43rd Chess Olympiad in Batumi
By Mariam Chanishvili
Friday, August 3
The 43rd Chess Olympiad, organized by the Federation Internationale des Echecs (FIDE) will be held in the seaside city of Georgia, Batumi.
The competition will take place from September 23 to October 6.
The 43rd Chess Olympiad is open to all National Federations affiliated to FIDE, each of which had an opportunity to nominate one team for open section and one team for the women’s section. Each team shall consist of four players, one reserve and one captain. The captain may be, but not necessarily, one of the players or the reserve Teams of women and men from 190 countries are expected.
The registration was open from April 23 till July 30.
The opening ceremony will take place at the beautiful Black Sea Arena, while the closing ceremony will take place at Batumi State Musical Center on October 5.
Captains and judges will meet on September 24, and official rounds will begin the same day.
The event will take place in the Olympiad venue, Sports Palace, situated in the center of Batumi. The site was built in 2018, and the first event to be held there will be the Batumi chess Olympiad. The Sports Palace is a very spacious modern complex.
Pre-Olympiad event - "One day in the Chess World" took place in Tbilisi on July 31, which was attended by the Georgian Chess Federation president Giorgi Giorgadze, the European Chess Union President Zurab Azmaiparashvili, five-times Women’s World Chess Champion Nona Gaprindashvili, Deputy Minister of Education, Science, Culture and Sport Shalva Gogoladze., etc.
It is worth mentioning that FIDE received bids to host the 2017 World Cup and 2018 Olympiad from the national federations of Georgia and South Africa. Georgia's bid won, receiving 93 votes to South Africa's 58.
The Federation Internationale des Echecs or World Chess Federation is an international organization that connects the various national chess federations around the world and acts as the governing body of international chess competition.
