Winning with the black pieces in the blitz Armageddon play-off against Gabriel Sargissian, Jaan Ehlvest clinched the title at the Chicago Open on Monday. The two had ended on 5.5/7 ahead of Van Wely, Shulman, Akobian, Kacheishvili, Shabalov and Finegold.

The 2009 Chicago Open was held May 22-25. It was a 7-round open Swiss held during the Memorial Weekend. The rate of play was 2 hours for 40 moves plus another hour to finish.

For the different sections (besides the Open there was an Under 900, Under Under 1300, Under 1500, Under 1900, Under 2100 and Under 2300) there was a US $100,000 unconditionally guaranteed prize fund.

The venue was the Westin Chicago North Shore Hotel in Wheeling, Illinois

The tournament had attracted several very strong grandmasters from the US and abroad. Besides US Championship participants Yuri Shulman, Varuzhan Akobian and Alexander Shabalov, from the Netherlands there was Loek van Wely, and part of the Olympiad gold medal winning team Armenia also participated: Gabriel Sargissian and Tigran Petrosian.

GM Loek van Wely making already a second trip to the US this year

Tigran Petrosian, Gabriel Sargissian and Varuzhan Akobian

Gabriel Sargissian and Jaan Ehlvest agreed to a quick draw in the last round, guaranteeing themselves a share of 1st place. GMs Yury Shulman, Varuzhan Akobian and Giorgi Kacheishvili could have all caught the two leaders if they had won but they ended up drawing their respective games leaving Sargissian and Ehlvest at the top of the standings.

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Jaan Ehlvest took home the title and additional bonus money with a win with the black pieces in the Blitz Armageddon play-off against Sargissian

Below you can replay the games of the top boards from all 7 rounds, including the Armageddon between Sargissian and Ehlvest.

Game viewer

Click on the pairings at the top of the board to reveal a drop down list of all the games. Click on the arrow under the board just once, then the arrow keys of your keyboard also work.

All photos © Chris Bird, check out more here

Links

• Tournament website
• Games in PGN