Corus chess tournament

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The Corus chess tournament takes place every year, usually in January, in a small town called Wijk aan Zee in the province of North Holland in the Netherlands. It was called the Hoogovens tournament before the Dutch steel and aluminium producer Koninklijke Hoogovens merged with British Steel to form the Corus Group on 6 October 1999. Corus first sponsored the event in 2000. From 1938 to 1967, the tournament took place in Beverwijk.

While it is true that very strong chess players compete in the prestigious tournament, regular club players are welcome to play as well. The top 'A' section pits 14 of the world's best against each other in a round-robin tournament. Since 1938, there has been a long list of famous winners, including: Max Euwe, Bent Larsen, Tigran Petrosian, Paul Keres, Efim Geller, Lajos Portisch, Boris Spassky, Mikhail Botvinnik, Mikhail Tal, Viktor Korchnoi, Anatoly Karpov, Vladimir Kramnik, Garry Kasparov and Viswanathan Anand. In fact, of the world champions since World War II, only the names of Vassily Smyslov and Bobby Fischer are missing. In 2001, nine of the top ten players in the world participated.

Viswanathan Anand is the only player to have won five titles of the Corus chess tournament (he won one of these titles when it was called Hoogovens tournament) in its long history.

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