Grand Chess Tour Names Field of Elite Players to Compete for $1.4M Purse

2023 Tour Features One of the Strongest Fields of All-Time including Reining Grand Chess Tour Winner and 2023 World Championship Contenders

SAINT LOUIS--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Grand Chess Tour, a leading global circuit of international chess tournaments featuring the world’s best players, announced today the full tour players:

No.	Player Name	Highlights	Country	FIDE Rapid Rating	URS Rating
1	GM Alireza Firouzja	Ranked No. 4, 2022 GCT overall winner and 2022 Sinquefield Cup winner	FRA	2785	2787
2	GM Wesley So	Ranked No. 8, 2022 GCT runner-up winner, 2021 Grand Chess Tour winner and 2021 Paris Rapid & Blitz winner	USA	2760	2772
3	GM Maxime Vachier-Lagrave	Ranked No. 16, 2021 Grand Chess Tour runner-up winner, 2021 Sinquefield Cup winner, and 2021 Croatia Grand Chess Tour winner	FRA	2737	2768
4	GM Ian Nepomniachtchi	Ranked No. 3, the 2021 World Championship Challenger, 2022 Candidates Tournament winner, 2023 World Championship candidate	FIDE	2793	2787
5	GM Ding Liren	Ranked No. 2, 2022 Candidates Tournament runner-up winner and 2023 World Championship candidate	CHN	2811	2797
6	GM Anish Giri	Ranked No. 7, four time Dutch champion and 2023 Tata Steel Masters winner	NED	2764	2762
7	GM Fabiano Caruana	Ranked No. 6, 2022 American Cup winner and 2022 U.S. Championship winner	USA	2766	2776
8	GM Jan-Krzysztof Duda	Ranked No. 21, 2021 FIDE World Cup winner and 2022 Candidates Tournament qualifier	POL	2729	2767
9	GM Richard Rapport (Wild Card)	Ranked No. 15, 2022 FIDE Grand Prix winner and 2022 Candidates tournament qualifier	ROU	2740	2745

Full tour player invitations for the 2023 GCTs edition were extended to nine players. Three players qualified by finishing 1st through 3rd in the 2022 Grand Chess Tour. The remaining 6 were invited based on a number of factors, including URS rating, FIDE rating, fighting spirit and sportsmanship.

“Now in our eighth year, we are proud to feature one of the strongest fields in tour’s history - including the player who will be crowned the 2023 World Champion this spring,” said GCT Executive Director, Michael Khodarkovsky. “Thanks to our sponsors, Superbet Foundation and Saint Louis Chess Club, the Grand Chess Tour continues its quest to promote chess around the world by bringing the best of the best players to compete for the one of the most prestigious titles of the year.”

The full tour participants will play in both classical events as well as in two of the three rapid and blitz tournaments. The wildcard participants for the three rapid and blitz events scheduled to take place in Warsaw, Zagreb, and Saint Louis will be announced as they become available.

The 2023 tour schedule consists of five tournaments as follows:

• Superbet Chess Classic Romania: May 4-16, 2023, Bucharest, Romania
• Superbet Rapid & Blitz Poland: May 19-26, 2023, Warsaw, Poland
• SuperUnited Rapid & Blitz Croatia: July 3-10, 2023, Zagreb, Croatia
• Saint Louis Rapid & Blitz: November 12 - 19, 2023, Saint Louis, Missouri, USA
• Sinquefield Cup: November 19 - December 3, 2023, Saint Louis, Missouri, USA

Tour participants will compete for a $1.4M prize fund over the course of the 2023 season. The prize fund for each of the two classical tournaments will be $350,000 and $175,000 per event for rapid and blitz. In addition, a bonus prize fund totalling $175,000 will be awarded to the top three overall tour finishers.

The prize fund is provided by the 2023 Grand Chess Tour major sponsors Superbet Foundation and Saint Louis Chess Club, both non-profit organizations that support chess education and the mission to expand the game of chess to a worldwide audience.

Visit more information, visit grandchesstour.org.

Grand Chess Tour

The Grand Chess Tour is a circuit of international events, each demonstrating the highest level of organization for the world's best players. The legendary Garry Kasparov, one of the world's greatest ambassadors for chess, inspired the Grand Chess Tour and helped solidify the partnership between the organizers. All Grand Chess Tour 2022 events will comply with local and regional COVID-19 restrictions. For more information about the tour, please visit grandchesstour.org.

Superbet Foundation

Founded in 2019, Superbet Foundation is a nonprofit organization. Its role is to coordinate Superbet Group’s CSR activities and to connect with civil society organizations and the general public. Through its activity, the Foundation strives for a better world, with healthy and educated people and by supporting various projects it wants to inspire people to hold unbreakable moral values. It supports projects in domains like education, health, culture, performance in sport and, most notably, in chess. Since 2019, chess has become one of the backbones of Superbet Foundation by organizing its first tournament of the Grand Chess Tour in Bucharest. The Foundation is committed to turning GCT tournaments into a tradition for the Romanian and Polish chess communities. For more information, visit superchess.ro.

Saint Louis Chess Club

The Saint Louis Chess Club is a non-profit, 501(c)(3) organization that is committed to making chess an important part of our community. In addition to providing a forum for the community to play tournaments and casual games, the club also offers chess improvement classes, beginner lessons and special lectures.

Recognizing the cognitive and behavioral benefits of chess, the Saint Louis Chess Club is committed to supporting those chess programs that already exist in area schools while encouraging the development of new in-school and after-school programs. For more information, visit saintlouischessclub.org.