The 19th Amber Blindfold and Rapid tournament takes place in Nice from March 13 (first round) to March 25 (last round). The 12 participants according to their ELO are:
- Magnus Carlsen – Norway (2813)
 - Vladimir Kramnik - Russia (2790)
 - Levon Aronian – Armenia (2782)
 - Alexander Grischuk – Russia (2756)
 - Peter Svidler – Russia (2750)
 - Boris Gelfand – Israel (2750)
 - Vasily Ivanchuk - Ukraine (2748)
 - Vugar Gashimov – Azerbaijan (2740)
 - Ruslan Ponomariov – Ukraine (2737)
 - Sergey Karjakin - Russia (2725)
 - Leinier Dominguez – Cuba (2713)
 - Jan Smeets – The Netherlands (2651)
 
