The participants of the Chess Olympiad 2018 get to know Ugra
This Sunday, March 23, in the vicinity of Batumi at the stadium “Black Sea Arena” the opening ceremony of the 43rd World Chess Olympiad took place. Participants and guests were greeted by Georgian President Giorgi Margvelashvili and other officials.
Besides the main games of the Olympiad that attracted players from 189 countries, the program of the event includes tournaments for amateurs, exhibitions and presentations. In particular, the host of the next, 44th World Chess Olympiad – Ugra, presented its expo panel at the tournament. Many chess players, participants, organizers and representatives of FIDE from different countries wanted to become acquainted with the Khanty-Mansiysk Autonomous Okrug ahead of schedule.
For instance the panel was visited by the FIDE President Candidate Arkady Dvorkovich, the fifth female world champion in the chess’ history, the first female international grandmaster, the first female international grandmaster among men Nona Gaprindashvili and the sixth female world champion, nine-times winner of the Chess Olympian Maia Chiburdanidze.
The Governor of Ugra Natalia Komarova will join the delegation later. As a part of the closing ceremony there will be the handover of the FIDE flag to the next Olympiad host – Khanty-Mansiysk.
The right to host the Olympiad was given to Khanty-Mansiysk in Baku in September 2016. The participants of the General Assembly of FIDE unanimously voted for the candidacy of the Ugra capital. It should be noted that in addition to the 2020 Olympiad, in the next couple of years Khanty-Mansiysk will host two more major tournaments: the Women’s World Chess Championship, which will be held in November 2018, and the World Cup in 2019.
The 43rd World Chess Olympiad has been taking place in Batumi (Georgia) from September 23 to October 6. Men’s team of Russia represented by Vladimir Kramnik, Ian Nepomnyashchiy, Sergey Karyakin, Nikita Vitiugov and a player from Ugra Dmitry Jakovenko, has the second starting number. The first place belongs to USA team, the reigning champion of Chess Olympiad. The main rivals of our chess players are teams of China, India, Azerbaijan, Ukraine, France, Armenia, Great Britain and Israel. Meanwhile the Russian chess players top the rating list of the women’s tournament. Team Russia is represented by Alexandra Kosteniuk, Alexandra Goryachkina, Valentina Gunina, Natalia Pogonina and Ugra chess player Olga Girya. Their main competitors are teams of China, Georgia, Ukraine, India, France, Poland and Kazakhstan.
Recently the first round of the 43rd World Chess Olympiad has ended. In men’s tournament team Russia won the match against team Uganda with a shutout. During the second round team Russia will face Ireland. Women’s team Russia defeated Costa Rica with a score 3,5:0,5. Valentina Gunina, Natalia Pogonina and Olga Girya won, Alexandra Goryachkina had a draw.
Photo: David Llada, Goga Chanadiri