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Fedoseev, Lazavik, Sindarov, Bortnyk Keep Weissenhaus Hopes Alive
Vladimir Fedoseev won the Swiss Stage of the Weissenhaus Grand Slam Play-In.

Fedoseev, Lazavik, Sindarov, Bortnyk Keep Weissenhaus Hopes Alive

Colin_McGourty
Colin_McGourty
Staff
| 28 | Chess Event Coverage

GMs Vladimir Fedoseev, Denis Lazavik, Javokhir Sindarov, and Oleksandr Bortnyk will join the likes of GMs Ian Nepomniachtchi and Wesley So in a 16-player Knockout on Chess.com to decide the final spot in the 2025 Weissenhaus Freestyle Chess Grand Slam. They finished in the top-four spots of an almost 250-player Swiss qualifying tournament on Monday.

The 16-player Knockout takes place on Tuesday-Wednesday, January 7-8, starting at 11:00 ET / 17:00 CET / 9:30 p.m. IST.

Swiss Stage: Final Standings

Full standings

The top four qualify for a single-elimination Knockout, where they join 12 invited players.

Knockout Bracket

What's At Stake?

2025 promises to be a big year for chess, with one of the most exciting developments the launch of a new series of events for the world chess elite. Following the success of the first freestyle chess (Chess960) event won by GM Magnus Carlsen in Weissenhaus in February 2024, Jan Henric Buettner, Harley Miller, and Carlsen have raised $12 million for their Freestyle Chess venture.

In Singapore, just before the 2024 FIDE World Championship began, the 2025 Freestyle Chess Grand Slam was announced, with five events each providing a $750,000 to $1 million prize fund.

As you can see, it all kicks off back where it began, in Buettner's luxury resort on the Baltic coast near Hamburg, Germany. 

Star-Studded Weissenhaus Freestyle Chess Grand Slam Lineup

The lineup for the Weissenhaus Grand Slam is impressive, featuring eight of the world's current top-11 players, including the new World Champion Gukesh Dommaraju and former World Champions Viswanathan Anand and Carlsen.  

GM Vincent Keymer plays as a local wildcard for the event in Germany, with the Official Rules and Regulations of the Freestyle Chess World Championship listing how each player was selected—and how players will be selected for future events.

The use of "World Championship" by Freestyle Chess has led to a behind-the-scenes battle with the International Chess Federation (FIDE) that seemed to have been resolved in the run-up to the World Rapid & Blitz Championship in New York.

FIDE President Arkady Dvorkovich later posted a statement saying that the press release "includes significant inaccuracies that mispresent the situation," though no public clarification has yet followed.

Whatever happens, however, the big question for now is who will take the 10th and final spot in the Weissenhaus Grand Slam, a spot that's worth at least $7,500 (for 10th place) and potentially $200,000 for first.   

The Battle For The Final Qualification Spot

The final spot in Weissenhaus was open to all via a Play-In on Chess.com. That began on Saturday with Open Qualifier 1, followed by Open Qualifier 2 on Sunday, with the top-three players in each Swiss tournament eligible to join the main Swiss Stage on Monday that was open to all titled players. In total, 248 took part in the event played at a time control of 10 minutes for all moves, with a two-second increment per move. The goal was to finish in the top-four and join Nepomniachtchi, So, and 10 more players in the Knockout that starts on Tuesday.

Each round was played from a new position, with the eventual winner Fedoseev explaining the appeal of shuffling the pieces on the back rank before each game:

In my opinion, Fischer Random is a great alternative to modern classical chess because we have simply reached the point that preparation is killing almost half of the games already, in some cases. It’s not good that we are not competing who is the most creative, who is the most innovative player, and so on. We are just competing in some processes of memorization.

Fischer Random is a great alternative to modern classical chess because we have simply reached the point that preparation is killing almost half of the games already.

—Vladimir Fedoseev

He said that in freestyle chess "you can choose your way to play from move one," but that also makes things tough, of course. He picked up his first win in just 10 moves when the b2-pawn proved not to be as well defended as it looked!

Young Turkish FM Kaan Ozcan resigned since if the knight is taken, the other knight comes to c3, forking the queen and king. And if you try to run with 11.Ke1, the knight still comes to c3, forking the queen and rook. 11.Kd2 to stop that fork followed by 11...Qb4+ is mate next move.

That was far from the fastest opening disaster, however.

The early pace was set by GM Sam Sevian, who raced into the sole lead with a perfect 6/6 start. His round-six win over Bortnyk is our Game of the Day and has been analyzed by GM Rafael Leitao below. 

Sevian's run came to an end, however, in round seven when he met Fedoseev who later commented, "I can’t pick my best game today, but probably the most important one was the game I played with the black pieces against Sam Sevian."

The endgame was equal, but with just a second or two on his clock to Fedoseev's over a minute, Sevian blundered a key pawn and lost.

Fedoseev went into the final round on 7.5/8, after only conceding a draw to GM Christopher Yoo, but despite being the sole leader, he noted how tough it was that he didn't know if he would still qualify if he lost. In the end it didn't come to that, since he made a draw with Bortnyk that gave both players a spot in the Knockout.

Bortnyk had only lost that game we've seen to Sevian, while he pulled off some great wins, including a combination against GM Peter Svidler featuring a knight sacrifice on h6 and then a rook sacrifice on e6.

For Sevian, meanwhile, there was last-round heartbreak. Needing just a draw against Lazavik to clinch a spot in the Knockout, he was agonizingly close before he went for another fateful pawn-push, 68.b4?. It seems Black can't take en passant without losing a piece, but sacrificing the piece was also the way to win the game, as the 18-year-old demonstrated! 

That win saw Lazavik take Sevian's place in the Knockout, after scoring seven wins, one draw, and one tough 102-move loss to GM Jorden van Foreest.

The one remaining player to take a qualifying spot was 19-year-old Sindarov from Uzbekistan, who had a curious path to qualification, drawing three of his first four games.

That was partly explained, however, by his tough first-round pairing. Sindarov was rated just 1738 for Chess960 and came up against 13-time Czech Champion David Navara.

Sindarov clinched his spot in the final round when he overcame the famously fast U.S. GM Andrew Tang, who had seven wins and one loss (to Sevian) going into the final round. However, in the end he couldn't pull off the feat of qualifying from a train! 

"It was a valiant effort given my connection issues," he tweeted.

The four winners—Fedoseev on 8/9 and Lazavik, Sindarov, and Bortnyk on 7.5/9—now go forward to the 16-player Knockout, with matches played over two 15+3 games. If the score's tied 1-1, we get two 5+2 games; then, if needed, armageddon, when the players bid for the lowest time they're willing to accept to get draw odds.

Fedoseev faces GM Leinier Dominguez and says there are no favorites because "the cost of a move is insane and it’s hard to claim on a distance of two games you can be favorite against any decent player in the world."

Lazavik plays GM Wesley So, Sindarov plays GM Wei Yi, and Bortnyk takes on Nepomniachtchi, while we also have GM Hans Niemann vs. GM Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, GM Jan-Krzysztof Duda vs. GM Parham Maghsoodloo, GM Praggnanandhaa Rameshbabu vs. GM Vidit Gujrathi, and GM Liem Le vs. GM Yu Yangyi.

The Round of 16 and Quarterfinals are on Tuesday, while the Semifinals and Final are on Wednesday. Don't miss it!

    How To Watch
    You can watch the 2025 Freestyle Chess Grand Slam Weissenhaus Play-In on the Chess24 YouTube or Twitch channels. You can also check out the games on our dedicated events page.
    GM Daniel Naroditsky and IM David Pruess hosted the broadcast.

    The Freestyle Chess Grand Slam starts with the $750,000 first of five legs in Weissenhaus, Germany, on February 7-14. Nine players, including GMs Gukesh Dommaraju, Magnus Carlsen, and Hikaru Nakamura have already been invited, while the remaining spot will be decided in a Play-In on Chess.com on January 4-8. 12 players move straight to a 16-player Knockout with two-game 15+3 matches, while the last four players qualify from a nine-round Swiss Open played at a 10+2 time control. All games are played in freestyle chess.  

    Previous coverage:

    Colin_McGourty
    Colin McGourty

    Colin McGourty led news at Chess24 from its launch until it merged with Chess.com a decade later. An amateur player, he got into chess writing when he set up the website Chess in Translation after previously studying Slavic languages and literature in St. Andrews, Odesa, Oxford, and Krakow.

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