Chess: Carlsen finally achieves 2900 rating as Niemann aims to be Las Vegas party pooper

The Guardian

2 days ago

For years the world No 1, Magnus Carlsen, tried to achieve a 2900 classical rating but he always peaked 10-20 points short of the round figure. The Norwegian, 34, had a personal best of 2889, achieved in 2014. That was 33 points ahead of Garry Kasparov's highest figure and 100 ahead of Bobby Fischer. Carlsen made later attempts but could never get past the 2880s, while the numbers had an eerie similarity to the 28,000s and 29,000s at the top of Everest where George Mallory and Andrew Irvine perished in 1924.
In the new Freestyle rating list Carlsen at 2909 is nearly 100 points ahead of Hikaru Nakamura in second place, with his performance boosted by his perfect 9/9 at Grenke Karlsruhe. In contrast, the Fide world champion, Gukesh Dommaraju, ranks a lowly 26th with 2701 points.
Carlsen will hope to maintain his new rating next month when the third leg (of five) of the Freestyle $3.75m Grand Slam takes place on 16-20 July at Wynn Las Vegas. The field of 16 will include most of the usual top names but there will be particular interest in one who could turn out a party pooper.
Hans Niemann, the 22-year-old whose game with Carlsen at the 2022 Sinquefield Cup led to a $1m lawsuit, was invited to the Paris leg of the Freestyle Grand Slam but withdrew for undisclosed personal reasons. Now, having turned down the easy entrance, Niemann has got in by a much harder route, qualifying for the Las Vegas leg by winning a 16-player knockout where he defeated four top-class opponents, including the former world classical champion Ding Liren. Niemann has also shown significantly improved results in chess.com's Titled Tuesday, where, in recent weeks, his performances have matched those of Carlsen and Nakamura.
Chess in the past five years has enjoyed powerful boosts. Netflix's The Queen's Gambit and its heroine, Beth Harman, were a viewing success, the Niemann v Carlsen lawsuit was widely publicised, Carlsen's personality is popular, while the leading chess site, chess.com, has millions of blitz games played every day and lichess.org is also very successful.
As a consequence, the incomes of the top 10 or 20 grandmasters have soared from events like the St Louis organised Grand Chess Tour and the $3.75m Freestyle Grand Slam. This year, for the first time, the Esports World Cup, in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, will include chess (10-minute games without any per-move increment and a $1.5m prize pool). In 2026 Fide's $2m official world championship series will resume centre stage, as India's Gukesh defends his crown against the winner of the eight-player Candidates.
Meanwhile, back in Britain, participation remains high but financial returns do not match the stellar numbers. A new survey from chess.com reveals that its UK online membership has reached an astonishing 8.9 million players, behind only the US (43.9 million) and India (20.4 million).
This stratospheric figure is 600 times that for the membership of the English Chess Federation, which in 2023 was officially 14,567. Worse for the ECF, the £500,000 government grant for elite chess, which Rishi Sunak introduced in 2023, was axed completely as part of the Treasury's departmental cuts at the end of April 2025. One consequence of this is that the rewards for playing success in Britain do not compare with the massive amounts on offer in world events.
Next month's English Championship in Warwick (18-21 July) offers £2,000-£1,250-£750 for its top three, while the week-long British Championship in Liverpool from 31 July to 9 August has £5,000-£2,500-£1,500. The highest ever British Championship first prize was £8,000 in 2011.
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There is an obvious event which could make a big difference, and ought to tempt some of the millions of UK residents who play exclusively online blitz on chess.com to try a day of over-the-board blitz chess as well.
This is the UK open blitz championship, which was launched in 2023 and is now in its third year. Full details for the tournament can be found here. The UK blitz championship uses a three minutes per game plus a two-second per move increment, which is also the most normal time control for chess.com blitz games.
The championship will have 16 one-day regional qualifying tournaments in August and September, followed by a one-day final at Leamington Spa on 22 November.
The one-day qualifiers will be in London (three events at Golders Green, Hampton, and Harrow) Belfast, Birmingham, Bristol, Cardiff, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Leeds, Liverpool, Manchester, Newcastle, Nottingham, Sheffield and Southampton. Many masters and grandmasters are expected to take part. The total prize fund will be in excess of £10,000.
To enter any of the qualifiers, click here.
3978: It's mate in six by 1 Rg6+! hxg6 2 Rxg6+ Kh7 3 Rg2+! Kh6 4 Qe3+! Kh5 5 Qxe5+ Kh4 6 Qg5 mate.