Bulgarian Chess Grandmaster Heads to Top

Sports | July 2, 2004, Friday // 00:00
Bulgarian Chess Grandmaster Heads to Top Bulgarian kids have played live in Varna the historic game between Vesselin Topalov and Garry Kasparov ten years ago, when the 19-aged Bulgarian beat the world’s top-seed at the Moscow Chess Olympiad. Photo by SIA-DKS.

Bulgaria's top seed Grandmaster Vesselin Topalov drew first two semi-final games at the World Chess championship in Tripoli, Libya.

Winning streak, Topalov was halted by Uzbekistan's Grandmaster Rustam Kasimdzhanov ending in a tie 1-1.

Kasimdzhanov drew a near no game black pieces, while Topalov on his part expressed happiness over the result, as getting such an easy draw with black in their first game is always welcome.

The Bulgarian has a fantastic record of nine wins and just two draws in his 11 games so far in the championship.

The championship is being played on a knockout format with two games round till the semifinals, which is a four-game match. The final will be a six-game contest, which starts on July 6.

The stakes are high with the winner's purse set at USD 100,000 out of a total prize pool of a little more than USD 1.5 M. The losers in the semifinals will get USD 45,000, while the losing finalist will get USD 70,000.

Vesselin Topalov was ranked fifth among the world's greatest chess players in the April's update of FIDE top list.

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