Le Tuan Minh qualified for the Champions Chess Tour

Three days after winning the bronze medal on board three for Vietnam at the 2024 Chess Olympiad in Hungary, Tuan Minh returned to Hanoi to participate in the Generation Cup qualifying round. A total of 184 players competed in the qualifying round, including 176 Grandmasters and world Top 20 players such as Levon Aronian, Wesley So, Fabiano Caruana, Leinier Dominguez, Hans Niemann and Shakhriyar Mamedyarov.

Vietnam has two players, Tuan Minh and Nguyen Ngoc Truong Son, playing early in the morning of September 26. After 9 games, Le Tuan Minh won 5, drew 2 and lost 1, earning 7 points. Tuan Minh's losers include former world number two Aronian or Aryan Tari - the player who just lost to him at the Olympiad. The four players above him are Vladimir Fedoseev, So, Aronian and Olexandr Bortnyk.

Truong Son only played 6 games, won 2, lost 4, so he stopped playing early, not passing the qualifying round.

The Generation Cup, which takes place from September 25 to October 2, is the final leg of the Champions Chess Tour 2024, before the tournament enters the final round from December 14 to 21. Each leg will have three divisions, with 8, 16, and 32 players respectively. In the previous three legs, Le Tuan Minh twice qualified, once ranked ninth in second place, once ranked fourth in third place, earning a total of $9,000 in prize money and currently ranked 30th on the Tour.

Le Tuan Minh will have to compete in one more qualifying round starting at 10pm today, Hanoi time, to compete for a spot in the first division. In the first qualifying round, he will meet David Anton - the player who defeated Le Quang Liem in the penultimate round of the 2024 Olympiad. If he overcomes Anton, Tuan Minh will need to defeat one more player in the second round to enter the first division. If he loses in either round, he will be relegated to the second division.

Each match in the first round of the qualifying round will consist of two games, with the pieces swapped, while the second round will consist of four games. The three players who qualified directly for the first place of the Generation Cup thanks to their high results in the previous round are Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, Alireza Firouzja and Alexander Grischuk. Meanwhile, Magnus Carlsen, Jan-Krzysztof Duda, Vidit Gujrathi, Erigaisi Arjun and Fedoseev will go straight to the second round of the qualifying round.

After three stages, Firouzja leads the Tour with $70,000 in prize money, while Carlsen is second with $62,500. The tournament brings together most of the world's top players, with a total prize money of $1.7 million. Of which, the final round has $500,000 in prize money, with the format yet to be announced.