We've waited out the gloom and the gray, and now - hallelujah! - it's finally here: summer! As everyone knows, from the first moment the sun starts showing its big yellow head, we're in our short sleeves and aiming to spend as many hours outdoors as possible - not to mention visiting some of those amazing summer chess festivals.
Yes, you'll find more chess al fresco in the streets, the beaches and the parks during the coming months - but there's still a wealth of indoor activity with some elite tournaments coming up such as the Bazna Kings Tournament about to start in Romania, followed next month by the Dortmund Sparkassen Tournament in Germany, and then onto the Biel Festival in Switzerland.
During the summer months many of the ICC Chess.FM team will be involved in summer camps or on vacation - but we are not going to be having a complete summer break, with our Game of the Day service in operation from all of these headlining event, with the full live commentary service back again in August for the NH Tournament in Amsterdam.
4th Bazna Kings Tournament
Due to the recent Anand-Topalov match in Sofia, we missed out on the traditional Bulgarian Grand Slam tournament of the MTel Masters - but in its place, there's now an upgrade to a full Grand Slam event for the fourth Bazna Kings Tournament that runs 14-25 June in Medias, Romania, with a field featuring Magnus Carlsen (Norway), Wang Yue (China), Boris Gelfand (Israel), Teimur Radjabov (Azerbaijan), Ruslan Ponomariov (Ukraine), and local star Liviu Dieter Nisipeanu (Romania).
Round 1 pairings: Gelfand-Wang Yue, Nisipeanu-Radjabov and Carlsen-Ponomariov.
Games will be relayed live on ICC starting at 08:30AM EDT (06:30AM final round), with rest days on 18th & 23rd June. Chess.FM will provide a GOTD service throughout featuring main host GM Larry Christiansen. Only ICC members can follow the live relays and view our hit GOTD recap videos - so why not join now to follow Magnus Carlsen's progress by clicking here?
Official site: http://www.turneulregilor.com
Featuring Chess.FM
One of the great benefits of ICC (apart from all the top-notch online play and tournaments) in recent years has been the upgrade in our Chess.FM service - many members agree that the live Chess.FM commentary and GOTDs from our elite tournament coverage alone is worthy of their membership fee. But as a member you have access all through the year to our regular weekly shows: Ronen's Opening Survey (Mondays), Chess Talk (Tuesdays), Attack With LarryC (Wednesdays), Bpris Alterman's Gambit Guide (Thursdays), Joel Benjamin's Game of the Week, and Dan Heisman's Improve Your Chess (Saturdays).
And this coming week on Chess Talk, IM John Watson's guest in a two-part special will be four-time US Champion GM Yasser Seirawan, who will be talking about his career and his new book, Chess Duels: My Games with the World Champions. So sign up for ICC membership today and don't miss out on this amazing interview with GM Yasser Seirawan.
