In A group of “Aeroflot” Chess Festival, Pole Mateus Bartel (2658) and Ukrainian Pavel Elianov (2690) are leaders of the tournament with 5.5 points after 7 rounds. Georgian grand master Baadur Jobava (270) is in the 17th place with 4.5 points. He is half point behind Armenian Hrant Melkumyan (2620) who is in the fifth place.
In the last round Jobava beat Russian Dmitry Bocharov (2611) with white pieces and as a result he advanced a bit. For being in top 10 he needs victory over Maxim Rodstein (Israel, 2634) in the 8th round.
In A group, Nazi Paikidze (2411) has 1.0 point. She played two draws and lost five matches. As a result he is in the 85th place among 85 participants. Meri Arabidze (2358) who competes in group B of “Aeroflot Open” had only 0.5 points after four rounds, but she celebrated 3 victories and now she is in the 81th place among 130 participants.
Prize money of this tournament, which is underway in the capital of Russia, Moscow is 125 000 EUR. Winner in group A wins 20 000 EUR and champion of group B- 10 000 EUR. Chess festival includes 9 rounds and lasts till February 15.
