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The Xtracon Chess Open (formerly the Politiken Cup) is an international chess tournament and the main feature event of the annual Copenhagen Chess Festival.

History

Organized by the Copenhagen Chess Federation (KSU), it was originally set up to give Danish players the opportunity of international experience and title norms. Starting from modest means in 1979, with just 22 contestants, it has grown to become one of the world's largest and most respected open chess tournaments, with numbers of participants rising to 200 in 2003, and nowadays reaching well in excess of 400.

The tournament has attracted many of the world's strongest grandmasters as well as promising youngsters. Former world champion Vassily Smyslov was among the winners in 1980^[1] and 1986,^[2] while other notable winners have included Viktor Korchnoi as clear first in 1996 at the age of 65 and Nigel Short in 2006.^[3] At the Politiken Cup in 2003, Magnus Carlsen achieved his third and final IM norm.

The early editions were held in Copenhagen and its suburbs, before moving to Helsingør. The tournament has always taken the format of a large "Open", accessible to both titled and non-titled players, except in 1983, when there was an invite-only, all-play-all Grandmaster event and a subsidiary Open tournament aimed at International Master level.

In later years the tournament has taken place during July/August, over 10 rounds, at the Konventum, a convention centre and resort set in the scenic surroundings of Helsingør.

From 1979 to 2015, the main sponsor was the Danish daily newspaper Politiken, but new arrangements have been announced for 2016–2018. The main sponsor is now Xtracon A/S, a Danish IT company with a chess playing owner. Accordingly, the tournament has been renamed to reflect the change, although it is anticipated that the format will remain broadly the same.^[4]

List of winners (Politiken Cup)

#	Year	Winners	Points
1	1979	Carsten Høi	7½ (10)
2	1980	Vassily Smyslov, Adrian Mikhalchishin	7½ (10)
3	1981	Petar Velikov, Tom Wedberg, Shaun Taulbut	7½ (10)
4	1982	Tom Wedberg	7½ (10)
5	1983	István Csom, Sergey Kudrin	5½ (9)
6	1984	Nick de Firmian, Aleksander Sznapik	7½ (10)
7	1985	Karel Mokry	7½ (10)
8	1986	Vassily Smyslov, Alexander Chernin, Evgeny Pigusov, Laszlo Cserna	7 (10)
9	1987	Bjørn Brinck-Claussen	7½ (10)
10	1988	Rafael Vaganian	8 (10)
11	1989	Lars Karlsson, Aleksander Sznapik, Jens Kristiansen	7½ (10)
12	1990	Konstantin Lerner	7½ (10)
13	1991	Yuri Dokhoian, Yuri Piskov	8 (10)
14	1992	Sergey Smagin, Matthew Sadler, John Emms, Avigdor Bykhovsky	7½ (10)
15	1993	Igor Khenkin, John Emms, Henrik Danielsen	7½ (10)
16	1994	Valery Neverov, Michail Brodsky	7½ (10)
17	1995	Lars Bo Hansen	8 (10)
18	1996	Viktor Korchnoi	8½ (11)
19	1997	Helgi Grétarsson, Carsten Høi, Erling Mortensen, Lars Schandorff	8½ (11)
20	1998	Hannes Stefánsson, Daniel Gormally, Tiger Hillarp Persson Lars Schandorff, Nikolaj Borge	8½ (11)
21	1999	Alexander Baburin, Tiger Hillarp Persson	8½ (11)
22	2000	Boris Gulko, Lars Bo Hansen, Jonny Hector	8½ (11)
23	2001	Mikhail Gurevich, Alexander Rustemov, Peter Heine Nielsen Lev Psakhis, Nick de Firmian	8½ (11)
24	2002	Sergei Tiviakov, Alexander Beliavsky, Rubén Felgaer	8½ (11)
25	2003	Krishnan Sasikiran	9 (11)
26	2004	Darmen Sadvakasov, Leif Johannessen, Nick de Firmian	8 (10)
27	2005	Konstantin Sakaev	8 (10)
28	2006	Vadim Malakhatko, Nigel Short, Jonny Hector	7½ (9)
29	2007	Michal Krasenkov, Gabriel Sargissian, Emanuel Berg Nick de Firmian, Vladimir Malakhov	8 (10)
30	2008	Sergei Tiviakov, Vladimir Malakhov, Yuriy Kuzubov Peter Heine Nielsen, Boris Savchenko, Jonny Hector	8 (10)
31	2009	Parimarjan Negi, Boris Avrukh	8½ (10)
32	2010	Pavel Eljanov	8½ (10)
33	2011	Igor Kurnosov	8½ (10)
34	2012	Ivan Cheparinov, Ivan Sokolov, Jonny Hector	8 (10)
35	2013^[5]	Parimarjan Negi	9 (10)
36	2014^[6]	Bu Xiangzhi	9 (10)
37	2015^[7]	Markus Ragger, Liviu-Dieter Nisipeanu, Jon Ludvig Hammer Laurent Fressinet, Tiger Hillarp Persson, Sam Shankland Sébastien Mazé, Mihail Marin, Sune Berg Hansen, Vitaly Kunin	8 (10)

List of winners (Xtracon Chess Open)

#	Year	Winners	Points
1	2016	Matthias Blübaum, Alexei Shirov, Bassem Amin, Jonathan Carlstedt Mihail Marin, Jon Ludvig Hammer, Jean-Marc Degraeve	8 (10)
2	2017	Baadur Jobava	8½ (10)
3	2018	Jon Ludvig Hammer, Dmitry Andreikin^[8]	8½ (10)
4	2019	R Praggnanandhaa	8½ (10)