FIDE announces the full details of the Grand Prix 2014-2015, from which the first two (2) winners will qualify to the Candidates Tournament of the World Chess Championship Cycle 2014-2016.
The schedule of the four events is the following:
a) 1-15 October 2014: Baku, Azerbaijan
b) 20 October – 3 November 2014: Tashkent, Uzbekistan
c) 14-28 February 2015: Tehran, Iran
d) 13-27 May 2015: Moscow, Russia
In total 16 players will participate, 11 qualifiers as per regulations (listed below) plus 4 nominees from the organisers (to be announced) plus 1 nominee of the FIDE President (to be announced).
The 11 original qualifiers who have to confirm their participation by 27 August 2014 are:
01. Carlsen, Magnus (World Champion)
02. Anand, Viswanathan (World Ch. match 2013)
03. Kramnik, Vladimir (World Cup winner 2013)
04. Andreikin, Dmitry (World Cup runner-up 2013)
05. Tomashevsky, Evgeny (World Cup semi-finalist 2013)
06. Vachier-Lagrave, Maxime (World Cup semi-finalist 2013)
07. Aronian, Levon (Average Rating List 5/2013 to 4/2014)
08. Caruana, Fabiano (Average Rating List 5/2013 to 4/2014)
09. Grischuk, Alexander (Average Rating List 5/2013 to 4/2014)
10. Nakamura, Hikaru (Average Rating List 5/2013 to 4/2014)
11. Topalov, Veselin (Average Rating List 5/2013 to 4/2014)
The first reserves for any replacement needed are:
1. Karjakin, Sergey (Average Rating List 5/2013 to 4/2014)
2. Gelfand, Boris (Average Rating List 5/2013 to 4/2014)
3. Mamedyarov, Shakhriyar (Average Rating List 5/2013 to 4/2014).
Each player will play in 3 tournaments and all his results will be taken into account for the overall final standings of the Grand-Prix.
The full regulations of the Grand-Prix 2014-2015 can be downloaded from the FIDE website here: http://www.fide.com/fide/handbook.html?id=31&view=article
