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Unique at Chesstique

April, 2007:
Updated April 15, 2007 

April 15, 2007:  This was a great women's championship.  Tatiana Kosintseva's performance was outstanding, and Stefanova's second-half play was outstanding, moving her up to second place.  The final table is below.  

I've been involved in some controversy over at Chessville's message board, well, I was told some things I posted were controversial and the male visitors there were offended by me and some thought I must be a female Sam Sloan.  Eek!  And here I thought my comments weren't anything new under the sun or controversial at all!  My contention has been that women players, when playing in such events as the European Championships where they have separate events for men and women players, should receive the same prize money as their male counterparts.  Well - knock me over with a feather - I guess this is a radical concept!  Maybe I should run for a seat on the USCF Executive Board.

Today I did a few calculations.  The average ELO of the top five male finishers in the 2007 European Championships is 2642; the average ELO of the top five female finishers is 2455.  That is a difference of 187 points.  The percentage difference between the average ELOs is about 7%.  And yet the top five women's prizes are 50% less than the prizes for the top five men.  How is this fair?  If the prizes MUST be different because (so the argument goes), the women are of lower ELO and therefore the quality of their chess is crappier, why not reduce the women's prizes by the differential in the average ELOs?  In this case, the differential for the top five women and the top five men is nowhere near 50% - it's 7%.  So, what if the total prizes for the men's and women's events were combined, and the prize money was doled out to groups of finishers in each event based on the average ELO differential for each group? 

Here are the performance ratings for the top 5 female finishers:

(1) Tatiana Kosintseva (2459), 2774 
(2) Antoaneta Stefanova (2496), 2572 
(3) Nadezhda Kosintseva (2475), 2568 
(4) Hoang Thanh Trang (2472), 2568 
(5) Ekaterina Atalik (2374), 2521

April 13, 2007:  Happy Goddess Good Luck Day to Everyone!  Friday the 13th was, before the unfortunate arrest and subsequent torture and murder of most of the members of the Knights Templar in France in 1307 on a Friday the 13th, considered a lucky day and, in ancient times, it was a day of the Goddess, a day for celebration and love.

But that was then, and this is now.  Who cares about ancient goddesses when we have present-day chess goddesses performing before our very eyes!   For results in Round 10 - scroll down.  

This was the drama yesterday: The #2 player drew her game with the #1 player today (TK sister v. NK sister), but defending champion Atalik, who was in the #4 spot, won her game today and so now the standings are Tatiana Kosintseva #1 with 8.0, Atalik #2 with 7.0 and Nadezhda Kosintseva #3 with 7.0, and the #4 spot has been taken over by Ekaterina Korbut, also with 7.0.  Stefanova has slipped to the #5 spot after a draw today, with 6.5.  Amazing how a win by the #4 spot can shake things up, heh?

Today, Tatiana Kosintseva has solidified her hold on the number one spot and widened her lead.  Even if she loses her final game tomorrow, no one can catch her!  She's the new Individual European Women's Champion in 2007.  Congratulations to the lady - a well-earned victory.  

The players ranked 2 through 4 shuffled their spots yet again!  TK (great initials - in U.S. boxing, that's short for "technical knock-out") defeated Atalik today to retain her #1 spot.  Atalik falls to #5 with the loss (ouch!), with 7.0, while TK now has 9.0, a full 1.5 points ahead of the next highest-ranked player, her own sister, NK, who is #2 with 7.5.  Stefanova, drawing with Nadezhda Kosintseva, falls to the #6 spot, with 7.0, while NK replaces Atalik in the #2 spot.  Hoang Thanh Trang moved up into #3 with 7.5, after her victory over Ekaterina Korbut.  Korbut falls all the way to the #8 spot, oh my.  Who am I missing?  The #4 spot is now held by Maia Lomineishvili (yesterday at 6.5), who today defeated Kateryna Lahno.  Well, I'm confused!  Check out the list below for Round 10 standings and see if you can figure it out!

8th Individual European Women's Chess Championships 
April 2 - 16, 2007 
Dresden, Germany 

The women once get short-changed when it comes to prize money. Their prizes are one-half the men's.  Here is the prize structure for the top 20 women.  FIDE/ECU will deduct 20% from each prize.  Geez.