Canada at NATO Chess 2015
CANADA AT 26th NATO CHESS CHAMPIONSHIP IN AMSTERDAM
By Regis Bellemare
10 Canadians participated to the 26th NATO Chess Championship in Amsterdam, 6-10 July 2015.
This Championship was a great success on and off the board! The Netherlands organiser, Lieutenant-Colonel Johan Engelen, supported by The Netherlands CISM (International Committee of Military Sports), put out an outstanding championship. In addition of the excellent playing condition, players liked the opening ceremony at Amsterdam City Hall, the boat tour of Amsterdam during Wednesday free afternoon, the championship souvernir coin and T-shirt given to all participants and excellent food! The location of the Championship being downtown Amsterdam, we got the opportunity to enjoy this wonderful city, including the visit the Max Euwe museum, former Dutch World Champion.
There was a total of 108 players from 18 countries (15 presenting a team), making this Championship the one with the highest number of player in his history. That said, the competition was still very strong but we managed to do excellent individual and team results.
27th NATO Championship will be hosted by the United-Kingdom, 22-26 August 2016, in Shrivenham close to Oxford, about 1 hour from London. Team Canada qualification will be at Royal Military College St-Jean in April 2016. Info: Major Regis Bellemare at regis.bellemare@forces.gc.ca.
TEAM RESULTS
Canada is still improving as a team and we are starting to be a real threat for the other teams!
Canada finished 13 out of 15 countries Canada 13 points is the highest number of points since we go back to the competition in 2008 and we are catching up with the middle of the group as there are many countries in the 14-17 points range. Congratulation to the German, once again the winning team of the Championship!
INDIVIDUAL RESULTS
Congratulation to Chris Felix from Halifax scoring 4 points, the highest score for a Canadian since 2008! Also noteworthy is the awarding of the certificate of NATO Chess «Life Time Member» to Major Regis Bellemare, for is involvement as Canada Team Leader for the last 8 years.
Team Canada
Chris Felix (Halifax) 4
Capt Francois Simard (St-Jean-sur-Richelieu) 3.5
Capt Fernando Echavarria-Hidalgo (Ottawa) 3
Maj Regis Bellemare (Gatineau) 2.5
Cpl Dominic Coulon (Québec) 2.5
OCDT Samuel Jimenez (Kingston) 1
Capt Mario Tremblay (Montréal) 1
Veteran players
Brian Murray (Kingston) 2
Herb Langer (Arnprior) 1.5
Jelani Ghiacy (Kingston) 1
Links of interest:
NATO Chess Championship: www.natochess.com
Military chess facebook: www.facebook.com/MilitaryChess
Max Euwe Museum: www.maxeuwe.nl/index.php/english/museum
