After the final round of play on Saturday, 13th November 2021 the 4th FIDE World Chess Championship for People with Disabilities has come to an end. You can also read the official FIDE report, which also talks in more detail about Tornelo's Blind Mode which was used for the first time at an Online World Chess Championship. You are also able to watch the closing ceremony on the FIDE Youtube Channel.
We are delighted to announce the winners of the tournament:
1st Place: FM Sargis Sargissyan from Armenia
2nd Place: FM Marcin Molenda from Poland
3rd Place: Jose Maria Saponara Caizzi from Argentina
And the top women:
1st Place: Tatiana Flores Bernholz from Spain
2nd Place: Zuzanna Lukasik from Poland
3rd Place: Solenn Afraoui from France
We've also received a lovely report from Indian FA Smitha Selvi, who was one of the arbiters during the tournament, providing her perspective on the challenges some of the players are up against.
With this tournament being impacted by continuing Covid restrictions worldwide the online edition allowed players from all corners of the world to take part. Some of them shared their stories of how chess has impacted their lives and how online competitions have kept them busy for the last two years.
Manuela Mekus, from Germany, has previously taken part in the over the board editions of this tournament but her physical impairments and the resulting pains have forced her to step back from chess a little. However, over the last year she's been training with Croatian GM Sasa Martinovi, allowing her to challenge herself with her chess skills and have a little break from the daily challenges.
Tilegen Rakhatbekov from Kyrgyzstan, who is one of our younger players enjoys the opportunity to compete against people from all over the world, even though he does prefer over the board games, as this means making new friends and visiting different countries for him. Runpeng Guo from China is also looking forward to travel again for chess competitions - one of his goals is to visit St Louis Chess Club.
Pawel Piekielny from Poland is also enjoying the connection aspect that has been opened up through a focus on online tournaments for the past two years. Playing chess for a decade, the game has helped him continuing to learn for life through the game.
FM Stanislav Babarykin from Russia trained as psychologist but decided to focus on chess, furthering his own career but also coaching others. As a visually impaired player he enjoys the possibilties to actually participate in a sport and keep his mind engaged at the same time.
The Italian player Ruben Bernardi has represented the IPCA Team at the Chess Olympiads of 2012 in Istanbul and in 2014 in Tromso. He is the president of his local chess club in the Italian Alps but this tournament was his first online tournament.
French participant Marie Moulin played at last years Online Olympiad for People with Disabilities and formed a lasting friendship with her fellow French team mates, leading them to form an initiative to drive awareness for chess for people with physical impairments. Sharing this experience with her fellow countrymen Georges, Djimmy, Frederic, Aldric, Solenn and Anouk is really important to her, embracing the chance to compete with other international players again.
Delighted to have this tournament in an online format, Russian Igor Kolomytchenko highlights the opportunties for hybrid formats, which will allow those players less able to travel.
It has been a great tournament overall and we are hoping that we will be able to welcome the players to Dresden again in person in the near future for an over the board tournament.
To allow for thorough administrative checks the closing ceremony will not take place today, 14th November 2021, as planned but is now scheduled for Wednesday, 17th November 2021 at 12:00 UTC.
Today marks the final day of play during th 4th FIDE World Chess Championship for People with Disabilities and this final set of games might still bring some changes to the leaderboard - and it is great to see the final standings of the tournament really only being decided in the last round.
One of the players starting the final day on 3.5 points is Dariia Kudainazarova from Kyrgyzstan. She has previously participated in over the board tournaments, where she and her family shared some of the challenges she is up against on a daily basis.
The tournament is also the first online World Championship where blind players have access to utilising a blind mode on Tornelo whilst playing their games. This has allowed 13 blind chess players to play their rounds completely independently, without physical or virtual assistance, providing more equitable conditions. We will be sharing more details on this exciting development that has taken shape in the last 6 months over the next few days.
After 6 rounds played only one participant is left on 6 points - Russian FM Stanislav Babarykin. But he is closely followed by 5 players on 5.5 points and a number on 5 points - so a lot can still happen over the remaining 3 rounds. Remember, you can can follow all the action on all boards live on Chess 24.
With players from 44 different countries we've put a map together to actually give you a feel for how far apart in the world some of the participants are - yet they are all united through the love of chess! There is also an age difference of almost 60 years between the youngest and oldest player which shows how inclusive the game is. GM Thomas Luther, the chairman of the FIDE DIS commission spoke (Interview in German) about this inclusivity a few years ago, the transcript in English is also available.