Jump to content

Women's World Chess Championship

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is an old revision of this page, as edited by 75.62.7.22 (talk) at 08:16, 2 May 2007 (→External links: rm W.T. Harvey extlink WP:EL). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

The Women's World Chess Championship is played to determine the women's world champion in chess. Like the World Chess Championship, it is administered by FIDE.

Unlike most sports, women are able to compete against men in chess, and so some women do not compete for the women's title. Notably, the world's top rated female player, Judit Polgar, has never competed for the women's title.

Women's World Champions

Name Years Country
Vera Menchik 1927–1944 Czechoslovakia Czechoslovakia / United Kingdom United Kingdom
Lyudmila Rudenko 1950–1953 Soviet Union Soviet Union / Ukraine Ukraine
Elisabeth Bykova 1953–1956 Soviet Union Soviet Union / Russia Russia
Olga Rubtsova 1956–1958 Soviet Union Soviet Union / Russia Russia
Elisabeth Bykova 1958–1962 Soviet Union Soviet Union / Russia Russia
Nona Gaprindashvili 1962–1978 Soviet Union Soviet Union / Georgia (country) Georgia
Maya Chiburdanidze 1978–1991 Soviet Union Soviet Union / Georgia (country) Georgia
Xie Jun 1991–1996 China People's Republic of China
Susan Polgar 1996–1999 Hungary Hungary / United States USA
Xie Jun 1999–2001 China People's Republic of China
Zhu Chen 2001–2004 China People's Republic of China
Antoaneta Stefanova 2004–2006 Bulgaria Bulgaria
Xu Yuhua 2006–present China People's Republic of China

Era of Menchik

The Women's World Championship was established by FIDE in 1927 as a single tournament held alongside the Chess Olympiad. The winner of that tournament, Vera Menchik, did not have any special rights as the men's champion did — instead she had to defend her title by playing as many games as all the challengers. She did this successfully in every other championship in her lifetime ([1930, 1931, 1933, 1935, 1937 and 1939).

Menchik died, still champion, in 1944 in a German air raid on Kent. The next championship was another round-robin tournament in 1949-50 and was won by Lyudmila Rudenko. Thereafter a system similar to that of the men's championship was established, with a cycle of Candidates events (and later Interzonals) to pick a challenger to face the reigning champion.

The first such Candidates tournament was held in Moscow, 1952. Elisabeth Bykova won and proceeded to defeat Rudenko with seven wins, five losses, and two draws to become the third champion. The next Candidates tournament was won by Olga Rubzowa. Instead of directly playing Bykova, however, FIDE decided that the championship should be held between the three top players in the world. Rubzowa won at Moscow in 1956, one-half point ahead of Bykova, who finished five points ahead of Rudenko. Bykova regained the title in 1958 and defended it against Kira Zvorykina, winner of a Candidates tournament, in 1959.

Georgian dominance

The fourth Candidates tournament was held in 1961 in Vrnjacka Banja, and was utterly dominated by Nona Gaprindashvili of Georgia, who won with ten wins, zero losses, and six draws. She then decisively defeated Bikova with seven wins, no losses, and four draws in Moscow, 1962 to become champion. Gaprindashvili defended her title against Alla Kushnir of Russia at Riga 1965 and Tbilisi/Moscow 1969. In 1972, FIDE introduced the same system for the women's championship as with the men's: a series of Interzonal tournaments, followed by the Candidates matches. Kushnir won again, only to be defeated by Gaprindashvili at Riga 1972. Gaprindashvili defended the title one last time against Nana Alexandria of Georgia at Pitsunda/Tbilisi 1975.

In 1976-1978 Candidates cycle, 17-year-old Maya Chiburdanidze of Georgia ended up the surprise star, defeating Nana Alexandria, Elena Akhmilovskaya, and Alla Kushnir to face Gaprindashvili in the 1978 finals at Tbilisi. Chiburdanidze proceeded to soundly defeat Gaprindashvili, marking the end of one Georgian's domination and the beginning of another's. Chiburdanidze defended her title against Alexandria at Borjomi/Tbilisi 1981 and Irina Levitina at Volgograd 1984. Following this, FIDE reintroduced the Candidates tournament system. Akhmilovskaya, who had earlier lost to Chiburdanidze in the Candidates matches, won the tournament was but was still defeated by Chiburdanidze at Sofia 1986. Chiburdanidze's final title defense came against Nana Ioseliani at Telavi 1988.

Rise of the Chinese and Hungarians

Her domination ended at Manila 1991, where the young Chinese star Xie Jun defeated Chiburdanidze, after finishing second to the still-active Gaprindashvili in an Interzonal, tying with Alisa Maric in the Candidates tournament, and then beating Maric in a tie-breaker match.

It was during this time that the three Polgar sisters Susan (also known as Zsuzsa), Sofia (Zsófia), and Judit emerged as dominant players. The family decided that Judit, as the strongest of the three, should concentrate on the men's championship, while Susan and Sofia should go for the women's.

Susan Polgar won the 1992 Candidates tournament at Shanghai. The Candidates final - an 8 game match between the top two finishers in the tournament - was a drawn match between Polgar and Ioseliani, even after two tiebreaks. The match was decided by a lottery, which Ioseliani won. She was then promptly crushed by Xie Jun in the championship at Monaco 1993.

The next cycle was dominated by Polgar. She tied with Chiburdanidze in the Candidates tournament, defeated her easily in the match, and then decisively defeated Xie Jun at Jaén 1996 for the championship.

In 1997, Alisa Galliamova and Xie Jun finished first and second, but Galliamova refused to play the final match entirely in China. FIDE eventually awarded the match to Xie Jun by default.

However, by the time all these delays were sorted out, Polgar had given birth to her first child. She requested that the match be postponed. FIDE refused, and eventually set up the championship to be between Galliamova and Xie Jun. The championship was held in Kazan, Tatarstan and Shenyang, China, and Xie Jun won with five wins, three losses, and seven draws.

In 2000 a knock-out event, similar to the FIDE men's title and held alongside it, was the new format of the women's world championship. It was won by Xie Jun. In 2001 a similar event determined the champion, Zhu Chen. Another knock-out, this one held separately from the men's event, in Elista, the capital of the Russian republic of Kalmykia (of which FIDE President Kirsan Ilyumzhinov is president), from May 21 to June 8, 2004, produced Bulgarian Antoaneta Stefanova as champion. Similar to Polgar seven years prior, Zhu Chen did not participate due to pregnancy.

In 2006 the title returned to China. Interestingly, the new champion Xu Yuhua has been pregnant in the time of the championship.

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/enwiki/w/index.php?title=Women%27s_World_Chess_Championship&oldid=127635928"