Magnus Carlsen APPLAUDS Hikaru Nakamura in Opening Ceremony of World Rapid Blitz Chess Championship

Carlsen and Hikaru Nakamura, the two finalists of the thrilling Speed Chess Championship on chess.com, are among a star-studded field competing in the World Rapid & Blitz Championship which begins in Almaty, Kazakhstan on December 26.

For the 7th year since 2016, the prestigious speed chess event will take place from December 26-30. While questions about the scheduling of the World Rapid & Blitz during Christmas continue to come up, it remains immensely popular among fans, with most top players returning every year.

Magnus Carlsen, with an incredible 7 gold medals (3 rapid and 4 blitz), 3 silver and 2 bronze in the last 10 years, will be back and is once again the huge favourite. Carlsen took both titles in 2014 and 2019, but scored a disappointing 12th place in the blitz and 3rd in the rapid in Warsaw last year.

The Norwegian will be particularly eager to take back a World Championship title or two, as he is in danger of being without a single title for the first time since 2013.

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125 Comments

  1. Ahh, Heekaru Hakamoora, clear crowd favorite!

  2. 𝓢𝓪𝓿𝓪𝓷𝓽 𝓖𝓪𝓻𝓭𝓮 says:

    This will be interesting considering hans is gonna play lmao

  3. Hikaru is the only chess player I know who presents a real challenge for magnus … magnus is like kobe bit Hikaru is like Manu ginobli!

  4. The problem of being that successful, is that it literally takes ages to name their accomplishments…

  5. Is ithe venue a bit smoky? Got the feeling of it being an old time boxing match where the audience could smoke during the fight.

  6. i dont like it when magma man tames his hair like this. i much prefer when he lets it roam free like the buffalo

  7. Magnus is the only mf who will relinquish his titles to give himself the slight motivation to get his own titles back LMAO

  8. Its like small creator games in 90's who did not have Copyright for player names so they used to change it to something similar to "Marcus Carlson", "Hakamura" haha.

  9. Why are they in an empty stadium?
    We all know that chess doesn't pull that many viewers, so don't put chess in a stadium.
    Rather a small full crowd than a big empty one.

  10. Hakamura and Marcus would light this tournament on fire. Why no Noke Beadsmann?

  11. Hickaroo Hakmura vs Magnoos Karsen
    Sounds like an intense match.

  12. I think they should learn their names before doing this

  13. 250 pounds, the world heavy weight championnn…. Marcus carsennn

  14. I hope Hans wins this ….. What a way to end the year that would be.

  15. Ұят-ай, Нәке мен Мәке реңжімеңіздер! Sorry about that)🙏

  16. It's a treat every time Magnums Clarsen and Hikramaru Nakmarana are in a video!!

  17. The duo we never expected.. Hakamura and Marcus 💯

  18. The appearance of clapping, but no clapping. lol

  19. wow it must be so hard to snag a ticket for this, just look at the stadium!

  20. Why there is nobody in the stadium to support? 😧

  21. The "Hakamura" mistake made Hikaru wonder for a second if they were talking about a different Hikaru. He stopped in his tracks! 🤣

  22. Nakamura destroyed Carlsen this year head to head in Rapid, Blitz, and Fischer Random

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