Burak Firat, Turkey, is the second Grandmaster to join Stockholm Chess Challenge April 30–May 5. The first Grandmaster to join was the winner of the swedish championships 2016: Erik Blomqvist.

Photo: YouTube

The Turkish chess-federation was a decade ago very small but last years they made fantastic progress which many other federations can only dream of. In 2006 suddenly 1,1 million euro was injected in Turkish chess and this didn’t stop. A massive recruiting campaign started which at beginning of 2014 already gathered more than 350.000 members.

Soon enough the young turkish chess player started to achieve norms. Burak Firat (born 1993) was one of them, and he has now the Grandmaster title and will be an interesting contender in Stockholm Chess Challenge April 30–May 5.