In the first round, Uzbekistan’s Rustam Kasimdzhanov played with black figures against the world chess Olympic Games winner Shahriyor Mamedyarov from Azerbaijan. In the parties, which lasted more than four hours, the forces of the competitors were equal.

Parties between Ruslan Ponomariov (Ukraine) and Wang Hao (China), Peter Svidler (Russia) and Fabiano Caruana (Italy), Boris Gelfand (Israel) and Peter Leko (Hungary) also ended in a draw.

The Russian chess player Sergey Karjakin beated Cuban Leinier Dominguez Perez, Alexander Morozevich (Russia) – the American Gata Kamskiy and it allowed winners to gather the first points.