The favourites and Polgar

Polgar versus Dominguez

The Cuban pair Leinier Dominguez and Lazaro Bruzon Batista fought down to the wire, but both lost out in the Blitz. The high seeds Vassily Ivanchuk, Ruslan Ponomariov, Alexander Grischuk and Vugar Gashimov, all made it through to the last eight along with Judit Polgar.

Here are the full results of the five matches decided today:

Tie-break 1:

Seed	Name	Country	Rating	C1	C2	R1	R2	R3	R4	B1	B2	AB	Total
33	Judit Polgar	HUN	2699	0w	1b	1w	0b	1w	0b	½w	1b		4.5
16	Leinier Dominguez Perez	CUB	2719	1b	0w	0b	1w	0b	1w	½b	0w		3.5

Tie-break 2:

Seed	Name	Country	Rating	C1	C2	R1	R2	R3	R4	B1	B2	AB	Total
50	Bu Xiangzhi	CHN	2672	½w	½b	0w	0b						1
02	Vassily Ivanchuk	UKR	2766	½b	½w	1b	1w						3

Tie-break 3:

Seed	Name	Country	Rating	C1	C2	R1	R2	R3	R4	B1	B2	AB	Total
52	Lazaro Bruzon Batista	CUB	2673	½w	½b	0b	1w	1b	0w	½w	0b		3.5
04	Ruslan Ponomariov	UKR	2764	½b	½w	1w	0b	0w	1b	½b	1w		4.5

Last year's finalist Ruslan Ponomariov is still there, but only after a tough scrap against Bruzon.

Ruslan Ponomariov

Tie-break 4:

Seed	Name	Country	Rating	C1	C2	R1	R2	R3	R4	B1	B2	AB	Total
05	Vugar Gashimov	AZE	2760	1w	0b	1w	0b	1w	1b				4
44	Peter Heine Nielsen	DEN	2681	0b	1w	0b	1w	0b	0w				2

Gashimov has been very effective with the white pieces in Khanty Mansiysk, but lost twice as Black to Nielsen.

Vugar Gashimov

Tie-break 5:

Seed	Name	Country	Rating	C1	C2	R1	R2	R3	R4	B1	B2	AB	Total
43	Vladimir Potkin	RUS	2746	1w	0b	½b	0w						1.5
06	Alexander Grischuk	RUS	2682	0b	1w	½w	1b						2.5

Sixth seed Alexander Grischuk, came back from a first leg loss, a rare event, but he wasn't alone, as Judit Polgar did the same!

Alexander Grischuk

These five will join Teimour Radjabov (AZE, 2744), Peter Svidler (RUS, 2739) and David Navara (CZE, 2722), the 7th, 9th and 14th seeds respectively, in the fifth round.

The Tie-break play-off rules:

Two games at Rapid chess (25' plus 10" per move), then if things are all-square a pair of further games at (10' + 10" a cross between Rapidplay and Blitz), followed if necessary by two Blitz games (5' + 3"). Finally (as in Dominguez-Lysyj) an Armageddon Blitz game may be necessary, where White has more time (esentially 5 mins vs. 4 mins) but an obligation to win.

For more information go to the official site: http://chess.ugrasport.com/

Live games: http://chess.ugrasport.com/?cat=12

If you want to follow the live games then note the following:

The local starting time is 3pm and 3pm Khanty Mansiysk = 11am Paris = 10am London = 5am New York = 2am Los Angeles.

All the photos today are from the official site.

The total prize fund is of $1.600.000 (about 1.100.000€):

First round losers win $6.000 (about 4.100€);

Second round losers win $10.000 (or roughly 6.900€);

Third round losers $16.000 (or 11.000€);

Fourth round $25.000 (or 17.000€);

Fifth round (Quarter-finals) $35.000 (or 24.000€);

Sixth round (Semi-final) $50.000 (or 34.500€);

Losing finalist $80.000 (or 55.000€);

The winner receives $120.000 (or 82.500€).

All photos today from the official site.