The United Nations picked July 20 to to mark the date of the International Chess Federation’s establishment in 1924, and to promote chess. This is also our day, let’s celebrate it with some delightful chess compositions on our boards!
The preliminary results in section H – Retros (PDF) are already published and can be found above the Announcement, in the Preliminary Results section. Preliminary results are published without names. Names will appear in the final results. Claims of defects and anticipations can be sent to the Director during one month after the publication of the preliminary results (until 08.08.2023).
Solvers’ ratings as of July 1st 2023 produced by the Solving Tournament Manager are published on the WFCC Solving Portal.
14 tournaments of the 2nd quarter 2023 are included: 49th Latvian Chess Solving Championship 2023, Open Solving Championship of Serbia 2023, 37th Ukrainian Championship 2023, Open Solving Tournament Lithuania 2023, 44th Lithuanian Championship 2023, 31st Chess Solving Championship of Slovakia 2023, Winton British Chess Solving Championship 2023, 44th French Chess Solving Championship 2023, Open Solving Tournament of ECSC 2023, 16th European Chess Solving Championship 2023, 45th German Solving Championship 2023, 42nd Azerbaijan Chess Solving Championship 2023, 8th Israel Open Solving Championship 2023, 8th Israel Open Solving Championship 2023 – Category 2.
Ranking of the top ten solvers: Eddy Van Beers overtook John Nunn from the 7th to the 6th place and Kevinas Kuznecovas gained 50 places to the 10th place.
Largest five gains: junior Kevinas Kuznecovas, LTU (+216.88), women junior Kamila Hryshchenko, GBR (+166.96), Arvydas Mockus, LTU (+131.61), junior Taras Rudenko, UKR (+107.86), women junior Daria Dvoeglazova, ISR (+86.01).
Composers from all around the world are welcome to take part in the
11th FIDE World Cup in Composing 2023!
(the Regulations are published on the page COMPETITIONS->COMPOSING->FIDE)
The Director of the tournament is Aleksey Oganesjan (FIDE).
The sections are:
The closing date for submitting the entries is June 15, 2023.
Solvers’ ratings as of April 1st 2023 produced by the Solving Tournament Manager are published on the WFCC Solving Portal.
6 tournaments of the 1st quarter 2023 are included: 19th International Solving Contest 2023 Cat 1, 19th International Solving Contest 2023 Cat 2, 44th Finnish Chess Solving Championship 2023, 28th Dutch Open Chess Solving Championship 2023, 46th International Polish Championship 2023, 31st Branko Atanacković Memorial 2023.
Ranking of the top ten solvers: former World Champion Kacper Piorun overtook John Nunn and Eddy Van Beers from the 7th to the 5th place, and Boris Tummes passed Marko Filipović from the 11th to the 10th place.
Largest five gains: Arvydas Mockus, LTU (+81.89), junior Kevinas Kuznecovas, LTU (+52.36), women junior Kamila Hryshchenko, GBR (+40.05), Tomoki Kurokawa, JPN (+31.55), Andrii Sergiienko, UKR (+29.70).
In 2007, our organization accepted the idea of the famous Ukrainian Grandmaster of Chess Composition Valentin Rudenko (1938-2016) to name January 4th as the International Day of Chess Composition. According to the proposal, on January 4th 1869, the Czech (Bohemian at that time) magazine “Svetozor” published an article by Antonín König (1836-1911) where he described chess composition as an independent form of Art.
It was, in fact, a joint proposal by Ukraine and Russia in 2007. It was accepted, but has never got an essential acceptance by the majority of WFCC member countries. In reality, the International Day of Chess Composition was mostly celebrated in the same two countries, Ukraine and Russia, with lively meeting of problemists, adding sometimes competitions to mark it. Without a wider appreciation, January 4th was gradually losing its importance. To add to the controversy, later research in the archive of “Svetozor” has never proved the existence of that particular article, published on that particular day.
So, what would be the reasons for us to celebrate it today? We do it, not only to respect our own decision, but to glorify the greatest events and personalities from our history. No matter what day we may choose, it is a historical fact that Antonín König – a well known painter, illustrator, and chess player – promoted chess composition as equal to other forms of art, and founded the Bohemian school, the first attempt to define aesthetic models on the chess board.
It’s also well known that magazine “Svetozor” served as a high platform for that. Surfing through its old archive, you may be amazed to see that chess problems were the main, if not the only, content of the Chess column of that magazine. We should proudly recall how it was 150 years ago, and use every possible reason to celebrate our existence and unity.
Marjan Kovačević,
WFCC President
Solvers’ ratings as of January 1st 2023 produced by the Solving Tournament Manager are published on the WFCC Solving Portal.
10 tournaments of the 4th quarter 2022 are included: 31st Kedainiai Cup 2022, 37th Open Swiss Solving Championship 2022, 27th Belgian Championship 2022, 31st Henk Hagedoorn Memorial 2022 Cat A, 3rd Branko Babic Memorial 2022, 4th Ukrainian Cup 2022, Open Solving Tournament of WCCC 2022, 45th World Chess Solving Championship 2022, 4th Pavle Orlov Memorial 2022, 7th Greek Chess Solving Cup 2022.
Ranking of the top ten solvers: World Champion Danila Pavlov has overtaken Georgy Evseev and is now also the leader in the ranking, Eddy Van Beers has overtaken Kacper Piorun to the 6th place; in addition Ural Khasanov and Marko Filipović are new in the top 10 on places 9 and 10.
Largest five gains: women junior Kamila Hryshchenko, (+163.20), junior Kevinas Kuznecovas (+143.61), junior Nikita Ushakov (+95.16), women junior Denisa-Andreea Bucur (+73.70), Bilguun Sumiya (+64.82).
The year behind was crowded with official composing and solving events, thanks to the judges and organizers who worked hard in 2022.
January brought 18th International Solving Contest, another successful edition run by ever passionate Axel Steinbrink.
In March, the Solving Committee has made another step forward, introducing the very informative Solving Portal on our website.
May was the month of 15th European Chess Solving Championship, and Julia Vysotska created and exceptionally friendly atmosphere in Riga to attract solvers to the first ECSC since 2019.
Results of the two longest lasting composing events were completed between August and October. First, Valery Kopyl finalized the 8th World Championship in Composing for Individuals 2019-21, in spite of the most difficult circumstances in his country.
The other hard task was fulfilled by our long standing President Harry Fougiaxis, who took over the duty of the 11th World Chess Composing Tournament director.
During the summer, awards of the 10th FIDE World Cup in Composing were appearing one by one. In October, the director Aleksey Oganesyan ended his job and announced the final results.
World Solving Cup 2021/22, under the firm control of Roland Ott, lasted throughout the year, using the organizing resources of 13 different countries.
The final stage of the WSC was in Fujairah. In November, the United Arab Emirates hosted the 64th World Congress of Chess Composition. The first ever WCCC in Arabian Peninsula was an outstanding event in many ways. Dr. Abdulla Ali Aal Barket assured the memorable conditions for promotion of chess composition, and Mohammad Abdul Ghani was there to execute every single task.
The director of the 45th World Chess Solving Championship was the same as for the 15th ECSC. It was a challenging double task, unmistakably executed by Ivan Denkovski.
Let’s turn to 2023!
The red dates in our calendars will be 29th January (19th ISC), 2nd-4th June (16th ECSC in Bratislava) and 2nd-9th September (65th WCCC in Batumi).
Apart from regular competitions, we will have a joint duty to come closer to a much wider audience. The first steps in this direction were made a week ago, registering the WFCC in different social media (YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram), with some introductory posts for each of them.
To find our stable place there we need more contributors from different countries, to “feed” the media with short but attractive and frequent posts. Some longer posts, for instance from national championships, may appear on the FIDE website, as announced by their Marketing and Communications Officer David Llada.
It’s perhaps time to recall words by our Honorary President Dr. Klaus Wenda, dedicated to the Golden Jubilee of our organization, in 2007:
There is no doubt that the status of the contemplative occupation of chess problems among the young is lower nowadays; that is confirmed by an alarming lack of young problemists in virtually all the member countries. It only makes the task of the commission more important, though: creating new incentives and new ways to arouse interest in chess composition. I know that there is no easy answer, but the important thing, in accordance with Herakleitos’s dictum, is to recognise new trends quickly and react to them appropriately.
Happy, healthy, and peaceful 2023!
Marjan Kovačević
WFCC President
Dear WFCC community,
our composers, solvers, judges, organizers, supporters,
and all friends of chess composition, have a Merry Christmas!
Enjoy your winter holidays as much as you can, with family, friends, and a chess board too! Before we finalize the year 2022, here are some recent news and nice materials for you to see:
The 65th WCCC will be held from 2nd to 9th September 2023 in Batumi.
The WCCC2022 Bulletin (171 pages!) has been compiled, with generous help from Hannu Harkola.
The WCCC 2022 Media section has grown to include hundreds of photos, external articles, and videos.
We’ve got an invitation from the FIDE to promote our most important events, on their official website.
We live in the times of social media, and now please welcome the WFCC in this open air too! See icons for YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Instagram on the top right corner of the official website. Whichever of them you use, please, visit our introductory post and join the WFCC followers! Let’s keep in touch!
The FINAL results of the 10th FIDE World Cup in Composing 2022 are published and can be found above the Announcement, in RESULTS section.
“Congratulations to all for completing the 10th FIDE World Cup in the planned time frame! Congratulations to all winners and prize-winners! I wish new creative successes to all the participants! And, especially thanks to the director and the judges for their work!”
Andrey Selivanov, FIDE Chess Composition Director
