World Amateur Chess Championship

The World Amateur Chess Championship is a tournament organised by FIDE and Amateur Chess Organisation (ACO).

The world governing body intended to promote amateur chess play by holding championship tournaments linked to the Olympic Games, but only two events were held. Since 1996, it has been an annual FIDE event.

History

The first championship was held the year that FIDE was founded, at the 1924 Summer Olympics in Paris. This is considered the unofficial first Chess Olympiad, and is the only Olympiad that was an individual event. The second championship was held at the 1928 Summer Olympics in The Hague, in conjunction with the 2nd Chess Olympiad.

Chess has never been an official part of the Olympic Games, and since the chess community does not make any essential distinction between amateur and professional^[1] the championship was discontinued after 1928. However, in 1995 FIDE has revamped it to celebrate the centenary of the Hastings International Chess Congress^[2] and since then it has been held annually. The first renewed edition, held concurrently with the 1995/96 Hastings Congress from 28 December 1995 to 5 January 1996, was restricted to non-FIDE rated players.^[3] Subsequently, amateur was defined as a player with a FIDE rating below 2000 and not having attained a rating of more than 2000 in the past 2 years. Since 2016, the championship has been split into three rating categories: U-2300, U-2000 and U-1700. Additionally to these rating limits, a player must not hold the title of International Master or higher (or Woman International Master for women) for U-2300 and U-2000 section or the title of FIDE Master (or Woman FIDE Master for women); however, players that are 65 years or older are exempt from this additional requirement to qualify.^[4]

According to the current FIDE regulations, the winners of the U-2300 and the U-2000 sections are awarded with the title of FIDE Master (FM), while the winner of the U-1700 category, the runner-ups and bronze medallists of the U-2300 and the U-2000 categories receive the Candidate Master (CM) title. Analogously the women's champions in the U-2300 and U-2000 categories receive the title of Woman FIDE Master (WFM), the winner of women's U1700 category, the silver and bronze medallists in the women's U-2300 and U-2000 categoriew are granted the title Woman Candidate Master (WCM).^[5]

Since 2012, there is another World Amateur Chess Championship, organised by the Amateur Chess Organisation (ACO),^[6] which is not recognised by FIDE.^[7]

Winners

Year	Dates	Host	Winner(s)	Women's champion(s)
1924	4 May – 27 Jul	Paris	Hermanis Matisons
1928	17 May – 12 Aug	Amsterdam	Max Euwe
1996	28 Dec – 5 Jan	Hastings[8]	Brian Johnson[9]
1997[10]	28 Dec – 5 Jan	Hastings	Olev Schults	Catherine Dewitte
1998[11]	29 Dec – 11 Jan	Hastings	Viraf Avari	Rosalind Kieran
1999[12]	29 Dec – 10 Jan	Hastings	Gaguik Oganessian	Jessie Gilbert
2000[13]	29 Dec – 6 Jan	Hastings	Sven Mühlenhaus	Elaine Rutherford[2]
2001[14]	27 Dec – 8 Jan	Pamplona	Bismarck Nicolás Chaverra Rojas	Maria Goni
2001[15]	6–13 Dec	Bento Gonçalves	Flávio Olivência	Amanda Benggawan
2002[16]	13–19 Dec	Bento Gonçalves	Juliano Resende Pereira	Thalita Cincinato
2003[17]	2–13 Jul	Tshwane	Shabier Bhawoodien	Daleen Wiid
2004[18]	30 Jun – 10 Jul	Cape Town	Farai Mandizha	Jenine Ellappen
2005[19]	31 Jul – 12 Aug	Piešťany	Cancelled[20]
2006[21]	23 Nov – 3 Dec	Tripoli	Rachid Hifad	Nirmala Chandrasiri
2007[22]	11–18 Aug	Predeal	Alexandru Gabriel Duca	Eugenia-Daniela Ghita
2008[23]	28 Apr – 6 May	Chalkidiki	Panagiotis Galopoulos	Mitali Patil
2009[24][25]	27 Apr – 3 May	Thessaloniki	Stefan Parlog	Efstathia Andrikopoulou
2010[26][27]	19–25 Mar	Skokie	Andrew Hubbard	Yun Fan
2011[28][29]	1–10 Oct	Antalya	Bilgunn Sumiya	Bayar Anu
2012[30][31]	16–22 Apr	Chalkidiki	Haralambos Tsakiris	Laura Perez
2013[32][33]	21–30 Apr	Iași	Lehel Vrencian	Bayarsaikhan Yanjinlkham
2014[34]	26 Apr – 3 May	Singapore	Gijir Munkhbayar	Chitlange Sakshi
2015[35]	14–21 Apr	Chalkidiki	Mire Deniz Doğan	Paula-Alexandra Gitu
2016[36]	18–28 Apr	Chalkidiki	Zhuban Bigabylov (U2300) Khulan Enkhsaikhan (U2000) Jatin S.N. (U1700)	Georgia Grapsa (U2300) Khulan Enkhsaikhan (U2000) Diana Zakharova (U1700)
2017[37]	1–9 Apr	Spoleto	Win Tun (U2300) Maciej Koziej (U2000) Hope Mkhumba (U1700)	Bayarjargal Bayarmaa (U2300) Zainab Saumy (U2000) Vilena Popova (U1700)
2018[38]	22–29 Apr	Cagliari	Arvinder Preet Singh (U2300) Kanan Hajiyev (U2000) Batuhan Sutbas (U1700)	Bayarjargal Bayarmaa (U2300) Elisaveta Chetina (U2000) Vilena Popova (U1700)
2019[39]	29 Jun – 7 Jul	Colima	Elías Renzo Gutiérrez Medina (U2300) Jesús Amezcua Luría (U2000) Dashtogtokh Amarsaikhan (U1700)	Alexandra Zherebtsova (U2300) Batnasan Khaliun (U2000) Omya Vidyarthi (U1700)
2020[40]	2–12 Apr	Heraklion	Postponed to 2021[41]
2021[42]	16–26 Oct	Rhodes	Dimitrios Ladopoulos (U2300) Mukhtar Ainakul (U1700) Peter Anand (U2000)	Alexandra Zherebtsova (U2300) Glenda Madelta (U1700) Marigje Degrande (U2000)
2022[43]	20–30 Oct	Mellieħa	Abdilkhair Abilmansur (U2300) Tuguldur Soninbayar (U1700) Sodbilegt Naranbold (U2000)	Grigoryan Meri (U2300) Margadgua Erdenebayar (U1700) Baliuniene Margarita (U2000)
2023 [44][45]	2-11 Nov	Muscat	Abdilkhair Abilmansur (U2300) Dashtogtokh Amarsaikhan (U2000) Ganbat Danzanjunai (U1700)	Bauyrzhan Amash (U2300) Norovsambuu Badamkhand (U2000) Bat-Amgalan Anujin (U1700)

See also

• 1st unofficial Chess Olympiad (Paris 1924)
• 2nd Chess Olympiad (The Hague 1928)

References

• Brace, Edward R. (1977), An Illustrated Dictionary of Chess, Hamlyn Publishing Group, p. 18, ISBN 1-55521-394-4
• Hooper, David; Whyld, Kenneth (1992), The Oxford Companion to Chess (2 ed.), Oxford University Press, p. 13, ISBN 0-19-280049-3
• Whyld, Ken (1986), Chess: The Records, Guinness Books, p. 28, ISBN 0-85112-455-0