The Next Big Event: The Superbet Rapid & Blitz, Starting Thursday

Some sources state May 17 as the start date for the next Grand Chess Tour (GCT) event, the 2022 Superbet Rapid & Blitz, taking place at the Museum of the History of Polish Jews in Warsaw, Poland, but that is the date set for "Player Arrival". Nor is it on the 18th, contrary to other sources; that's the date for the opening ceremony. Instead, the action commences on Thursday the 19th, with the first three rounds of the rapid. Rounds 4-6 are on Friday, and the rapid concludes with its last three rounds on Saturday. There is no rest day: Sunday the 21st has the first round-robin of the blitz, and Monday the concluding round-robin.

Here's the field: Levon Aronian, Fabiano Caruana, Wesley So, Richard Rapport (all full GCT participants; the rest are wildcards), Viswanathan Anand, Jan-Krzysztof Duda, Anton Korobov, Radek Wojtaszek, Kirill Shevchenko, and David Gavrilescu. It's too bad Magnus Carlsen isn't playing, and it would be nice to see some of the young greats who are also rapid & blitz specialists like Alireza Firouza or Arjun Erigaisi playing, but it should still be a very interesting and entertaining event.