45th VILLA DE BENASQUE INTERNATIONAL CHESS OPEN 2026. PREVIEW

Everything is ready for the Benasque Sports Pavilion to welcome, from Sunday onwards, the more than 500 players registered for the 45th edition of the International Chess Open.

This is a special edition, in which the Open and the Blitz Tournament will be joined by the Spanish Mixed Pairs Championship, which, together with the parallel activities, will make for a packed calendar full of activity throughout the 10 days of the tournament.

The ranking is headed by the Americans Mikhail Antipov and Brandon Jakobson, both rated over 2600 Elo points. They are followed by Bulgaria’s Petkov, India’s Samant, and Colombia’s Cardoso. The highest-ranked Spaniard is Grandmaster Renier Castellanos, who is tenth in the ranking.

The women’s ranking is clearly led by Spanish Olympiad player Anna Matnatze, followed by the American Thalia Cervantes, Murcia’s Elena Rodríguez, and Aragon’s Belén Miranda.

The veterans’ ranking is truly outstanding, featuring three champions in Benasque: Navarre’s Jesús De La Villa, winner in 1982; Huesca’s Roberto Cifuentes, winner in 1998; and Elizbar Ubilava, winner of the 1990 Magistral and the 2001 Open, one of the most beloved players in Benasque.

The under-18 category is set to be very open, with Navarre’s Javier Habans, recent bronze medallist at the Under-18 World Championship, competing against Germany’s Bennet Hagner and Chile’s Mauricio Marrujo.

For the second year running, there will be three prizes for the best Aragonese federation players, sponsored by the Aragonese Chess Federation, and three prizes for the best players from Benasque.

The remaining prizes are the same as last year, with a first prize of 10,000 euros for the champion and a significant number of Elo-category prizes, bringing the total prize fund to more than 50,000 euros, which is a major incentive for all participants.

The organisers will comply with the FIDE anti-cheating protocol, with checks at the players’ entrance. Mobile phones and electronic devices that could provide access to any kind of assistance are prohibited.

An important new feature is that the number of games available to follow online has been increased from 10 to 35, a significant effort aimed at keeping the Open at the forefront.