World Junior and Girls U-20 in Chotowa, Poland

The World under 20 Junior and Girls Championships 2010 is taking place from 2-17 August in Chotova, a small town in Czarna, a rural municipality in the southeast Poland. The nearest big city, about 120 km away, is Krakow. A total of 203 players– 81 girls, 122 boys – from 56 federations are participating. The contenders include 19 GMs, 36 IMs, 20 FMs, six WGMs, 13 WIMs and 24 WFMs. They will be vying for eight cash prizes in each group, the first being 4,000 Euro for juniors and 3,000 Euro for girls.

The Republic of Poland lies in Central Europe, bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north. The total area of Poland is 312,679 square kilometres (120,726 sq mi), making it the ninth largest country in Europe. The population is over 38 million, which makes it the sixth most populous member of the European Union.

First arrivals at the Krakow airport. The Georgian team, our kind interpreters and guides
Ella (far left) and Edyta (on the right) and Satea Husiari, a coach from Syria (far right).

The playing venue is reached by buses that collect players from three hotels at approximately 10-20 minutes drive. The buses are regularly accompanied by police cars or bikes that provide security but more importantly they make sure that buses arrive promptly, undisturbed by road traffic.

On the opening day, the Mayor of Czarna Municipality Mr Jozef Chudy and other governmental representatives delivered welcoming speeches. Students from local schools presented a recital of piano and strings pieces by Chopin, the Polish musical hero.

The FIDE President Ilyumdzinov arrived for the opening ceremony to greet the participants and guests and declare open the World Junior Championships 2010. The participants were invited to sit at tables decorated with their country’s flag. Among them were:

Armenia: GM Hrair Simonian, GM Samvel Ter-Sahakyan, GM Robert Hovhannisyan,
GM Artashes Minasian (coach) and Ani Khanamiryan

Australia: IM Gary Lane (coach), Tamzin Oliver, WFM Emma Guo and Sherab Guo-Yuthok

Belarus: WIM Nastassia Ziaziulkina and her father, GM Aliaksei Ziaziulkin, who is also her coach

Bulgaria: Ani Krumova, IM Kosta Angelov (coaches), and Stojan Lubomirov Ivanov

Cyprus: Siblings Pearl and Mark Bryan-Vissi

Denmark: FM Mads Andersen (2382) and his father

The 15-year-old Mads was twice Scandinavian champion under 11 and under 12. In 2008 he emerged as a surprise winner of the strong Calvia Open. He reached the fifth place at the World Youth Championship in 2009.

England: FM Yang-Fan Zhou, WGM Anya Corke and GM Mark Hebden (coach)

Georgia: (from left) Davit Lomsadze, Elena Pareshishvili (Nani’s coach), Nani
Unapkoshvili, and sisters Keti and WGM Sopiko Guramishvili.

Hungary: GM Laszlo Gonda (coach), WFM Sarolta Toth and FM Tamas Fodor

India has sent the largest, 13 member delegation (from left, front row) Upadhyaya Anwesh, S. Sahu (coach), (second row) RN Gokhle (coach), IM Babu Musunuri Rohit Lalith, IM Sunil Dhopade Swapnil, Shah Dharmendra Sagar, WGM Rout Padmini and CM Kulkarni Pradip Bhakti.

Kazakhstan: WFM Dinara Sadukassova, WIM Guliskhan Nakhbayeva and FM Berik Akkozov

Moldova: FM Vladimir Hamitevici and WFM Diana Baciu

Peru: the proud father with his two child prodigies, who both won gold in Turkey in 2009: GM Jorge Moises Cori Tello in the category boys under 14 and Deysi Estela Cori Tello, in the category girls under 12.

Russia: GM Alexander Potapov (coach), GM Dmitry Andreikin, WGM Olga Girya,
IM Pavel Potapov, WFM Elena Semenova

Singapore: IM Daniel Howard Fernandez with his coach IM Jovan Petronic (left)

South Africa: Adriana Hoek, Benjamin Vincent Hercules and Ryan Pierre Van Rensburg

Spain: WFM Anabel Guadamuro Torrente, GM Ivan Salgado Lopez, IM David
Recuero Guerra and GM Jesus De la Villa Garcia (coach)

Switzerland: Gabriele Botta (left) and FM Emanuel Schiendorfer

Turkey: FM Ogulcan Kanmazalp, IM Mustafa Yilmaz, IM Emre Can, WIM Kubra Ozturk and Emel Kaya

Uzbekistan: WIM Nafisa Muminova and FM Aleksandr Kasyan

Ngok Lan Tran bravely ventured on his own all the way from Hanoi

Filipowicz is an International Master and a member of the FIDE qualifications and titles regulatory committee. He worked for many years with Professor Arpad Elo, the Hungarian mathematician and creator of the ‘Elo’ rating system. From 1986 to 1990 Dr Filipowicz was Chairman of the FIDE Qualification Commission. His 30 years arbitrating activity include the World Championship matches Karpov-Anand, Lausanne 1998; Kasparov-Kramnik, London 2000 and Kramnik-Leko, Brissago 2004. Since 2003 he has been arbitrating at the Dortmund super tournament.

On the free day, after the fifth round, players and guests went on an excursion to the nearby Krakow and on the way back visited the Bochnia salt mine.

Krakow, the Market Square with a glimpse of the Cathedral

The medieval town of Krakow, one of the oldest cities in Europe, for centuries was the capital of Poland and the seat of Polish kings. Today it is the second biggest city in Poland and its unofficial cultural capital. For many people, due to its rich history, represents a synthesis of all things Polish, connecting tradition with modernity.

The Jagiellonian University of Krakow is the second oldest in Central Europe, founded in the 13th century

Collegium Maius, the University’s oldest building is where its famous student, the Renaissance astronomer and mathematician Nicholas Copernicus (1473-1543) attempted to ‘displace’ the Earth from the centre of the Universe and was was accused of being a heretic by the Catholic Church. Copernicus published his findings about the Earth’s daily motion about its axis and its yearly motion around a stationary sun in his famous theses De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium (On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres).

Deep into the earth, the visitors, ‘mounted’ on long, single line trains, travelled through dark, narrow corridors plastered with salt layers that were created millions of years ago when this territory was under seawaters. The mine was still commercially active until the late 90' but today is preserved as a tourist attraction. The chess players were treated to a lunch on a plateau 350 meters under the earth surface.

Previous winners of the World Junior Championship

In the following list you will recognise a lot of familiar or very familiar names. As far as we can tell all but two (Tony Miles, who died in November 2001, and 1976 Champion IM Mark Diesen, who passed away near Houston on December 9th, 2008) are still alive and a majority still active. Perhaps yopu can spot the one player who won the title twice, and perhaps count which country won it most often. Finally: how many junior world champions went on to become full World Champions, and how many became FIDE knockout or tournament world champions?

About the author

Diana Mihajlova is a chess player and artist who has been exhibiting internationally (under the name Yana Mitra) since 1988. She was born in Macedonia (former Yugoslavia). A linguist by profession, she has started her working career as a university lecturer, which took her to extensive studying and working sojourns in various countries around the world.

In 1989 after finishing a three-year lecturing contract in Perth, Australia, Diana decided to abandon her academic career and to dedicate herself to a full-time painting while still free-lancing in the languages field. She first started exhibiting while still in Australia where after winning some important national art prizes her work received a quick recognition and was included in important exhibitions and collections. After her return to Europe she continued her painting career by exhibiting in galleries in Paris, where she lived the following two years. Since 1993 she settled in London where she currently lives and works. Over the last couple of years she has temporarily relocated to Budapest, hence the frequent reports about chess in Hungary on our pages. You can see her paintings at the Yana Mitra web site.

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