YEREVAN, FEBRUARY 4, ARMENPRESS:  The leader of the Armenian national chess men’s team Levon Aronian took a victory over the world champion Magnus Carlsen in the rapid chess tournament of Zurich.

Armenpress reports that on the last day of the strongest tournament of Zurich the participants measured forces in the rapid chess. In the first round Aronian won Vishy Anand. Magnus Carlsen defeated Boris Gelfand. Hikaru Nakamura-Fabiano Caruana couple was the last to finish the round. Caruana had success in the round. 

In the second round Aronian defeated Magnus Carlsen with obvious advantage. Nakamura defeated Anand, while Gelfand- Caruana couple shared the point.

Zurich Chess Challenge was launched on January 29 and will end today on February 4.

Levon Grigori Aronian is an Armenian chess Grandmaster. On the May 2012 FIDE list, he was ranked number two in the world and had an Elo rating of 2825, making him the third highest rated player in history.

Aronian won the Chess World Cup 2005. He led the Armenian national team to the Gold medals in the 2006 (Turin), 2008 (Dresden) and 2012 (Istanbul) Chess Olympics and at the World Team Chess Championship in Ningbo 2011. He won the FIDE Grand Prix 2008–2010, qualifying him for the Candidates tournament for the World Chess Championship 2012, where he was knocked out in the first round. He was also World Chess960 Champion in 2006 and 2007, World Rapid Chess Champion in 2009, and World Blitz Chess Champion in 2010.

Aronian was declared the best sportsman of Armenia in 2005 and was awarded the title of "Honored Master of Sport of the Republic of Armenia" in 2009.

Aronian was born on 6 October 1982 in Yerevan, Armenia, to Seda Sarkisovna, an Armenian mining engineer, and Grigory Leontievich, a Jewish physicist. He was taught to play chess by his sister Lilit at the age of nine. His first coach was the Grandmaster Melikset Khachiyan. An early sign of his ability came when he won the 1994 World Youth Chess Championship (under-12) in Szeged with 8/9, ahead of future luminaries Étienne Bacrot, Ruslan Ponomariov, Francisco Vallejo Pons, and Alexander Grischuk.

Aronian holds a diploma from the Armenian State Institute of Physical Culture.