What are two USA go team members doing in the draughts playing area? Trevor Morris (left) and Louis Samuel Abronson, both being 6th dan in go, are playing international draughts. Coming from the USA they already knew the checkers game, but the international 10×10 game was unknown to them. Abronson was immediately struck by the subtleties he saw on the draughts boards. The nice positions, the combinations in a series of moves: those were unexpected surprises to him.

On the first glimpse, go seems to be the exact opposite of draughts. With go you place pieces on the board and they stay there, the draughts game pieces move around until they eventually will be taken off. While in go the edges are strong, in draughts the centre of the board is the battlefield. Cluttering of game pieces is very weak in go, while single pieces sometimes fear for their lives on the draughts board.

Morris was surprised that draughts has a long history. He explained that go was initiated in China a few centuries ago, professionalized in Japan, and the Korean are the best at it nowadays. It is an Asian dominated sport, although you’ll find participants from everywhere. The origin of draughts lays in Europe and from there it spread to Africa and the rest of the world. You can learn more about the history reading this article.

During the interview both go players kept on playing draughts, trying to understand the moves, only in between some moves there was time for a few words to say. When Dutch player Wim van Mourik started explaining and showing nice combinations, the interview was over, the focus was all again on the draughts board.

The tight schedule of the 10×10 rapid tournaments did not allow the finals to start at 12:00 sharp. It will start as soon as possible.

The 10×10 international rapid tournaments played on the WMSG venue are the official FMJD world championships. There are 5 categories: men, women, veterans, men under 23 and women under 23.

Men:
Alexei Chizhov - Guntis Valneris 1-1 barrage: 1-1 0-2
Alexander Georgiev - Bassirou Ba 1-1 barrage: 1-1 1-1 Georgiev proceeds, based on result in preliminaries

Women:
Elena Milshina - Natalia Shestakova 2-0
Tamara Tansykkuzhina - Marfa Danilova 2-0

Veterans 50+:
Alexander Mogilianski - Victor Volosienkin 1-1 barrage: 1-1 2-0
Edvard Bouzinski - Viacheslav Shchegolev 1-1 barrage: 1-1 2-0

Men under 23:
Pim Meurs - Roberts Misans 1-1 barrage: 1-1 1-1 Misans proceeds, based on result in preliminaries
Andrei Tolchykau - Ainur Shaybakov 1-1 barrage: 1-1 2-0

Women under 23:
Olesia Abdullina - Ariunzaya Eruuljav 1-1 barrage: 1-1 1-1 Abdullina proceeds, based on result in preliminaries
Irina Platonova - Olga Fedorovich 1-1 barrage: 2-0

Ion Doska (left) from Moldova is now playing against Russian Oleg Dashkov in the 64 Brazilian final.

In the semi finals Doska agreed to a draw with Sergey Belosheev (Ukraine). It was enough for Doska to proceed to the final, because he was higher ranked in the preliminairies. Oleg Daskhov entered the final after his win against Nikolay Struchkov from Russia.

The women’s final is a real top event. Current world champion Viktoria Motrichko (right) from the Ukraine competes with Elena Miskova from Moldova, current vice world champion.

Both women won their games in the 1/2 finals. Motrichko beat her Moldav opponent Julia Romanskaya. Miskova won her game against Julia Makarenkova from Ukraine.

Belosheev (left) and Struchkov are fighting the bronze, both Julia’s (Romanskaya (left) and Makarenkova) do the same at the women’s competition.

On October 16th the quarter finals in the 64 tournaments were played in the morning. Eight men and as much women had to eliminate the group with half the amount. The remaining 2 times 4 players were  welcomed in the semi finals in the afternoon.

Nikolai Struchkov manouvred himself into the spotlights by kicking 10×10 world champion Alexander Schwarzman out of the tournament. A draw was enough because he was higher ranked in the preliminaires. Struchkov is now up against his compatriot Oleg Dashkov, who defeated Andrius Kybartas in the necesarry barrage. Sergey Belosheev is playing the semifinals also, after winning the three requested micro-matches against Valery Grebenkin in the barrages! Last but not least Ion Doska played a draw against Kolesov, but reached the semi finals because of his higher ranking in the preliminaires.

The only game that requiered barrages in the women’s quarter final was the one between Yulia Makarenkova and Akaterina Bushueva. Only 3 or 4 years ago this would have been a final! In the last years a group of younger players joined the level on which they act. Elena Miskova, Viktoria Motrichko and Yalia Romanscaya will accompany Yulia Makarenkova to the semi finals.

The best female checkers player at the moment is the 20 years old Amangul Durdyeva from Turkmenistan. She is the reigning world champion and will be challenged for the title in 2009 by the best placed woman in this 1st WMSG competition.

The WMSG in Beijing hosts a mixed (men and women) checkers tournament and Durdyeva is happy with that. She hopes to meet one of her brothers as an opponent. Her father, who acted as an interpreter during the interview, smiled when he told this anecdote: ‘In the Irish Open of 2003, her brother Bashim and she were 1st and 2nd placed in the tournament before the last round. They had to play for the title. While it was on Amangul’s birthday, we joked that Bashim could lose the game to her as a birthday present, which he obvious didn’t. He won the tournament and Amangul took the silver. A year later, they were again each other’s opponent in the last round of the Irish Open, ranked 1st and 2nd. This time Amangul beat her brother!’

Family
Amangul surely is very talented, but more is needed to be a top level player for this long time. Mother and father Duryev are both honoured coach of Turkmenistan and all of her brothers are playing checkers, it is thus not a surprise that she trains and plays very often at home.

The checkers and also international draughts playing brought her to many countries: Holland, England, Ireland, Northern-Ireland, Belarus, Russia, Czech Republic, Germany and of course China. She is glad that her family joins her on her trips. Unfortunately her mother is too busy to come along to Beijing.

Future
When not at home, you can find Amangul at the polytechnical institute where she studies and is getting high marks for her work. Study, training and helping her mother at home, isn’t it difficult to manage her time? Amangul: ‘If you consider something to be difficult, then everything is difficult.’ In the future, Amangul’s wants to be the world champion in the men’s checkers competitions and she considers this to be a real possibility.

One of the draughts schools in Beijing invited the Dutch players Wim and Arne van Mourik to attend a draughts class. The draughts classes for children are held on every sunday afternoon, they then train for 1,5 hours.

Father and son Van Mourik started promoting the draughts sport from the first day they arrived in China. Wim van Mourik is very interested in the history of the game. Arne is dedicated to draughts composing.

Wim showed the young children many pictures from ancient paintings, drawings and books and told them about the old history the draughts sport has.

Arne gained applause with the nice compositions he presented on the demonstration board. He ended his presentation with a fantasy construction named ‘Torch On Fire’, a blink to the Olympic ambiance in Beijing during the World Mind Sports Games.

At the end of the class the children and their parents all received a Dutch kids magazine and a plastic bag with a draughts cartoon.

Enjoy looking at the pictures!

In the 64 tournaments the final 8 in both categories are now known. In the men’s tie-breaks, in which players with the same amount of points in the swiss preliminaries played a round-robin tournament, Gabril Kolesov showed his class and experience and joined the already qualified players for the quarter finals. Sandra Laurutiene was the unlucky loser in the women’s tournament, all other five contestants in the barrage advanced to the last 8. The undoubtably exciting quarter finals will start 10 am tomorrow (Beijing time).

Checkers
Just when it looked that Moseev was on his way towards gold in an easy seat, Mustafa Durdyev showed up. M. Durdyev came to Beijing to win the tournament, not to take the 2nd place. His draw against Ron King (one win, one loss) is a step in that direction. His brother Bagtiyah Durdyev managed to have two draws against Moseev. But like every checkers tournament the last round will be decisive.

Haitian surprise Alix Louis during his game against Guntis Valneris

10×10 rapid
In the rapid tournament, WMSG champion Alexander Georgiev managed to take over the top position, now two points ahead to four players: the African veteran Bassirou Ba, the young talent Roberts Misans and former world champions Alexei Chizhov and Guntis Valneris. The Africans are swinging in the rapid tournament: we have seen beautiful combinations by Ba, and also Jean Marc Ndofjang, Leopold Kouogueu and Adame Kone are very close to the top of the standings.

Alexander Georgiev celebrated his WMSG victory by drinking tea and eating cake with a small group of people. Not champagne, the winner does not understand why people should drink alcohol, a juice for him will do just fine. Talking to Georgiev is talking to a man who chooses his words with care.

Knowledge is needed for understanding
Although he acts at a top level in international draughts, Georgiev thinks that there still lays a lot of improvement ahead. Thousands of positions are waiting for him to understand. ‘Knowledge and understanding are not the same. You start with gathering knowledge. A good player cannot do without this, you should search for the why of every move. There are many different positions and accompanying rules you have to know. Everybody knows that each rule has its exceptions, that is where the understanding part comes in. A really good player chooses the exact moment to deviate from the theory.’

Georgiev: ‘My strongest points are that I understand the game quite well and can play different styles.’ The young players from Yakutia benefit from his skills. Georgiev is the consultant to promising good players, amongst them are Nogovitsyna and Platonova. He meets them at different competitions and teaches them while analysing their games. He likes to work with this group from the Asian part of Russia. With them he shares his love for draughts, and of course it is nice to teaching when you see results.

WMSG
Georgiev played all of his games in the WMSG without preparing for any opponent in special. ‘I am already familiar with the style of the top players and have enough understanding of the game to compete’. The day after the regular tournament the rapid tournament started. When he was asked about his ambitions in this quicker played competition, he answered clearly ‘of course I want to win.’