2017 Champions Showdown

​The highest rated Chinese player ever and only the second player from China (after Wang Yue) to break into the world’s top 10. At the age of 16, he became the youngest person ever to win the title of Chinese Champion. Ding has since won this title twice more in both 2011 and 2012. In the 2015 Tata Steel Tournament, Ding finished in a tie for second place just half a point behind World Champion Magnus Carlsen. Ding was part of the gold medal-winning Chinese national team at the 2014 Chess Olympiad and earned Ding an individual bronze medal. Most recently, Ding received second at the World Cup and will be playing in the Candidates Tournament in 2018.

Carlsen is a Norwegian chess grandmaster, and the current World Chess Champion. Carlsen was a child chess prodigy who became a chess grandmaster in 2004, at the age of 13 years and 148 days. This made him the third-youngest grandmaster in history. In November 2013 Carlsen became World Champion by defeating Viswanathan Anand in the World Chess Championship 2013. On the May 2014 FIDE rating list, Carlsen reached his peak rating of 2882, which is the highest in history. In November 2016 he defended his world title against Sergey Karjakin.

Lenier Dominguez is a Cuban Grandmaster and was Cuban Chess Championship (2002, 2003, 2006, 2012). His best tournament result was Barcelona 2006, where he scored 8/9 and finished with a performance rating of 2932. On November 8, 2008 he won the World Blitz Championship 2008, held at Almaty in Kazakhstan. Then, in June 2013 he won the FIDE Grand Prix in Thessaloniki as a clear first in a field of twelve elite players.

A former chess prodigy who became the youngest player to pass the 2600 threshold in October 2008, breaking the record previously held by Magnus Carlsen. In February 2015 he entered the World top 10 after tying for second place at the 2015 Tata Steel Chess Tournament. He is a three-time Philippines Chess Champion and also won the Bilbao Chess Masters Final in 2015.

The Bulgarian No. 1 became the FIDE World Chess Champion by winning the FIDE World Chess Championship in 2005. He lost his title in the 2006 World Chess Championship match against Vladimir Kramnik and was also narrowly defeated by Vishy Anand in their match for the World Chess Championship title in 2010. Topalov has competed at nine Chess Olympiads (1994-2000, 2008-2016), winning in Linares, Corus, Dortmund, Stavanger and Pearl Spring tournaments. At his 1994 appearance, Topalov won best overall performance.

Nakamura is a four-time United States Chess Champion who also won the 2011 edition of the Tata Steel Group A. He has represented the United States at five Chess Olympiads, winning two team bronze medals. In May 2014, when FIDE began publishing its official rapid and blitz chess ratings, Nakamura was ranked number one in the world on both lists.

Grishchuk is a Russian Grandmaster and was the Russian Champion in 2009. Grischuk has played in the Candidates tournament three times and is also a three time winning World Blitz Champion. In November 2014, Grishchuk crossed the elite 2800 ELO rating mark when he took clear first place with 5/7 points in the Tashir Chess Tournament in Memory of Tigran Petrosian. Most recently, Grischuk shared first place with Maxime Vachier-Lagrave and Shakhriyar Mamedyarov in the first event of the FIDE Grand Prix 2017 in February.

The No. 4 ranked player in the world Caruana became a Grandmaster at the age of 14 years, 11 months, 20 days. He was the youngest grandmaster in the history of the United States until this record was beaten in 2009 by Ray Robson. In October 2014 he achieved an Elo rating of 2844 becoming the third highest rated player in history. During the 2014 Sinquefield Cup, Caruana won with an unprecedented 7 game winning streak that set a world record for the highest performance rating in chess history. Caruana played as board 1 when the U.S.A. won the chess olympiad for the first time in 40 years in 2016.