The Champions Chess Tour Julius Baer Generation Cup 2024 was held from September 25 to October 1 as an online affair. It featured a prize fund of $300,000 and offered the world’s best chess players a final opportunity to secure their place in the CCT Finals.
The final event of the Champions Chess Tour 2024 concluded with a familiar result, as GM Magnus Carlsen clinched Division I with a 2.5-1.5 win over GM Alireza Firouzja in the Grand Final. The World No 1 took home $30,000 as winnings while his young foe pocketed $20,000 for his troubles.
It was a hard-fought win for Carlsen, who drew the first three games before eking out a brilliant opening in the fourth and final game to emerge as the champion. The Danish legend felt it was his best match so far considering its high qualify:
“I felt like I was rarely in a lot of danger today, even though I guess I was lost in the second game, but I don't think any of us actually realized that. I felt like this was my best match so far and it feels really good to finish off with that.”
The Julius Baer Generation Cup 2024 recorded 693.2K Hours Watched, 88.4K Peak Viewers, and 27K Average Viewers over an airtime of 25 and a half hours. This put it among the ten most popular Chess tournaments in 2024, a table led by the FIDE Candidates Chess Tournaments 2024.
Magnus Carlsen remains integral to the live-streaming viewership stats of these events. His official channel on YouTube was the top one by watch time and peak concurrent spectators at this competition, not the first time such a thing has happened at an event he has participated in.
There were two other segments in this Chess tournament, with GM Wesley So clinching Division II after a white win in armageddon over GM Denis Lazavik and earning $15,000. GM Fabiano Caruana claimed Division III with a game to spare, the 2.5-0.5 win against GM Vincent Keymer handing him $7,500.
Readers must note that the Champions Chess Tour Julius Baer Generation Cup 2024 is part of the larger Champions Chess Tour 2024 series. The next competition, Champions Chess Tour Finals 2024, is Chess.com's most important tournament of the year.
Scheduled to be held at the Screen Studios in Oslo, Norway, from December 14 to 21, it will be the first Tour final with a live audience. A total purse of $500,000 will be on the line, including $200,000 for the winner.
Most popular Chess events in 2024 (as of Oct 11)
| #
|
Event name
|
Peak Viewers
|
|---|---|---|
| 1
|
FIDE Candidates Chess Tournaments 2024
|
337 656
|
| 2
|
Speed Chess Championship 2024
|
223 229
|
| 3
|
Norway Chess 2024
|
140 822
|
| 4
|
45th FIDE Chess Olympiad 2024
|
136 401
|
| 5
|
Chessable Masters 2024
|
114 377
|
| 6
|
Champions Chess Tour Chess.com Classic 2024
|
99 334
|
| 7
|
Champions Chess Tour Julius Baer Generation Cup 2024
|
88 471
|
| 8
|
Bullet Chess Championship 2024
|
80 172
|
| 9
|
Tata Steel Chess 2024
|
75 207
|
| 10
|
GRENKE Chess Classic and Open 2024
|
66 081
|
The eight Chess stars to have qualified for the CCT Finals either by winning any of the online events of the tour or through the CCT leaderboard are:
- Magnus Carlsen
- Alireza Firouzja
- Maxime Vachier-Lagrave
- Ian Nepomniachtchi
- Wesley So
- Denis Lazavik
- Vincent Keymer
- Levon Aronian
It will run over three stages — Round-Robin, Survival, and Finals — with all games being played over the board with a 10+2 time control. It will be broadcast on the official Chess.com YouTube and Twitch channels alongside the site's won live streaming service, while fans interested in attending the event live can check for tickets on this link.
