The 54th edition of the Iranian Chess Championship was held in the capital of the country Teheran. The head of national chess federation Farhad Nikoshal made the first symbolic move in this marathon 16-player round-robin event with classical time control.

The tournament turned into an exciting race of the rating favoгrite Parham Maghsoodloo and third-rated player Pouya Idani. After splitting a point in their first-round encounter the duo steamrolled the competition and quickly pulled away winning one game after another.

A half-way through the event only one question remained: “Who out of these two is going to take gold?” Maghsoodloo conceded his opponents just two draws and clinched the title with a fantastic result 14 points out of 15. It is Parham’s third gold in national championships. He repeated his success of 2017 and 2018. The champion picked up 21.8 rating points and took home a cash prize of 4,000$.

Idani made two extra draws and finished with impressive 13 points (+26.1 rating increase), 3½ points (!) ahead of Aryan Gholami who tied for third place with Amin Tabatabaei but took bronze thanks to better tiebreaks.

Final standings:

1. Parham Maghsoodloo (2676) – 14
2. Pouya Idani (2588) – 13
3. Aryan Gholami (2507) – 9½
4. Amin Tabatabaei (2629) – 9½
5. Ehsan Ghaem Maghami (2561) – 8½
6. Khalil Mousavi Seyed (2522) – 8
7. Masoud Mosadeghpour (2498) – 7½
8. Mahdi Gholami Orimi   (2428) – 7½
9. Pouria Darini (2432) – 7
10. Arash Daghli (2431) – 7
11. Bardiya Daneshvar (2401) – 7
12. Abtin Atakhan (2294) – 6
13. Arman Hakemi (2316) – 5½
14. Mani Jahedi (2201) – 4½
15. Bardia Veisi (2273) – 3
16. Mahdi Nikookar (2239) – 2½ 

Photo: Iran Chess Federation