she would take full positional control until eventually forcing capitulation with a checkmating attack.

An impressive start to Zhu's bid to become another in a long line of Chinese women's world champions. In round two Zhu has Black against Paehtz, while Tsolakidou is Black against Harika. Goryachkina vs. Muzychuk is the one all-2500 clash.

Round 2 Pairings

How to watch?

The 2025 Nicosia FIDE Women's Grand Prix is the fourth of six legs of the 2024-2025 FIDE Women's Grand Prix. The 10-player round-robin runs March 15-24 in Nicosia, Cyprus. Players have 90 minutes, plus 30 minutes from move 40, with a 30-second increment per move. The top prize is €18,000 (~$20,000), with players also earning Grand Prix points. Each of the 20+ players competes in three events; the top two qualify for the 2026 FIDE Women's Candidates Tournament that decides the World Championship challenger.

Previous Coverage:

• Goryachkina Wins In Monaco, Takes FIDE Women's Grand Prix Lead
• Goryachkina Wins Shymkent FIDE Women's Grand Prix
• Kashlinskaya Wins Tbilisi Grand Prix, Earns 2nd GM Norm
• FIDE Women's Grand Prix 2024-2025: All The Info