The first two events, both open tournaments, are now history.
At the Rilton Cup five players entered the last round tied for first, and they all drew their games. Remarkably, not one of the six players in the next score group managed to win either, so it ended with the same players tied for first: Rozentalis, Wojtaszek, Ponkratov, McShane and Lysyj, all of whom finished with 6½/9. Rozentalis had the best tiebreak score, so if there was a special prize for first and if there's no playoff system, it would seem that he would be the recipient.
At Hastings, round 8 had seen the seven-way tie for first winnow down to a pair of leaders: Istratescu and Hebden. They decided to call it a day after 11 less than thrilling moves and to hope that none of the five players in the next score group would catch them. Not quite: Edouard defeated Ansell and Howell beat Hracek - in both cases with Black - to join the tie. Hebden, Istratescu, Edouard and Howell all finished with 7 point out of 9. In this case, I know neither the tiebreak nor playoff order (or even if it's relevant to the prize-giving or titles).
Not quite finished, but almost finished in both the literal and metaphorical senses, is the Reggio Emilia tournament. As usual, it was a hard fought round with all the draws reaching endings. The only game to go less than 40 moves was Almasi-Vocaturo, and that's because White won! It's good news for Almasi, who leads by a point with just one round to go. Unfortunately for Almasi, he'll have Black against his closest pursuer, Kamsky, in the last round.
Standings After Round 8:
1. Almasi 6½
2. Kamsky 5½
3-4. Caruana, Godena 4½
5-7. Landa, Jobava, Bologan 4
8. Safarli 3
9. Brunello 2½
10. Vocaturo 1½
Finally, the World Team Championship kicked off today, with the following results:
Azerbaijan 2½ - Armenia 1½ (Mamedyarov was the only winner, vs. Pashikian.)
Turkey 1 - USA 3 (But the Turks' one win was very nice: Can Emre - Shuman.)
India 2½ - Greece 1½ (India was lucky - that's my story and I'm sticking to it.)
Russia 2½ - Brazil 1½ (The only decisive game was Grischuk's endgame win over Vescovi.)
Egypt 1 - Israel 3 (Wins by Sutovsky and Postny.)