Magnus Carlsen may have disappointed his legion of fans by missing out at a crack at the world championship by skipping the candidates' matches in Kazan, but the Norwegian is back again at the top of the officialJuly Fide rating listafter his performance at the recent King Tournament in Medias.

Carlsen is numero uno after again overtaking World Champion Vishy Anand, who didn't play in the last period. And that was not the only change in the world's top 10 - as expected, Sergey Karjakin (also a big performance at the Kings Tournament) moves up to world #4 (and new Russian #1) with the double whammy on Vladimir Kramnik; Ruslan Ponomariov, after winning the Ukraine Championship, moves to #7 on the same rating as Ukrainian #1 Vassily Ivanchuk, who takes the bragging righted ahead of his countryman by virtue of having played more games.

While Veselin Topalov, Hikaru Namamura and Shakhriyar Mamedyarov take the last three positions in the top 10, there could be more movement coming during a very active "Summer of Chess" coming our way soon (see below!).

FIDE Top 10: 1. Magnus Carlsen, 2821 (+6); 2. Vishy Anand, 2817 (=); 3. Levon Aronian, 2805 (-3); 4. Sergey Karjakin, 2788 (+12); 5. Vladimir Kramnik, 2781 (-4); 6. Vassily Ivanchuk, 2768 (-8); 7. Ruslan Ponomariov, 2768 (+14); 8. Veselin Topalov, 2768 (-8); 9 Hikaru Nakamura, 2766 (-8); 10. Shakhriyar Mamedyarov, 2765 (-7)

In the summer time when the weather is high, as the Mungo Jerry hit goes...and we're set to bask here on ICC with some major events being relayed live during a long, hot summer of chess, and with one or two also with live commentary as the Chess.FM team (shorts, sandals and sunblock optional) is back in action.

Going on right now there's theAirports Authority of India GM Tournamentin New Delhi, where Fabiano Caruana - despite a penultimate round loss to Viktor Laznicka - holds a full point lead over Krishnan Sasikiran going into the final round. ICC has beenrelaying all the liveaction from this exciting new event from India, and the night-owls among you can catch the final round of play on Saturday, 2 July starting from 1:30am ICC Time.

Also on the horizon there's an amazing triple bill of elite grandmaster action! First up is the World Team Championship in Nanjing, China, that will run 15-26 July, featuring China, Russia, Ukraine, Israel, Hungary, Azerbaijan, India, USA, Egypt and Armenia. Again its one for the night-owls, as this will have a 3:00am ICC start time for the live relay of the games. The44th Biel Chess Festivalin Switzerland runs 18-29 July, and has a star-studded field led by number uno himself, Magnus Carlsen; again with live relay of the games on ICC. Last but not least there's theDortmund Sparkassen Chess Meetingin Germany, 21-31 July, with Vladimir Kramnik, Ruslan Ponomariov, Hikaru Nakamura, Anish Giri, Quang Liem Le and Georg Meier - and we will have live Chess.FM coverage for that showdown.

And things continue to heat-up in August, with the breaking news this week that the Russian Championship Super Final has moved from its traditional end-of-the-year slot to now run 7-14 August in Moscow - and what a super-strong elite line-up it is, with the 8-player field consisting of Sergey Karjakin, Vladimir Kramnik, Alexander Grischuk, Peter Svidler, Alexander Morozevich, Ian Nepomniachtchi, Alexander Galkin and Artyom Timofeev!

Phew! It's going to be a long, hot summer of chess - so why not join ICC today byclicking hereto take advantage of all the best of the summer live chess action!

This weekend is a traditional holiday weekend in the US, as the country celebrates Independence Day on the 4th of July. And what better way can we celebrate than by bringing you all (members and non-members alike) a free edition of Game of the Week from the American Grandmaster himself, Joel Benjamin!

The three-time US champion's ever-popular GOTW (which comes out every Friday here on ICC) brings you the best analysis from a current ongoing tournaments. This week, in his inimitable style, Joel expertly breaks down all the action from a key encounter from the recent Ukraine Championship, as Ruslan Ponomariov beats Yuri Volk in a game that helped him to clinch the title.

Join ICC today by clicking here to tune-in every week to Joel Benjamin's GOTW - and to access all the other shows in the series, for a unique and very instructive chess lesson in each!

ICC has also made its Newsletter service available now on an RSS feed for you to get all the latest news on ICC online activities - get it now to keep in touch with ICC!

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