Now PDF reports from all 11 World Chess Composing Tournaments are available in WCCT Section. Many thanks to Roland Ott who scanned missing booklets and helped completing the WCCT Archive!
PDF Booklets: 1st WCCT Booklet | 2nd WCCT Booklet | 3rd WCCT Booklet | 4th WCCT Booklet | 5th WCCT Booklet | 6th WCCT Booklet |
7th WCCT Booklet | 8th WCCT Booklet | 9th WCCT Booklet |
10th WCCT Booklet | 11th WCCT Booklet
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
The WCCT-11 booklet is ready for download. Please address any remarks about misprints to the director. Trophies and diplomas will be handed in the celebration event of the congress closing banquet.
You can download the whole booklet or by section:
The 11th World Chess Composition Tournament (WCCT) of the WFCC is completed. In total 33 countries participated in the tournament with 550 compositions in eight sections. The tournament was announced in May 2020 and the closing date for the submission of entries was July 1st, 2021. One document with clarifications and one with claims and replies were circulated to the participating countries. In March 2022 WFCC decided to exclude the teams of Russia and Belarus from the tournament in response to the hostilities in Ukraine and the Official Statements of FIDE Executive Council. The closing date for the judgments was extended to August 1st, 2022 and they were all received on time.
The winner of the 11th WCCT is Slovakia, ahead of Ukraine and Germany. All 33 participating countries received points. At the moment you may download the score tables only (overall and of each section). The full booklet with diagrams, solutions and comments will be available by mid of October.
Update (a few hours later!): Thanks to those who pointed out that there are a few mistakes in the overall scores table. In the totals of some countries the formula was not correct. Apologies for the oversight. Please download the correct file again.
The claims of the 11th WCCT were published on December 29th, 2021 on the page of the tournament.
These are the claims concerning formal soundness, comparison problems and misprints in the entries to the 11th WCCT, as well as the replies received.
Introduction | Section A | Section B | Section C | Section D | Section E | Section F | Section G | Section H | The whole document
The judgments should be sent to the tournament director by August 1st, 2022 (new date!)
– Harry Fougiaxis
The World Federation for Chess Composition strongly condemns the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the involvement of Belarus and expresses its solidarity and support for the Ukrainian people. We feel deep sorrow for all the victims of the war and their families.
Ukrainian problemists are facing mortal danger right now, so it is unreasonable we keep the original time schedule of WCCI 2019-21 and WCCT-11; the deadline for WCCI judges and WCCT judging countries is rescheduled for 1st of August 2022. In the coming weeks we will have a more clear picture of the situation and will update you further.
The claims of the 11th WCCT are published on the page of the tournament.
Introduction | Section A | Section B | Section C | Section D | Section E | Section F | Section G | Section H | The whole document
Important notes:
1. The claims concern only formal soundness, comparison problems and misprints. Claims regarding thematic contents and quality of expression or construction were not allowed in this phase of the tournament. After consultation with the spokesman of the WCCT committee, matters related to conventions were also left to the opinion and evaluation of the judging countries.
2. Replies to claims should be sent to the tournament director Harry Fougiaxis by March 1st, 2022.
3. Only the appointed national team leaders may send replies.
4. The judging countries should start the judgment process immediately, in order to save time. The judgments should be received no later than June 1st, 2022.
My warm wishes for 2022, hopefully free of viruses and restrictions! – Harry Fougiaxis
Update of 06.01.2022: The PDF files of the introduction, section D, section E and of the whole document have been updated with a few additional comments. Please download the files again!
Update of 14.01.2022: The PDF files of section H and of the whole document have been updated with the notification that H29 is cooked. Please download the files again!
Harry Fougiaxis, the director of the 11th World Chess Composition Tournament, presents the ENTRIES BOOKLET of 8 sections with introduction (available from the 11th WCCT page): Introduction | Section A | Section B | Section C | Section D & Section D (PGN) | Section E | Section F | Section G | Section H
35 countries participate with 86 compositions in A, 75 in B, 67 in C, 74 in D, 92 in E, 71 in F, 54 in G and 79 in H.
Update 11.09.2021: The PGN file of section D (endgame studies) has been updated with comments from some countries. Please download again.
Update 02.09.2021: The file of section H (proofgames) has been updated as the diagram and the solution of H78 were incorrect. Please download again.
Update 01.09.2021: The file of section C (moremovers) has been updated as the solution of C56 was incomplete. Please download again.
Important notes:
WFCC is glad to announce the 11th World Chess Composition Tournament. Of course we are not so glad that we do this with such a great delay compared to the original schedule. We had to overcome several obstacles in the process: (1) the committee members needed considerable time to analyze the proposed themes and agree on the wording; sometimes the discussion was even heated and seemed it was close to a dead end, (2) the flow of the work was not always smooth with committee members losing their motivation for weeks, (3) poor response of the countries that volunteered to judge (we managed to complete the list just a few days ago!), (4) the initially appointed director stepped down for personal reasons, etc.
The director of the tournament is Harry Fougiaxis. The deadline for registration of the countries is July 15th, 2020. The closing date for submission of the entries is July 1st, 2021. Announcement in PDF.
Happy composing!
