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Current World Champion Threatens to Quit (Part 2)
Last time I reported that the new cc world champion GM Tunc Hamarat
of Austria (I mistakenly said Switzerland last time) has threatened
to quit playing in ICCF events based on two factors:
- It has become easier to win the world championship due to the reduction
in size of the playing fields. He thought ICCF should return to the
old size.
- The sponsor of the email championship dictated some of the conditions
of play, bypassing regular ICCF rules. He thought this was not appropriate
and that ICCF should not make exceptions to the normal conduct of
events based on sponsorship.
I should say the GM Hamarat did not characterize his statements as
a threat, but rather he said that it was a simple fact that he would
not compete unless these things were changed. It was my interpretation
that his public statements amounted to a threat a threat I found totally
inappropriate. Immediately after the APCT News Bulletin was published
with my last column I got a response from the ICCF Deputy President
& Development Director Max Zavanelli (USA) and ICCF President
Josef Mrkvicka (Czech Republic) responding to Tunc Hamarat's
statements. Though the responses were lengthy and detailed, I will attempt
to summarize the most pertinent items below. For the complete, unedited
responses in a popup window Click
Here.
1) Reduction in size of final from 17 to 13 players:
"Hamarat played in the postal correspondence version. The target
for these championships was always 15 players. Often we would have
late qualifiers or some previous champion deciding he wanted to
participate at the last minute. Since we could not have an even number
of players (unfair number of white and black games for some), we had
to have 17, not 16. Many participants complained this was too many
games!
"From the very beginning for the first email Championship, it was
decided there would be 13 players. The email pace was too extreme
and the strongest players did not want 15 games. All semi final qualifications
were in effect. We also did not know how many sections we would have."
-- Max Zavanelli
2) Restriction of field
"It is nice to have a prestigious sponsor like New In Chess
as compared to having no sponsor before. This sponsor imposed no special
requirements on us! So here again is a non-issue! The format was decided
by ICCF, not New In Chess!
"I have a copy of the agreement with New In Chess and there
are no restrictions whatsoever on qualifications or format.
"In the event ICCF did not manage to convince these players to play
in Final 19, the open places would have been filled with other 3rd
placed players from the same cycle. If still after this there were
any open places, THEN (and only then) would 'other' qualifiers be
invited to participate. Of course, in this last case, we would have
had to follow our custom, and that is to accept players as per the
aging of their qualification (therefore, I guess Berliner or Hovde
would have been the first accepted players, had they expressed a desire
to participate after all qualifiers from the NIC cycle had been invited
and any open spot were still available)." -- Max Zavanelli
- - - - - - - - -
"ICCF kept perfectly to the interchangeability of qualifications
in the 3/4-Final stage of this tournament. This can be proved by the
'Table of Qualifications' valid at the start of the 3/4-Final sections.
Moreover, I attach my old Excel file which contains all qualifications
which were used for this 3/4-Final tournaments (column 'Tournament').
Everybody can see that ALL valid 3/4-Final qualifications were allowed
to be used, including GM norms, ratings over 2600 (Hamarat!), postal
semifinals, etc. Consequently, arguments like that the participation
was only limited to those who participated in the Semifinal stage
are completely out of touch [note: I'm not sure that Hamarat made
this claim, but I incorrectly listed this as a restriction in the
May-June column -- JFC]. In fact, the qualifiers from the 1st
ECWC Semifinal were in considerable minority (only 26 players out
of 79!) The special promotional arrangements were adopted for the
Final only (otherwise, we would have ended up with a 18 players email
Final), but NO 3rd placed player lost his qualification for the future
Finals " -- Josef Mrkvicka
I'm sorry I can't include more of the remarks by Max Zavanelli and
Josef Mrkvicka, but space considerations dictate that I be concise.
In my view, these gentlemen have very clearly explained the smaller
size of the final. It seems very sensible to me. Perhaps the world champion
has a small point in the second item. However, it also seems quite sensible
to me that some special considerations would be established for certain
events. It is stated that New in Chess did not dictate this one
restriction, but rather ICCF itself determined to give first priority
for the finals to people who played in the 3/4-finals of this event. Max
Zavanelli did point out that if spots were still open after the qualified
3/4-final players were invited, then non-participants qualified from other
events would have been invited. For those not familiar with the ICCF
World Championship cycle, the semi-final is followed by the 3/4-final
(now renamed the Candidates') followed by the final. There are clearly
stated criteria for qualifying for each of these rounds of play. Further
information about the path to the world championship can be found at
the ICCF-U.S. web site http://www.iccfus.com.
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