Sergei Azarov

Sergei Azarov, Warsaw 2013

Sergei Nikolayevich Azarov (Belarusian: Сяргей Мікалаевіч Азараў; Russian: Серге́й Николаевич Азаров; born 19 May 1983 in Minsk) is a Belarusian chess Grandmaster (GM), ranked by the World Chess Federation, FIDE. He has been a GM since 2003 and has an overall rating of 59.5%. He placed second in the Junior World Championships in 2003. He placed 2nd (10th on tiebreak) at the 13th European Individual Championship (2012). His score was 8/11, which qualified him to play in the Chess World Cup 2013.^[1] Azarov is ranked No. 144 in the world, No. 120 in Europe, and No. 3 in Belarus; his rapid chess rating is 2672 and his blitz chess rating is 2614.^[2]

Career

Azarov won the Belarusian individual championship in 2001 and 2002 (both times in Minsk). In 2002, he shared first place in the Challengers tournament at the Hastings Chess Congress.^[3] With the Belarusian national team, he took part in the European Championships in 2001 and 2003 and in five Chess Olympiads between 2000 and 2008. At the club level, he played in the European Club Cup in 2001 and in 2003–2007 for Vesnianka Minsk.

At the 2003 U-20 World Championship in Nakhchivan, he finished in second place behind Shakhriyar Mamedyarov. In 2005, he finished second in the Czech Open Tournament with seven points in nine games. In 2006 he won the fifth Istanbul Chess Festival. In 2009, he won the Open Tournament at Béthune.^[4] Since 2009 he has played for the Ukrainian club A DAN DZO & PGMB Luhansk. In Romania, he plays for Sah Club Hidrocon Bacău, in the Czech Republic for BŠŠ Frýdek-Místek, and in Slovakia for ŠK Caissa Čadca. In 2012, he led the European Individual Chess Championship after his defeat of Arkadij Naiditsch in Round 7 of 11.^[5] Azarov took the title at the 3rd Annual Continental Class Championships in Arlington, Virginia, US in 2012.^[6] But at the Washington International Championship in August 2012, he came in at fifth place.^[7]

During the period 1999–2013, according to the data base of the chess games, he has played 448 games and has achieved a FIDE rating of 2629. In the World Cup (2011) he won against Artyom Timofeev in the first round but in the second round he lost against Vugar Gashimov. In Chess parlance, during the period of record, four of the "Notable Games" in which he has won or drawn his matches are: In 2006, he drew the match against Borki Predojević; against Yang Shen in 2007 he won by 0–1; in the match against Andrei Volokitin in 2008 he recorded a win with a score of 0–1; and in the 2008 match against Sergey Vokarev he drew the match.^[1]

References