Chess as a professional sport and activity has seen a rise in popularity across all cities in Türkiye with the number of players interested in the game increasing significantly, Turkish Chess Federation President Gülkız Tülay said Thursday.
Speaking to Daily Sabah, Tülay said: “Chess is now spread across the whole country. In previous years, interest was limited to big cities such as Ankara, Istanbul, Izmir, Mersin or Antalya. However, now chess is taking its place also in the east and southeast. Beyond taking presence, these cities also started to host chess tournaments.”
She mentioned that a tournament was organized in eastern Elazığ province, another international tournament was organized in Van province for the first time. Malatya has similarly hosted several programs while one was also held in Diyarbakır’s Bismil district.
When asked about comparing women chess players to men, Tülay said that men still dominate in numbers in all sports branches as in chess, adding: “We currently have 1,200,000 licensed athletes. This is the greatest number of athletes among sports federations, including football. We are the first and single federation to exceed 1 million. Some 396,000 of these are women.”
She noted the total number of chess players had been around 129,000 in 2012, when she came to the head of the federation which she is leading for three periods, while the number of women was only 36,000 compared to almost 400,000 right now.
Tülay said that the chess federation has taken up important projects in order to increase interest toward the sports branch since she came to the position. The interest of girls has increased while projects have been organized with ministries toward disadvantaged groups as well as handicapped.
“The state Turkish chess has reached in the eyes of the global chess society is a point of pride. Especially the investment we made toward youth setup in recent years, is bearing its fruits,” Tülay underscored.
She gave the example of Mustafa Yılmaz, saying that he made it to the top 100 chess players in the world according to the rating of the International Chess Federation (FIDE), the governing body of the sport of chess. “This is a first in the history of Turkish chess. It is a huge achievement.”
Tülay further mentioned that the FIDE World Cup was organized in Azerbaijan’s capital Baku this August, in which Türkiye participated with four players for the first time in its history.
“Mustafa Yılmaz, Vahap Şanal, Emre Can and Ediz Gürel participated. Gürel was born in 2008 and has become the youngest player to take place in the world tournament. He showed great success defeating a great master with only 28 moves – which is rather quick considering the length of chess tournaments.”
Tülay said that there is still more to do and many projects to realize such as a project to raise interest in kindergartens. “We have preparations for the 2024 olympics and we want to gain good degreed.”
Saying that the federation aimed to increase the number of licensed players further in 2024, Tülay added that a huge tournament will be organized in Antalya next year in the first week of the semester for the age groups of 7-18, where more than a thousand participants take place.
“Here, selections are made for the youth setup. Our players ranking first in the age group categories, represent us in international tournaments," Tülay noted.
Meanwhile, the 100th Century of the Republic Türkiye İş Bank Chess Cup started in the capital Ankara on Thursday with the participation of Tülay, İş Bank Deputy Director General Suat Sözen, chess players and members of the press.
In the cup, which brings together 12 of Türkiye’s leading chess players, an elimination system will be applied after five rounds. The winner of the cup will be announced on Nov. 27, after the semi-final and final matches.
