Samvel Ter-Sahakyan emerged as the new leader of the FIDE Circuit race following his victory in the 83rd Armenian Championship. The champion picked up 7.4 points and edged out the winner of the Rilton Cup, IM Pranesh M, to the second position. The runner-up of the Armenian Championship, Manuel Petrosyan, closes out the top three.
FIDE Circuit Race Top 10 as of January 24, 2023:
1
Ter-Sahakyan, Samvel
2605
ARM
7.40
2
Pranesh M
2475
IND
6.76
3
Petrosyan, Manuel
2632
ARM
5.92
4
Kucuksari, Kaan
2487
SWE
5.24
5
Hovhannisyan, Robert
2597
ARM
5.00
6
Meshkovs, Nikita
2576
LAT
4.90
7
Harutyunyan, Tigran K.
2511
ARM
4.63
8
Urkedal, Frode Olav Olsen
2536
NOR
3.55
9
Galperin, Platon
2534
UKR
3.21
10
Gorshtein, Ido
2498
ISR
2.87
At the end of 2022, FIDE Council approved a major reform of the qualification paths to the Candidates Tournament – the event that decides the challenger for the World Championship match.
One of the paths is the newly created FIDE Circuit (Path D). The player accumulating the most points during 2023 in eligible tournaments qualifies for the 2024 Candidates Tournament. The final score is calculated as the sum of the player’s five highest results.