The Singapore Chess Federation shall compete this year in the Open Section of the World Chess Olympiad in Khanty-Mansiysk, (Russia), 19 September – 4 October 2010.

The 2010 World Amateur Chess Championship was held on 19-25th March in Skokie, IL, U.S.A. The tournament was managed by the North American Chess Association, Sevan A. Muradian and the Village of Skokie, and featured $20,000 USD prize fund.

He was one of the strongest chess players in the world and the World Chess Champion from 1957-1958. Smyslov was twice equal first at the Soviet Championship (1949, 1955), and his total of 17 Chess Olympiad medals won is an all-time record.

The U.S. Championship Blitz Open will feature a $7,000 prize fund in the open section and a $3,000 prize fund in the reserve, U2000 section. The nine-round Swiss will begin at 8 p.m. and will feature a game-in-five-minute (G/5) format.

The most interesting encounter of the whole weekend will take place in Essen-Katernberg, where Werder Bremen meets Mülheim. Both teams are expected to play with many grandmasters. Mülheim is trying to save the fourth place in order to qualify for the European Club Cup. At least six teams are fighting against relegation.

“There are a lot of connections between spiritual and chess. This game helps me to question myself repeatedly, because its philosophy is very simple. You are constantly obliged to make decisions and when you make a move you cannot take it back, while each move has its consequences.”

Silvio Danailov, manager of Veselin Topalov and Executive director of GSCA, held a reception during the EICC in Rijeka, where he announced his candidacy for President of ECU. His only opponent (for now) is Ali Nihat Yazici. Here are photos from the reception, text of the speech, and part of the program of the candidate.

Iranian Chess Championship Finals for Men and Women took place on 3-14 March, 2010. GM Ehsan Ghaem Maghami convincingly won the men championship, leaving the second placed Asgari Morteza full three points behind.

Today in the Rijeka’s Chess Home an extraordinary meeting of the ECU General Assembly was held. The meeting was chaired by Boris Kutin and attended by 45 out of 54 delegates. The Assembly had unanimously adopted the new Statute which poses new technical rules in the election procedure for ECU bodies.

Deep’s third GM-norm came after he drew with Frenchman Christian Bauer in the ninth round and final round to tally seven points that made him part of the three-way tie for the title. Arghyadip finished in a remarkable fashion when he scored the much-needed victory over top seeded Kazakh Murtas Kazhgaleyev.