Championships

<Age> In 1997, Mamedyarov came second in Azerbaijan's U12 championship and continued his success in the junior nationals by coming first in 2000 in Azerbaijan's U16 and U18 championships. In 2001 he was runner up in the European U16 Championship with 7/9, half a point behind the winner Ernesto Inarkiev and in 2002, he came 2nd in the European Junior Championship with 7.5/11, a point behind the winner Zviad Izoria. Also in 2002 he set a record by winning the European under-18 Championship with 10 points out of 11. In 2003 he won both the under-18 World Championship (with 10/11 – 2 points clear of the field) and the World Junior Championships (2003). In 2005 he reclaimed his junior world title by winning the World Junior Championship (Boys) (2005) with 10.5/13 and raised his rating past the coveted 2700-mark in the process. This was the first time ever – and still the only time - that a contestant has reclaimed the World U-20 Championship title & the 3rd time (the previous being GM Roman Slobodjan of Germany & GM Pablo Zarnicki of Argentina) that a player has claimed this title in his home country (GM Pentala Harikrishna of India was the 4th of 5 players to win the World U-20 Championship title at home).

<National> He won the Azerbaijan Championships of 2001 and 2002.

<Continental> Following on from his solid debut at Aeroflot (see below), the untitled Mamedyarov scored 6.5/11 at the 3rd European Individual Championships (in 2002) in an immensely large field of grandmasters and international masters.

<World> In the FIDE World Cup (2005), which served as the qualifying tournament for ten of the participants in the 2007 Candidates tournament, he defeated Nurlan Ibraev in the tiebreaker of the first round before bowing out in round 2 to Evgeny Najer in the blitz playoff, after ties in the classical games and in the rapid game tiebreakers. In the World Chess Cup (2007) , the winner of which would play Veselin Topalov to determine the challenger for the 2010 World Championship, and the top four of whom would qualify for the 2008-2010 Grand Prix series that would produce some of the participants in the 2011 Candidates, Mamedyarov advanced to the third round after dispatching Khaled Abdel Razik in round one, and Zdenko Kozul in round 2, before bowing out to Ivan Cheparinov in the 3rd round. In the World Cup (2009) , the winner of which would qualify for the World Championship Candidates (2011), Mamedyarov defeated Alexandra Kosteniuk , Vadim Milov , Wang Hao and Viktor Laznicka in the preliminary 4 rounds, before losing to Sergey Karjakin in the quarter finals. Mamedyarov participated in the World Championship Candidates (2011) by strength of his being nominated by the organisers of the original venue (Baku) for the tournament. His participation remained intact although the venue was subsequently changed to Kazan in Russia. His lost to his first round opponent Boris Gelfand by 1.5-2.5 (+0 =3 -1), and was thereby eliminated from the 2012 World Championship cycle. He participated in the World Cup (2011), qualifying via his rating and entered the tournament as the number 3 seed. He defeated Egyptian player Hatim Ibrahim and German GM Daniel Fridman, before unexpectedly losing in the third round to young Ukrainian GM Yaroslav Zherebukh in the 25+10 rapid game tiebreaker, thereby exiting the Cup.

Mamedyarov gave his 2014 World Championship campaign an excellent start in October 2012 by placing =1st at the 1st FIDE Grand Prix London (2012) of the 2012-2013 series alongside Veselin Topalov and Boris Gelfand, scoring 7/11 (+4 -1 =6; TPR 2836) and accumulating 140 GP points. His =4th, a half point behind the three co-leaders at the FIDE Grand Prix Tashkent (2012), earned him another 80 points to take him into the lead for the 2012-2013 Grand Prix series with 220 points. A poor result in the FIDE Grand Prix Zug (2013), where he placed equal last with 4.5/11 may be overtaken by a better result in his next Grand Prix event, probably the 5th event which may be held in Berlin, however, he is still 2nd in the overall standings behind Veselin Topalov.

Tournaments

In 1999, 2000 and 2001, Mamedyarov won 1st place in the BP Amoco Cup Tournaments in Baku. In his first foray into the Aeroflot A tournament in 2002, the then untitled Mamedyarov scored an extremely creditable 5.5/9, a point off the lead, in a veritable sea of Grandmasters. Still untitled, he came =2nd in the Saraybahce Euro Grand Prix in Turkey in 2002 , a half point behind Mikhail Gurevich and alongside Vasil Spasov, Baadur Jobava , Antoaneta Stefanova, Valeriane Gaprindashvili and Mihai-Lucian Grunberg . In 2003, he came 3rd in the 4th Young Masters (2003); in 2004, he came 2nd to Luke McShane in the 5th Lausanne Young Masters (2004), losing to him in the final; and placed 3rd in the 2005 edition of the Lausanne Young Masters. In 2004, he was the outright winner of the 6th Dubai Open (2004) with 7/9 and also the President's Cup in Baku. In 2005, he came =2nd at Corus Tournament: Group B (2005) behind Karjakin. Mamedyarov’s second win of the World Junior attracted an invitation to the Essent Tournament (2006) , which he won on tiebreak ahead of Judit Polgar , and then followed up this success by winning 11th Essent Chess Tournament (2007) . He won joint first place in Aeroflot Open (2006) in Moscow in February 2006, with a score of 6½/9, although Jobava won on count back. He came =1st with Gabriel Sargissian , Ahmed Adly , Pentala Harikrishna , and Igor Alexandre Nataf at the XXII Reykjavik Open (2006) with 7/9, with Sargissian winning on count back. In 2007, he came =2rd in the Mtel Masters (2007) with 5/10, half a point behind Veselin Topalov and won the 11th Essent Chess Tournament (2007) Crown Group with 4.5/6. In 2008, Mamedyarov placed 3rd place in the Sparkassen Chess Meeting (2008) at Dortmund. His results in the 2008-2010 Grand Prix were modest. His best was 7.5/13 in the Baku Grand Prix (2008) , half point behind 3 joint leaders. Then came the Elista Grand Prix (2008) with 6.5/13 followed by 6/13 at the 4th FIDE Grand Prix (2009) in Nalchik. He was 2nd with 7/13 at the FIDE Grand Prix (2010) .

In 2009, he was =2nd alongside Valerij Filippov with 7.5/10 at the 4th Kolkata Open Grandmaster Chess Tournament (2009) , half a point behind Le Quang Liem . In 2010, he tied for first place with Vladimir Kramnik and Gata Kamsky in the President's Cup in Baku, and followed up with a joint win in the Tal Memorial (2010) alongside Karjakin and Aronian. In 2011, he scored 6/9 to come =4th in the Baku Open (2011) and in 2012 he scored 7.5/11 (+6 -1 =3) to come =3rd at the Tradewise Gibraltar (2012). He withdrew after eight rounds from the 13th European Individual Championship (2012) after forfeiting two games, one for arriving late under the controversial FIDE rule, and one for agreeing to a draw without asking the arbiters.

Olympiads

He played first reserve for Azerbaijan in the 34th Olympiad in Istanbul in 2000, and board 2 in the 35th Bled Olympiad (2002), the 36th Olympiad (2004) in 2004, and the 38th Olympiad (2008) in Dresden. He played top board in the 39th Chess Olympiad (2010) in Khanty-Mansiysk, coming 6th on board 1 with 6.5/10 and a 2778 TPR. At the Chess Olympiad (2012), he won the gold medal for board 3 with the stunning score of 8.5/10 for a TPR of 2880.

Teams

Mamedyarov has long been an excellent and prolific team player. He has played in the European Team Championships, the European Club Cup, the German Bundesliga, and in team championships in Turkey, Spain, Russia, Macedonia and Spain. He has also played in the World Team Championship (2010), where he scored 8/9 on board 4 (TPR 2950), winning an individual gold and helping his team to 4th place. In the World Chess Team Championship (2011), he played board 4, scoring 5/9.

Distinctions include winning 2nd place on Board 2 in the European Team Championship in 2003 and winning 1st place on Board 1 at the 21st European Club Cup (2005). In 2006, he scored 7.5/9 in the Russian Teams Championship and was the best player of the French Club Championship, scoring 9 points out of 11. He won a bronze medal on Board 1 in the European Club Cup (2007) in Turkey, a bronze on Board 1 in the Euro Club Cup (2008) in Kallithea, Greece, and was the best individual player with 8/9 at the World Team Chess Championships 2009. Shakhriyar won bronze with the Azerbaijani Chess team in the European Team Chess Championships (2007), individual and team gold in 17th European Team Championship (2009), individual gold (for board 3) and team silver at the European Team Championship (2011) and team gold for his team SOCAR Baku in the 28th European Club Cup (2012).

Match

In 2003, he drew a match that was held in Azerbaijan, dubbed the “Match of Champions”, with Iranian GM Ehsan Ghaem Maghami with a score of 3-3.

Rapids

Mamedyarov won the 2007 Rapid Tournament in the Czech Republic, the 2008 Rapid Tournament, Corsica, and the Ordix Open (2009), a rapid tournament, with a record-breaking score of 10/11.

Rating

Mamedyarov's FIDE ratings as of 1 May 2013 are:

<Classical> 2753, ranking him number 1 in Azerbaijan and number 13 in the world

<Rapid> 2726, world number 23; and

<Blitz> 2777, world number 9.

Personal

Mamedyarov’s father taught him how to play chess in the summer of 1993 and in that year he commenced attendance at chess school in Sumgayit where his first chess trainer was Valide Bayramova. Shakhriyar has two sisters, Zeinab Mamedjarova and Turkan Mamedjarova, who are both WGMs. Hobbies include football, bowling, music, ping-pong, horse-riding.