The 2024 World Senior Championship is already underway.
The 2024 World Senior Championship is already underway. Preparations are underway in Porto Santo (Madeira archipelago) to host this major world chess event, which will take place between 16 and 30 November.
The Golden Island, as Porto Santo is known, due to the unique colour of the sands of one of the most prized beaches on the planet, is expecting to welcome 300 chess players from all over the world, who will compete in the +50 and +65 championships, both Open and Women. Between chess players, companions, organisers and arbiters, this mega-event is mobilising half a thousand people, something that makes the people of Porto Santo proud.
The tournaments will take place in the magnificent facilities of the Vila Baleira Hotel, located next to the place that was recently recognised as the “Best Beach Destination in Europe” by the World Travel Awards”.
The presentation of the event, held at the Vila Baleira Hotel, was attended by the general director of the Vila Baleira Hotels & Resorts group, Bruno Martins, the president of the Portuguese Chess Federation (FPX), Dominic Cross, and the president of the Chess Association of the Autonomous Region of Madeira (AXRAM), Gilberto Garrido.
Bruno Martins made a point of emphasising the “great capacity of the Hotel Vila Baleira to host major sporting events”. “We are used to working with international sports organisations and chess fits in well with our aims of combining competition and tourist comfort,” he said.
For Dominic Cross, “the Portuguese Chess Federation is also growing in its ability to organise events on an international scale”. “The good relations with the tourism authorities in Madeira, especially in Porto Santo, have allowed us to think of a great chess tournament and a World Veterans Championship fits like a glove with the dynamics of playing high-level chess, while also being able to enjoy the incredible potential of Porto Santo and the hotel that will host the event,” said the president of the FPX.
Gilberto Garrido, for his part, described the event as “another good opportunity to grow chess in the Autonomous Region of Madeira”. “We have a promise to establish a strong core in Porto Santo,” said the AXRAM leader.
The World Veterans Championship awards four titles: Open +50 Years, Women +50 Years, Open +65 Years and Women +65 Years. Given the evolution of world chess, those veterans still play chess at the highest level and many of the participantes are used to fight top-100 world players on equal terms. In Porto Santo there will be chess players who have shone (and are still shining…) on the most categorised boards in the world. We’ll thus have historical figures from the sport who are equally well known outside of chess.
