FIDE Senior Championships 2019
Posted: Sat Dec 29, 2018 8:15 pm
It's time to start a new thread for the four FIDE Senior Championships in 2019 (two global, two European).
All four are announced in two age groups, 50+ and 65+ (based on a qualifying date 31 December 2019) so if your relevant birthday falls in 2019 it doesn't matter if you have actually reached it when the events are played.
First up, just before Easter, is the EU Individual on the Greek island of Rhodes (simultaneously with FIDE's amateur championship).
This will be immediately followed (second half of April) by the World Teams at the same venue, with ACO's rival version of the amateurs (in different rating groups) at a nearby hotel also on Rhodes.
As all these four events had originally been announced for different Greek venues, perhaps this is a sign of a rapprochement between FIDE and ACO?
For details of the FIDE events see my Seniors calendar at http://www.chessmail.com/seniors/Seniors-calendar.html where the PDF regulations of the FIDE events can be downloaded.
The closing dates are in late February. The FIDE events in Rhodes will be run by Nikos Kalesis who is a proven quality organiser of senior tournaments.
The European Senior Team Championships will be held in Croatia in September, rather than in March as originally scheduled; this may help to make it more popular.
There remains some confusion over the venue.
The calendar on the ECU website still says the tournament will be held at Sveti Martin na Muri, which is inland near the border with Slovenia, but the FIDE calendar says it will be on the island of Mali Losinj which would be a much more attractive venue (if maybe a little harder to reach). Clarification on this is badly needed.
Finally, the World Individual Senior Championships will as usual be held in November, at Oradea in Romania (province of Transylvania) just over the border from Hungary. A train from Budapest looks like the best way to get there (it's nearer than Bucharest).
The almost complete lack of Romanian presence at Bled last November (just one player of each gender) perhaps doesn't bode well for the standard of organisation to be expected?
It was also rumoured in Bled that the Senior Individual would be cut from 11 rounds to 9 but I don't know if that is official yet.
If anyone has better information I would be glad to hear it.
The relevant Seniors page on the ECF website is: https://www.englishchess.org.uk/Seniors ... ties-2019/
All four are announced in two age groups, 50+ and 65+ (based on a qualifying date 31 December 2019) so if your relevant birthday falls in 2019 it doesn't matter if you have actually reached it when the events are played.
First up, just before Easter, is the EU Individual on the Greek island of Rhodes (simultaneously with FIDE's amateur championship).
This will be immediately followed (second half of April) by the World Teams at the same venue, with ACO's rival version of the amateurs (in different rating groups) at a nearby hotel also on Rhodes.
As all these four events had originally been announced for different Greek venues, perhaps this is a sign of a rapprochement between FIDE and ACO?
For details of the FIDE events see my Seniors calendar at http://www.chessmail.com/seniors/Seniors-calendar.html where the PDF regulations of the FIDE events can be downloaded.
The closing dates are in late February. The FIDE events in Rhodes will be run by Nikos Kalesis who is a proven quality organiser of senior tournaments.
The European Senior Team Championships will be held in Croatia in September, rather than in March as originally scheduled; this may help to make it more popular.
There remains some confusion over the venue.
The calendar on the ECU website still says the tournament will be held at Sveti Martin na Muri, which is inland near the border with Slovenia, but the FIDE calendar says it will be on the island of Mali Losinj which would be a much more attractive venue (if maybe a little harder to reach). Clarification on this is badly needed.
Finally, the World Individual Senior Championships will as usual be held in November, at Oradea in Romania (province of Transylvania) just over the border from Hungary. A train from Budapest looks like the best way to get there (it's nearer than Bucharest).
The almost complete lack of Romanian presence at Bled last November (just one player of each gender) perhaps doesn't bode well for the standard of organisation to be expected?
It was also rumoured in Bled that the Senior Individual would be cut from 11 rounds to 9 but I don't know if that is official yet.
If anyone has better information I would be glad to hear it.
The relevant Seniors page on the ECF website is: https://www.englishchess.org.uk/Seniors ... ties-2019/