Newly crowned World Chess Champion D. Gukesh will participate in the Freestyle Chess Grand Slam Tour 2025, set to take place in Germany from February 7 to 14.
The 18-year-old Indian will face two former world champions: Magnus Carlsen and his idol, Viswanathan Anand. Gukesh clinched the title from defending champion Ding Liren in the final game of the World Championship match in Singapore.
“It was always clear to us that we wanted the reigning world champion to be part of the Freestyle Chess Grand Slam Tour’s opening event in Weissenhaus,” said Freestyle co-founder Jan Henric Buettner.
“I’m looking forward to the challenge,” said Gukesh, who also participated in the Freestyle event’s debut in February 2024.
During the World Championship match, Gukesh revealed his preference for classic, long time control in chess and expressed that Freestyle is his favourite variant.
With Gukesh’s confirmation, nine of the ten participants have been finalized. The winner of the open qualification, which begins online on chess.com on January 4, will secure the tenth spot.
The tour will cover five countries, with tournaments in Germany, India, France (Paris), the USA (New York), and South Africa (Cape Town). The prize pool for the Delhi leg is expected to range from $500,000 to $1,000,000.
The nine confirmed participants:
– Magnus Carlsen (Norway, number 1 in the world rankings)
– Fabiano Caruana (USA, number 2)
– Hikaru Nakamura (USA, number 3)
– Gukesh Dommaraju (India, number 5)
– Nodirbek Abdusattorov (Uzbekistan, number 6)
– Alireza Firouzja (France, number 7)
– Viswanathan Anand (India, number 10)
– Levon Aronian (USA, number 11)
– Vincent Keymer (Germany, number 19)