Women's World Championship Stalwarts

A few years ago, in a post on my main blog titled World Championship Stalwarts (October 2015), I developed a few statistics:-

[Re] the 'World Championship : Index of players'. I started to ask myself a few questions -- How many events does the index of players include? How many players? Which players participated in the most events? -- and so on.

Why not do the same for the World Chess Championship : Index of Women Players? I used that page to build a database, then developed the same sort of chart shown on the 'Stalwarts' post.

I counted 451 different women players who participated in 73 events. The events start with the 1949-50 Title Tournament, so none of the pre-WWII events won by Vera Menchik are included in the counts.

The table on the left shows how many players participated in a specific number of events. The table on the right gives the names of the players with the most events. For example, two players participated in 19 events, and 211 players participated in a single event. The two players topping the list, Maia Chiburdanidze and Nona Gaprindashvili, were both from the country of Georgia.

The original 'Stalwarts' post mentioned a number of other statistical curiosities. If there is no forthcoming news about the current cycle of the World Championship -- not that I'm expecting any -- I'll apply the same analysis to the 'Index of Women Players'.

Yekaterinburg Candidates - Players

As I wrote in last week's post, Yekaterinburg Candidates - 1st Half Crosstable,

I added the crosstable and PGN for the first half of the tournament to the '2020 CT' page.

The code '2020 CT' refers to my page on the 2020 Candidates Tournament. For this current post, I added the nine players in the CT to my page World Chess Championship : Index of players. 'Nine players?', you ask; aren't there only eight? I included Teimour Radjabov, because even though he didn't play, FIDE has to take his initial qualification and subsequent withdrawal into consideration. He was the only stakeholder who correctly assessed the impact of the coronavirus.

Yekaterinburg Candidates - 1st Half Crosstable

It's been more than four months since the 2020 Candidates Tournament was suspended mid-way, an action last discussed on this blog in Yekaterinburg Candidates - Intermezzo. I expected to have some news on its continuation by now, but there is little in the public domain. In last week's post, FIDE Newsletters Revisited, I noted,

The [FIDE] Council plans to make a final decision on the dates and location of the second part of the FIDE Candidates tournament 2020 during July 2020. Resuming the competition in a host country other than Russia is one of the possibilities that is being explored.

That quote was from Newsletter #009, dated 6 July 2020. Since that 'final' decision might be dragged out for months I added the crosstable and PGN for the first half of the tournament to the '2020 CT' page referenced in the first link above. Whatever FIDE decides, the second half of the tournament will not be a straightforward continuation of the first half. Even if FIDE adheres to the rules established before the event, the dynamics will have changed completely.

FIDE Newsletters Revisited

Since my first post on FIDE Newsletters (May 2020), the world federation has published another six numbers. Unlike many newsletters, the FIDE version is relevant and interesting. Three sections in particular caught my attention. The first two had news about the FIDE Council.

Subject: Newsletter #006
Sent: May 25, 2020

First online meeting of the FIDE Council

The first meeting of the newly established FIDE Council was held online on May 12. For the first time, both Women's World Champion Ju Wenjun and World Champion Magnus Carlsen (represented by his father Henrik) participated in the meeting.

One of the main topics was the approval of the revised FIDE budget for 2020 as proposed by the Management Board, having been adjusted to the new situation. The Council also officially approved the shifting of the 2020 Chess Olympiad to the next year, 2021, keeping the same locations in Russia and within the same time frame, as it had been already announced on March 24th, 2020.

The Council was informed that FIDE received a bid for the 2024 Olympiad from the Hungarian Chess Federation. The documents included detailed information about the plans and initial preparations, while formal inspections will be conducted as soon as the situation allows. Likewise, the Argentinian Chess Federation provided FIDE with a letter of intent to bid for the Olympiad, with a promise to present the whole package with official guarantees by September 2020.

The possibility of organizing an online 2020 General Assembly was also discussed by the Council. To be prepared for such eventuality, Mr. Roberto Rivello, Chairman of the Constitutional Commission, was assigned with the task of developing a plan to implement electronic voting.

The Council approved the creation of the Athletes’ Commission, as well as the liquidation of the Online Commission under the condition that a clear operational framework is established in order to manage and support all FIDE online activities. The Council acknowledged the decisions by the President to appoint the new Chairs for the Planning and Development Commission and the Social Commission.

A complete list of decisions and topics discussed during the meeting is available at the FIDE website.

The group's second online meeting continued to tackle the challenges presented by the coronavirus pandemic.

Subject: Newsletter #009
Sent: July 6, 2020

Main decisions of the FIDE Council meeting

As it is the norm now, the 2nd quarter FIDE Council Meeting was held online, on 23 June 2020. In fact, one of the first and main decisions to be approved during the meeting was the confirmation that the FIDE General Assembly, scheduled for the end of November 2020, will also be held online. This possibility had already been discussed in the previous FIDE Council meeting, on May 12. Back then, Mr. Roberto Rivello, Chairman of the Constitutional Commission, was asked to put together a contingency plan to implement electronic voting.

Among the main decisions were the final approval of the dates for the 2020 Online Olympiad, and to give a green light to some other new online competitions: a top event for juniors, cadet, and seniors, and a World Bullet Chess Championship.

On the other hand, it was approved that all the remaining 2020 competitions under the control of the Events Commission are postponed to 2021 (except World Amateur 2020); all the EVE competitions for 2021 are moved to 2022; and the bidding procedure of 2023 events will be done in 2021. Please note that these postponements do not affect the World Cup 2021 or the Grand Prix, since these events are not supervised by the EVE Commission.

The Council plans to make a final decision on the dates and location of the second part of the FIDE Candidates tournament 2020 during July 2020. Resuming the competition in a host country other than Russia is one of the possibilities that is being explored.

Regarding the World Championship match, the plan is still to hold it in Dubai in connection with the World Expo, with two possible dates: in spring, as a prelude to the Expo, or in autumn, during the first weeks of the World Expo. FIDE will continue monitoring the situation and considering the pros and cons of both scenarios.

A delicate point is the situation affecting the All India Chess Federation, where two factions claim to be the legitimate representatives of Indian chess – both of them backed by different governmental authorities. The FIDE President offered to mediate and received the approval of the Council to arrange a conference call with both parties, trying to establish an agreement that would allow AICF to function until the situation is clarified.

A complete list of decisions and topics discussed during the meeting is available at the FIDE website.

Those mentions of decisions and topics in the last paragraphs refer to the following news items:-

• 2020-05-16: FIDE Council online meeting decisions
• 2020-07-02: Decisions of the 2nd quarter FIDE Online Council Meeting

The third section that interested me was part of a newsletter mostly about 'International Chess Day'.

Subject: Newsletter #010
Sent: July 21, 2020

Anniversaries

On this day in 1924, FIDE was born in Paris. This is hardly news to any chess lover, since the echoes of our birthday celebrations still resound on social media. But, where exactly was our Federation born, and who were its parents? [...]

For the rest of the story, including the names of 'the 15 founding signatories', see the archive of all issues, FIDE Newsletter (fide.com).

International Chess Day 2020

This video features two former World Champions, GMs Anand & Kramnik, and one former Women's World Champion, GM Hou Yifan.

“Chess for Recovering Better” | United Nations and FIDE (1:33:13) • 'Streamed live on Jul 20, 2020'

The description says,

To celebrate the International Chess Day on 20 July, top chess personalities, including the FIDE President Arkady Dvorkovich, Viswanathan Anand, Vladimir Kramnik, Levon Aronian, Hou Yifan will take part in a high-level virtual event - “Chess for Recovering Better”.

The high-level participants of the meeting from the United Nations include H.E. Mr. Mher Margaryan, Ambassador and Permanent Representative of Armenia to the United Nations, and Melissa Ruth Fleming, Under-Secretary-General for Global Communications.

For more about chess's special day see World Chess Day | United Nations (un.org).

2020 World Championship Postponed

Less than three months ago, in 90th FIDE Congress : Whither the World Championship? (April 2020), I wrote,

'The biggest news came at the end of the minutes, although it's entirely possible that the next title match will be postponed because of scheduling complications caused by the coronavirus: 'Mr. Dvorkovich also announced that FIDE has almost finalized its negotiation with the organizers of Dubai Expo 2020 regarding the World Championship Match, which will most probably take place in the United Arab Emirates. The most likely starting date for the tournament will be the 20th December.'

Although the post was dated end-April, the 90th Congress took place end-February. Since then, FIDE has made several announcements concerning the match:-

• 2020-05-16: FIDE Council online meeting decisions • (12 May 2020:) 'OCM-2020/05 - The Council noted that the opening of World EXPO 2020 is confirmed to move to the fourth quarter of 2021 under the same name and with the same organizer, who expressed a clear commitment to host the World Championship Match with the dates and terms to be reconfirmed in a due course.'
  
  
• 2020-06-29: Arkady Dvorkovich: The match for the chess crown will be postponed to 2021
  
  
• 2020-07-02: Decisions of the 2nd quarter FIDE Online Council Meeting • (23 June 2020:) 'Q2OC-2020/9 -To continue monitoring the situation and discussing the logistics of the World Chess Championship Match 2021 with the World Expo organizers in Dubai, keeping in mind two possible dates (spring and autumn 2021) and considering all possible adjustments / changes in the FIDE official calendar.'

To keep track of the evolution, I created a new page, World Chess Championship : 2021 Carlsen - ?. Normally I would have created the page only after both players were known, but there is nothing normal about the current cycle.

Defecting Characters

In last week's post, Women's 1980-81 Candidates Matches, I finished with a couple of actions. The first action was:-

Lematchko tied for 1st in the 1979 Alicante Interzonal, but did not play in the 1980-81 Women's Candidates Matches. Why not? I'll look into that another time.

The second action was:-

At the same time, I'll standardize the spelling of her name across my pages. While preparing this post, I found Lemachko, Lematcho, Lematschko, and there might be others. I can do better than that.

The first action was answered on the appropriate Wikipedia page, Women's World Chess Championship 1981:-

In Alicante, Lematschko and Akhmilovskaya shared first place, well ahead of Gurieli and Litinskaya. However, Lematschko subsequently defected from socialist Bulgaria and was unable to take part in the Candidates Tournament, so her place was given to Fischdick as fourth-placed from the Rio Interzonal (on tie-breaks).

That's a detailed answer in just two sentences. It was followed by a note ('[2]') indicating its source:-

[2] -> "World Chess Championship (women) : 1979 Alicante Interzonal Tournament". Mark-weeks.com. Retrieved 2012-02-06

Thanks for the reference, Wikipedia! The problem is: my page doesn't say that (and I didn't know it). While much of the basic information on the Wikipedia page is indeed taken from my pages, the Wikipedia enhancements are considerable. Congratulations to the semi-anonymous Wikipedians who put the whole package together.

I was especially impressed to see that *all* of the participants in the 1980-81 women's WCC cycle have their own Wikipedia page. This might be expected for the corresponding men's WCC cycle, but is not trivial for women's events which received less press at the time than they do today. I know this from personal experience in my own library research. Are other Wikipedia pages for other women's WCC cycles so comprehensive?

As an aside, one of the participants in the 1980-81 women's WCC cycle was Miyoko Watai. If the name sounds familiar, the Wikipedia page explains,

After Bobby Fischer's detention on July 13, 2004 for trying to travel with a revoked U.S. passport, she campaigned for his release. They were reportedly married in August 2004.

As for the second action, 'standardize the spelling of [Lematchko] across my pages', my reference page Index of Women Players uses 'Lemachko'. Somewhat curiously, that spelling isn't found on any of my other pages where her name occurs:-

Lemachko T	1976 IZ-Roo	: Lematschko T
	1977 CM	: Lematchko, T
	1979 IZ-Ali	: Lematcho
	1982 IZ-Bad	: Lematcho
	1983 CM	: Lematschko T
	1990 IZ-Gen	: Lematschko T
	1995 IZ	: Lematschko T

I don't remember why I chose that spelling for the index, but it's probably not a coincidence that 'Chess Personalia' by Jeremy Gaige uses the same spelling. For the 1979 Alicante Interzonal, Informant 28 (1979-H2) gives the spelling as 'LEMAČKO'. This uses the same character 'Č' (lower case 'č') that you sometimes see for Korchnoi, i.e. 'KORČNOI'. That's another name with a similar set of variations found for Lemachko. In other words, the 'Č' is replaced by 'CH', or 'TCH', or 'TSCH'.

While I should be consistent and use 'Lemachko' on all of my own pages, I'll let it go for now. On top of the HTML pages, there are PGN files involved.