Σκακιστικά νέα

Azerbaijan will hold two round robin tournaments in memory of Vugar Gashimov from 19 to 30 April in Shamkir, Teymur Tushiev of ExtraTime.az confirmed for Chessdom.

Oslo Metropolitan Area (OMA) is preparing to participate in MIPIM real estate exhibition on 11-14 March at Palais des Festivals, Cannes, France.

Law firm “Simonsen Vogt Wiig”, one of Magnus Carlsen’s personal sponsors, is member of OMA. For this reason Carlsen will come to the Oslo stand of the congress.

The selection of “The Study of the Year” is organized by the World Federation for Chess Composition and aimed at introducing a single friendly endgame study to the general public.

The study should appeal to chess players of various levels and encourage them to pay more attention to endgame studies.

Composers were invited to submit a single study (either their own or by others) that was published (either in a magazine or in an award) during the year 2012.

The English Chess Federation Chief Executive Phil Ehr called an urgent, additional Board meeting on Saturday 8th February 2014 with the following agenda:

GM Petar Drenchev leads the Bulgarian National Championship Semifinal. After four rounds GM Drenchev is with 3,5/4, after defeating IM Pavel Dimitrov, Daniil Danov, and Kiril Terzijski, and drawing with IM Marholev.

Botswana is located in Southern Africa and if one can imagine a map of African Continent like chess board it’s easy to find Botswana on the second rank near to South Africa.

The population of the country is about 2 millions but the territory is so huge that the density is 3.4 people/km2 (in comparison density in India is 376 people/km2), which makes Botswana one of the most sparsely populated countries in the world.

The 1st International Chess Open Casino Graz 2014 is set to take place from 14th to 21st February at the Casino Graz and Joanneum Quarter in Graz, Austria.

The tournament will be held in two groups: Open A for all players and Open B for players rated under 2000. Both groups will be played over 9 rounds of Swiss system.

The total prize fund is 6,750 EUR. The top prize in Open A is 1400 EUR and in Open B 450 EUR.

Dansk Skoleskak and Capital of Children are hosting this year’s Nordic Championships in School Chess in Denmark for the first time in 6 years on February 13-16, 2014. Young people from Iceland, Faroe Islands, Norway, Sweden, Finland, and Denmark will spend this year’s winter holidays in Billund and fight to become Nordic School Chess Champion.

The chess engine Critter, created by the Slovakian software developer Richard Vida, leads Stage 1a of the top world computer chess championship TCEC.

Andrey Filatov, recently elected President of Russian Chess Federation, gave a long interview for the popular newspaper “Sport-Express”.