That's me yesterday in Dubai
As many of you may be aware from my Twitter or Facebook, I am now in Dubai, at the large Sport Accord Convention, helping to promote chess.
Gulf news published today an article (I reprint below from this original link) about my thoughts of having chess become an Olympic Sport. Please feel free to share your thoughts in the comments about this issue!
World champion chess player pushes for Olympic status25 year old says under-rated game has unlimited potentialBy Alaric Gomes, Senior Reporter, Gulf News. Published: April 28, 2010Dubai: She is cute, young, attractive and as the reigning world chess champion 25-year-old Alexandra Kosteniuk is pushing vigorously to have chess included as an Olympic sport in the not-too-distant future."My desire is to help chess and support the movement of having chess as an Olympic sport one day," Kosteniuk told Gulf News along the sidelines of the SportAccord International Convention at The Atlantis."My reason for coming here is to tell people about chess and to impress upon the International Olympic Committee (IOC) the need to have chess as an Olympic sport," she said.Born in 1984 in the Russian city of Perm, Kosteniuk showed tremendous talent from an early stage. The Women's World Champion since 2008, Kosteniuk wants to get rid of the notion that chess has been under-rated.Potential"I have always considered chess as a sport," she said. "Unfortunately, it is not as popular as it used to be. But chess has a lot of potential worldwide as we have 171 affiliated federations. And after spending all my life in the sport, I now see the need to help chess in some way."In fact, Kosteniuk has been doing a lot of work to promote chess including travelling, seminars, and lectures."This is a very interesting sport and it helps a lot of kids," she said. "I love chess very much and I want to share this passion with the world. I believe chess deserves much more attention."The pretty Russian believed her approach was working for the good of the sport.The sport has witnessed a renaissance of sorts with an increased following in recent times, partly due to such initiatives from FIDE, the world governing body for the sport."We have to move on," she said. "We need to find better ways of working and operating, with the sponsors and with the media."We have a huge advantage in chess as the distance really doesn't matter. The world is changing and life is faster nowadays."
Posted by Chess Queen® Alexandra Kosteniuk
Women's World Chess Champion
I'm not really convicned that chess should be in the Olympics. Chess has its own Olympiad and its own competitions and is an intellectual activity that makes it different from other Olympic Sports. The media coverage would be minimal or non-existent as is the case with even minority sports in the Olympics such as fencing. I don't believe that this would be of much benefit to chess.
ReplyDeletechess should be an Olympic sport
ReplyDeleteI agree.
ReplyDeleteThe Olympics have a creed: ""Citius, Altius, Fortius" (faster, higher, stronger).". Chess challenges the mind to be just that. I'm all for it. I myself play chess and would love to see this achieved sometime in the near future. Thus arising an ancient game and giving it the respect that it deserves.
http://TheStushFiles.blogspot.com
No! It would undermine the exclusiveness of the game and bring it a false popularity. Chess is a beautiful and wonderful game, but it's something different than other sports.
ReplyDeleteTo be honest: No. Chess isn't a physical sport, but a mental one.
ReplyDeleteI think the chess must be an Olympic sport included in the winter Olympic program:
ReplyDeletebetween curling & bobsleigh
http://www.olympic.org/en/content/Sports/
amb
@gordvass YES!!!!!!!!!!!!!
ReplyDeleteYES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
ReplyDeleteChess olympiad must continue and chess must be an olympic sport. I want to see top chess players in Olympiads.
ReplyDeleteusefulchess.com
I consider very interesting your proposition to include chess like an Olympic sport. And agree with you in this issue.
ReplyDeleteI think chess is as important as any sport due the hours of practice you have to spend. Besides play chess has a lot of advantages for health. Chess is popular in everywhere; unfortunately it hasn’t the enough diffusion. Is very common see every day in TV reports about football, basketball etc, but rarely chess
I think is necessary that people knows The Magic of a chessboard and the fantastic world when you’re playing a game. It isn’t an easy job, however you’re a real Queen and I consider yourself the right person to promote Chess around the world. Your labor is so admirable. I have seen in your blogs the participation in a lot of Chess events and I’m sure Chess will be considered like an Olympic sport in the near future
Don’t forget that you have the support of all your followers and fans to achieve it. If we can do something to support this work, please tell us.
mlemau
I believe that many talented chess players could develop much further, if they had support at the correct time and if they had not left gaps in their learning.Chess is a complicated sport, which has to be studied for many years. It is hard to imagine any other sport without coaches. I further believe that many chess lovers, who show great commitment will gain with this text books going through important methodological support and high quality training material for their chess lessons.
ReplyDelete