Live games will be daily on Chessdom.com. For more events from Poland, check out The European Chess Calendar, which is part of The Chess Calendar.

Live games will be daily on Chessdom.com. For more events from Norway, check out The European Chess Calendar, which is part of The Chess Calendar.

Women World Chess Cup 2025: All news / Round 1 pairings

Check out Chessdom’s main page for more news and coverage from the Women’s World Cup 2025.

The European Youth Rapid and Blitz Chess Championship will take place August 4 – August 8 in Porto Palace Hotel, Thessaloniki. Over 400 talented young players from across Europe will compete in this prestigious championship in the U8, U10, U12, U14, U16, U18 Open and Girls.

The European Youth Rapid and Blitz Chess Championship 2025 is organized by the European Chess Union and is part of the ECU Calendar. The event is a 9 rounds Swiss tournament. The rapid section time control is 15 min + 10 sec, while the blitz is 3 min + 2 sec. On August 6th the event also features a Chess Solving Competition.

More ECU youth events: European Youth Team Chess Championship 2025 / European School Chess Championship 2025

Live games will be daily on Chessdom.com. For more events in Europe, check out The European Chess Calendar, which is part of The Chess Calendar.

European Youth Rapid and Blitz Chess Championship 2025 participants

The Prime Minister of China HE Li Qiang is visiting the 5-star hotel Rodos Palace these days, the venue of the upcoming WCF Rodos International Tournament in Greece. WCF organizers said, “We are always honored to co-operate with Rodos Palace, a hotel preferred by famous politicians, celebrities and businesses for many years now.”

Visit the official website of the WCF https://worldchessfestival.com and for more events see the European Chess Calendar

The tournament will be a 9-round Swiss, FIDE rated and open to all players with a FIDE ID number. The time limit for each player is 90 minutes for 40 moves + 15 minutes for the rest of the game + 30 seconds increment for every move played, starting from the 1st move.

Participants

The basis of the story is a post by Kramnik on Twitter/X that is connecting Navara’s name with “stats” on “Cheating Tuesdays”. As Kramnik admitted, he is not making accusations but allegations. These allegations are based on data that Kramnik compiled himself and used an undisclosed method to analyze and tweet about.

In a post titled Checking the cheating allegations made by Kramnik on David Navara on Reddit, the user bhajji22 presents his analysis on Kramnik’s data and specifically the data in the tweet. Bhajji22 says, “I downloaded Navara’s and 8 other players’ all games they played in Titled Tuesdays in 2024 from letsdotheprocedure.com. Then I calculated their average centipawn losses and compared the results. […] Firstly, even the most basic thing – the number of moves Navara and others made when time on their clock < 10 seconds was wrong in Kramnik’s post. For instance, on his post , Kramnik said that 748 moves were played by Navara but I found nearly 1500 moves. Similarly, other values are also wrong.” Bhajji22 continues, “Now the cheating part – It can be seen that average centipawn loss for Navara is infact lower than one might expect but statistics is not that simple. Let us understand through an example. Let us say that a position is +5. Then a move that reduces the evaluation to +4 will not have the same effect as reducing the position from +1 to 0. As we all know, in blitz, the top players have the ability to simplify the game to a winning endgame which is necessary in time pressure and hence the +5 to +4 is a common thing. So instead of the Average Centipawn Loss, a better metric would be the Average Relative CPL. This would scale down the large values. So when this was calculated for each player, Navara’s value came out to be quite normal. Not only this, I also plotted a graph for the critical moves when the evaluation is between +1 and -1. And infact, Navara was the weakest player in that scenario.”

User fuettli comments, “I already did something like this and have done some more in the mean time with a little more info. I limited the data to the same time frame Vladimir Kramnik used (you used the entire year 2024) but of course even if you try to go as close to what VBK did, the results are always way different. According to some tweets he used positions with +2 to -2 and a loss of at least 100 centipawns.
But what about blunders from +8 to -1? Aren’t those also real blunders?”

Bhajji22, unlike Kramnik, published the full method and code behind his findings. While the period of Bhajji22 calculations is off, it is public for the mathematicians, statisticians, and chess experts to analyze the centipawn loss vs the suggested Relative centipawn loss. Check out the full post on Full post on Reddit here

Timeline of events

23.05.2025 Navara publishes an open letter about Kramnik’s actions
23.05.2025 Reactions to Navara’s open letter – Aronian, Polgar, etc
23.05.2025 Navara and Kramnik to meet at FIDE World Rapid and Blitz
24.05.2025 David Navara, “I firmly believe that Mr Dvorkovich should resign”
24.05.2025 Kramnik, “I am deeply disappointed Navara participates in unjust PR campaign against me”
24.05.2025 Kramnik rage-blocks Chessdom over a comment on David Navara’s case
24.05.2025 Live: David Navara at French Top 16
25.05.2025 Kramnik admits to allegations, FIDE has grounds to act
25.05.2025 Open call to action for FIDE
26.05.2025 David Navara now has personal chess calendar
26.05.2025 Czech Chess Federation: We stand behind chess legend GM David Navara
28.05.2025 MrDodgy : “Kramnik bullies Navara, will he be satisfied if he ends in hospital or worse?”
29.05.2025 Emil Sutovsky : “I find Kramnik’s latest address to David Navara inhuman”
12.06.2025 David Navara: “When I heard Kramnik’s reaction, I slept really poorly”
26.06.2025 Official Statement of Hetman GKS Katowice Chess Club + Keti Tsatsalashvili of support of David Navara
28.06.2025 Levon Aronian addresses Kramnik’s lawsuit threats towards David Navara
29.06.2025 FIDE addresses the Kramnik vs Navara case
29.06.2025 The entire Nový Bor Chess Club stands firmly behind David Navara
29.06.2025 Prague International Chess Festival thanks cFIDE for taking a clear stance on Kramnik vs Navara
04.07.2025 David Navara in an interview with Greg Mustreader
08.07.2025 Average centipawn loss vs Avereage Relative Centipawn loss in Kramnik vs Navara

Context (28.05)

Kramnik is known to have published numerous articles and videos regarding cheating in chess. On multiple occasions he uses a small sample size. As a result, his conclusions may be perceived as accusations (this is the case in a multitude of well documented videos, articles, and opinions by experts here, here, here, here are just a few examples), allegations, or suspicions about cheating in chess, and even as insults to players’ professionalism. Despite how each individual perceives his words, on Chessdom, starting 25 May, we have adopted a term that Vladimir Kramnik used himself – allegations.

In accordance with established journalistic practices, we work with information and quotations from sources, including Kramnik himself. Kramnik has never contacted Chessdom via its official communication channel posted in the header of the website. Our attempt to contact Kramnik was futile and met with a swift block. The latest threats by Kramnik on social media leave little room for any good-faith discussions (further details to follow)

Regardless, we stand by accuracy, fairness, and independence of journalism and will continue reporting on the Kramnik – Navara case and its tremendous social importance.

• Free chess lessons from a CSC tutor
• Simultaneous displays by the top Grandmasters in the country
• Giant chess sets
• Speed chess galore in the Challenge the Chess Master tent
• Living chess with actors, replaying famous games of chess on our giant board
• Puzzle-rush: pit your wits against fiendish chess puzzles on ChessKid 
• Watch chess masters battle it out in  game of giant blitz, a test of skill and stamina. 

ChessFest 2025 information

This year’s ChessFest theme is The Wizard of Oz. Will Dorothy triumph over the Wicked Witch of the West? Will the lion hold his nerve on the same chessboard as the Wizard himself? Come along to find out.

We will be joined by many master players, including England internationals Mickey Adams, Gawain Jones, Nikita Vitiugov and Harriet Hunt. Come and test your chess skills against them in either a simultaneous game or over a blitz game in our Challenge the Chess Master tent. 

We’ll be hosting challenge matches between the ChessFest in Trafalgar Square and our parallel event in Hull, while junior stars Bodhana Sivanandan and Supratit Banerjee will be taking on their counterparts in America in a live transatlantic match. All the action will be broadcast on a giant screen at the foot of Nelson’s Column. 

We are delighted to welcome the voice of ChessKid, FunMasterMike to Trafalgar Square. Mike will be running a Puzzle Rush competition and meeting guests until 1.30pm. For a flavour of what to expect at ChessFest, please see this video of our 2024 event. 

No need to book – just turn up on Sunday 13th July for a full day of chess fun!

ChessFest Portishead – Saturday 12th July New for 2025, ChessFest begins in the Somerset coastal town of Portishead on Saturday 12th July. With the event spread over 5 sites, all within walking distance, ChessFest will truly be taking over the whole town:

• Zone 1 – Casual Chess at Aqua. Enjoy a game of chess with brunch and coffee in this great restaurant on Portishead Marina.
• Zone 2 – Elite Chess on Parish Wharf. Come and challenge a master to a game of blitz chess, or take part in a simultneous display against International Master Chris Beaumont.
• Zone 3 – Kids’ Zone outside Portishead Leisure Centre. Enjoy a chess lesson from one of many junior coaches and meet ChessKid’s Fun Master Mike Klein who will be running activities for children of all ages.
• Zone 4 – Schools’ Competition at Portishead Primary School (9am-11am). An inter-school chess tournament for local children.
• Zone 5 – Ark of Angels in Jubilee Park. Come and watch a game of living chess on a giant board, featuring local adult and junior chess players as the pieces and pawns. Performances at 12.15pm and 2.30pm.

ChessFest Liverpool – Sunday 20th July ChessFest returns to Chavasse Park at Liverpool One for a fifth year on Sunday 20th July. Please join us for:

• Free chess lessons for adults and children, delivered by CSC tutors
• Social games of chess on one of many boards across the park
• Giant chessgames – a test of skill and stamina
• Simultaneous displays – take on a one of our visiting chess masters
• Blitz chess tournament – test your skills at speed chess. 

Last year over 1,000 people enjoyed a day of free, family-friendly fun at ChessFest Liverpool. We hope to see you there. 

ChessFest Schools Events

CSC was delighted to welcome over 400 children from 45 schools to three days of chess fun in Manchester Square Gardens, Westminster, last week. Schools from Liverpool, Leeds, Bradford, York, and Salford took part, alongside many from the capital, with CSC providing bursaries to support travel costs. 
The children enjoyed outdoor lessons from CSC tutors, simultaneous games against our visiting experts, Grandmasters Chris Ward and Shreyas Royal, and former World Under 8 Champion Bodhana Sivanandan, and consultation games on giant boards. They also took part in a tournament against their peers, with medals awarded to the highest scorers. All children received a selection of chess goodies to take home with them.

Record breaking ChessFest

Last year ChessFest at Trafalgar Square, London was bigger and better than ever before! A record 23,300 people visited the festival and enjoyed a wide range of fun, family-friendly, and free chess activities. Many of the UK’s top chess players joined for the day, including England’s top player, Grandmaster Nikita Vitiugov, British Champions, Grandmasters Gawain Jones, Matthew Sadler, Stuart Conquest, and Chris Ward, as well as British Women’s’ Champions, International Master Harriet Hunt and FIDE Master Akshaya Kalaiyalahan. In addition, three of the UK’s new generation of chess stars, Supratit Banerjee, Ethan Pang, and Bodhana Sivanandan, took on members of the public in simultaneous displays and in our Challenge the Chess Master tent. 

Last year ChessFest at Trafalgar Square, London was bigger and better than ever before! A record 23,300 people visited the festival and enjoyed a wide range of fun, family-friendly, and free chess activities. Many of the UK’s top chess players joined for the day, including England’s top player, Grandmaster Nikita Vitiugov, British Champions, Grandmasters Gawain Jones, Matthew Sadler, Stuart Conquest, and Chris Ward, as well as British Women’s’ Champions, International Master Harriet Hunt and FIDE Master Akshaya Kalaiyalahan. In addition, three of the UK’s new generation of chess stars, Supratit Banerjee, Ethan Pang, and Bodhana Sivanandan, took on members of the public in simultaneous displays and in our Challenge the Chess Master tent. 

This year Chess Fest is back and will take place Sunday 13th July 2025. The festival is free and open to all

More about Chess Fest: Chess Fest 2022 marks the 50th anniversary of the 1972 World Chess Championship match Fischer – Spassky

This year Chess Fest is back and will take place Sunday 13th July 2025. The festival is free and open to all

Top players in the Chennai Masters include Arjun Erigaisi, Anish Giri, Vincent Keymer, Vidit Gujrathi, Nihal Sarin, Pranav V, Awonder Liang. Full participants list and information here Live games from Quantbox Chennai Grand Masters 2025 will be daily on Chessdom.

Live games will be daily on Chessdom.com. For more events from Slovakia, check out The European Chess Calendar, which is part of The Chess Calendar.

Live games will be daily on Chessdom.com. For more events from Slovakia, check out The European Chess Calendar, which is part of The Chess Calendar.