Vietnam’s number two chess player enters top int’l bullet semifinals

Le Tuan Minh at the national chess championship in Hanoi, 2020. Photo by VnExpress/Xuan Binh

Minh led Sadhwani 4-3 after the first 15 minutes, then scored 4.5 more points in the next six games to lead 8.5-4.5. Overall, Minh won 10-7 to advance.

The Bullet Chess Championship was hosted by chess.com for the first time in 2019 with a prize pool of $15,000. It’s considered the top bullet chess tournament in the world. In 2022, the prize pool went up to $100,000. The tournament takes place from Feb. 21 to March 17, starting from the qualifiers. Minh has a high Elo rating on bullet on chess.com so didn’t have to play the qualifiers.

The main event is a 16-player double elimination knockout bracket. Four qualified players join 12 invited players to play the main event. Players who lose a match go to the losers bracket and if they continue to lose, are eliminated from the event. Grand Finals consist of up to two matches, where a player from the loser bracket has to win twice to become the champion.

A 30-minute countdown clock marks the match duration, with a break at the 15-minute mark with no added time. The higher-rated player starts with white in the first game of the match. Players win 1 point for a win, 0.5 points for a draw, and 0 points for a loss. The player who scores the most points during the match wins.

Minh, 26, is the only non-grandmaster in the semifinals. With an Elo rating of 2,514, he needs another chess title to become one.