Armenia got a wonderful week: Levon Aronyan

YEREVAN, OCTOBER 14, ARMENPRESS: The leader of the Armenian National Chess Men team Levon Aronyan touched upon the latest sports events taking place in Armenia and the birthday anniversary of Yerevan. Armenpress reports that Aronyan wrote in his official Twitter page: “What a wonderful week it was for Armenia. I won in the Grand Slam tournament, the Armenian national football team won and our capital Yerevan has become 2975 years old”.

The Armenian chess player was taking part in the Grand Slam 6th tournament (Chess Masters Final) taking place on October 7-13 2013 in Bilbao, Spain. He got 10 points and become the winner of the tournament.

In the FIDE October rankings Levon Aronyan was on the third horizontal. The Armenian Grand Master had 2795 points.

Aronyan was born on 6 October 1982 in Yerevan, Armenia.An early sign of his ability came when he won the 1994World Youth Chess Championship(under-12) inSzegedwith 8/9, ahead of future luminariesÉtienne Bacrot,Ruslan Ponomariov,Francisco Vallejo Pons, andAlexander Grischuk. Aronyan was declared the best sportsman of Armenia in 2005and was awarded the title of "Honored Master of Sport of the Republic of Armenia" in 2009.

Aronyan won theChess World Cup 2005. He led the Armenian national team to the Gold medals in the2006 (Turin),2008 (Dresden) and2012 (Istanbul)Chess Olympicsand at theWorld Team Chess ChampionshipinNingbo2011. He won theFIDE Grand Prix 2008–2010, qualifying him for the Candidates tournament for theWorld Chess Championship 2012, where he was knocked out in the first round. He was also WorldChess960Champion in 2006 and 2007,World Rapid Chess Championin 2009, andWorld Blitz Chess Championin 2010.

Aronyan holds a diploma from theArmenian State Institute of Physical Culture.

Aronyan played for Armenia in theChess Olympiadsof 1996, 2004, 2006, 2008, and 2010.He took team bronze medal in 2004 and team gold medal in 2006, 2008 and 2012. In the2010 Chess Olympiadhe won the silver medal for his individual performance on board one.He was a member of the gold-medal winning Armenian team at theWorld Team Chess Championshipin 2011.