Beijing: Armenia’s Aronian leads competition

Grandmaster (GM) Levon Aronian played a draw with GM Ruslan Ponomariov (Ukraine) in the first round of the blitz chess tournament being held within the framework of the World Mind Games in Chinese capital city Beijing.  In Rounds 2, 3 and 4, Aronian—who plays first board for the three-time World Chess Olympiad champions and the previous World Team Chess champions, Armenia, and who is ranked second in the FIDE ratings—defeated GM Wang Yue (China), GM Wang Hao (China) and GM Vassily Ivanchuk (Ukraine), respectively.  

After Round 4, the Armenian GM tops the standings all by himself. In the fifth round, Levon Aronian will face GM Péter Lékó (Hungary).

 In Beijing, the Armenian GM is competing in the rapid, blitz, and Basque system chess tournaments.  Levon Aronian’s opponents are GMs Karjakin, Grischuk, Mamedyarov, Dominguez, Ponomariov, Radjabov, Lê Quang Liêm, Wang Hao, Wang Yue, Nepomniachtchi, Vachier-Lagrave, Kamsky, Lékó, Ivanchuk, and Giri.