This article was intended for publishing on FIDE site two days ago but it didn't happen. You can see what has changed since then.
Chess festival Voronezh-2019 is not far from its finish, so you can see all the most interesting events in classical chess tournaments in the next three days.
Blitz tournament (June 17) gathered 135 participants from 11 countries. Of course, most of them (122) were from Russia, and many players came to Voronezh for this event specially from different regions of Russia. GM Boris Savchenko (RUS) is the sole winner with 10 points in 11 games (without losses), after the 3rd place in Chess960 tournament and the 2nd place in Rapid tournament. IM Zhamsaran Tsydypov (RUS, already having 3 GM norms), winner of the Chess960 and Rapid tournaments, is the 2nd this time one point back. Azamat Utegaliyev (KAZ) is the 3rd on tie-break with 9 points too. IM Mihail Nikitenko (BLR) is the 4th with 8.5 points without tie-break. There were 9 other ordinary prizes and 12 special prizes.
We hope for a lot international title norm achievements in the Master Open tournament this year. There are 23 GMs in the tournament and 18 players 2500+ but none of them is among three leaders now. Arseny Nesterov (RUS, 2423, already having 3 IM norms) is the sole leader with 5.5 points in 6 rounds. IM Sergey Pavlov (UKR, 2473) having 2 GM norms and Azamat Utegaliyev (KAZ, 2495) having 2 IM norms are half a point behind. Another possible contender for GM norm is IM Cristhian Camilo Rios (COL) with 4.5 points. Of course, GMs will also fight for the first place; 10 of them have 4.5 points now, including rating favorite Dmitry Kryakvin (RUS, 2586).
Players from Russia only have ever won the second festival event FIDE Open, but this year Ashutosh Kumar (IND) leading with 6.5 points in 7 games have an opportunity to break this tradition. Player from Voronezh Andrey Skorobogatykh, Russian national deaf chess team member, is the leader in Sail of hope tournament for handicapped people before the last round.
Look for news on the festival site http://vrnchessfestival.org/en/main, follow festival games broadcasting on the festival site, Followchess, Chess24 and Chessbomb!
The previous info: https://www.fide.com/component/content/article/4-tournaments/11664-23th-voronezh-festival-started.html
A big and very interesting article about the festival in Chessbase India by Rupali Mullick: https://chessbase.in/news/Voronezh-Masters-2019-Round-1-to-5
Zhamsaran Tsydypov (left) and Boris Savchenko were successful in Chess960, Rapid and Blitz
