The 4th Berlin U25 Open took place today at Berlin’s Olympic Stadium. Numerous chess players competed in the blitz tournament across the A-Open, B-Open and Over-25 categories, battling for victories and prize money.

A-Open: Gumularz Wins with 11 Points

In the A-Open, Grandmaster Szymon Gumularz (SAbt SV Werder Bremen) claimed victory with an impressive 11 points from 13 games. Artem Dyachuk finished second with 10.5 points, followed by German International Master Jakob Leon Pajeken (SAbt SV Werder Bremen) in third place with 9 points.

Places four to eight went to Toivo Keinänen (8.5 points), Konstantin Peyrer (Hamburger SK, 8.5 points), Dimitris Alexakis (Panathinaikos Chess Club, 8.5 points), Maurin Moeller (SK Blauer Springer Paderborn, 8 points) and Mykhailo Podolskyi (8 points).

Yelyzaveta Hrebenshchykova (SC Noris-Tarrasch Nürnberg 1873) received the award for the best female player. Daniel Rose won the special prize for the best player from SV Königsjäger Süd-West.

B-Open: Svanidze Takes the Title

Alexander Svanidze (SC Borussia Lichtenberg) won the B-Open with 10.5 points. Johan Schneider (SV Empor Berlin) also scored 10.5 points and secured second place. Gustav Rauschhardt (SV Dresden-Leuben) finished third with 9.5 points. Veronika Lorenz (TSG Oberschöneweide) and David Schacht (SchVgg Blankenese) followed in fourth and fifth place, respectively, both scoring 9 points. In addtion Lorenz was also named the tournament’s best female player. The prize for the best woman went to Gayathri Kolla (SV Empor Berlin).

The rating prizes brought further success: Sami Al Amin (SchVgg Blankenese) won the under-1800 Elo category with 8.5 points. The prize for players rated under 1600 Elo went to Luca Brau (TSG Oberschöneweide), who scored 7.5 points. Leontii Maksimov received the award for the best unrated player with five points.

The team prize for the best club went to TSG Oberschöneweide. The four players whose results counted towards the team score — Veronika Lorenz, Arvid Schaudienst, Livius Bongardt and Rafael Antonio Bergmann — all competed in the B-Open and scored a combined total of 34 points.

Over-25 Blitz: Ilja Schneider Dominates the Round-Robin Tournament

A separate blitz tournament for players over 25 was held alongside the other events. In the 15-round round-robin, in which every player faced every other participant, International Master Ilja Schneider claimed a convincing victory with an impressive 14 points out of 15 games.

Gedeon Hartge finished second with 12.5 points. Karsten Schulz took third place with 11.5 points. Arjun Uday Prabhu secured the special prize for the best player rated under 2000 Elo with 10 points.

The 4th Berlin U25 Open offered an exciting day of chess in the unique setting of Berlin’s Olympic Stadium.

The rapid tournament awaits us tomorrow and on Wednesday!