7 April 2021

Russian Coaches Nominated for FIDE Trainer Awards

Nine applications were submitted.

Photo: RIA Novosti
Photo: RIA Novosti


The International Chess Federation, together with the FIDE Trainers’ Commission (TRG), is holding the 14th FIDE Trainer Awards (trainers and book authors), which recognizes and celebrates the outstanding achievements of the chess training community.

Achievements in 2019 and 2020 will be the basis of the trainers’ award while for books it will be those published in 2020. 

The categories have now been expanded to 10 so that every licensed trainer now has the opportunity to win an award and be recognized by their peers. 

Chess Federation of Russia nominated Head coach of the Russian national men's chess team, CFR President Andrey Filatov, Head coach of the Russian national women’s chess team Sergei Rublevsky, Head coach of the Russian national youth chess team Mikhail Kobalia, well-known coaches Sergey ZagrebelnyAlexander Kostyev, Yuri Yakovich, Sergei Shipov, and Jakov Geller for the FIDE Trainer Awards 2020 and the CFR Chess Museum curator, Cand. Sc. History Dmitry Oleynikov in the “Book and Author” category. 

Over the years of Andrey Filatov's work since 2014, the Russian team has shown a lot of outstanding results:

 

- Chess Olympiad (Azerbaijan, 2016) - 3rd place 

- Chess Olympiad (Georgia, 2018) - 3rd place

- FIDE Online Olympiad 2020 - 1st place

 

- World Team Chess Championship (Russia, 2017) - 2nd place

- World Team Chess Championship (Kazakhstan, 2019) - 1st place

 

- European Team Chess Championship (Iceland, 2015) - 1st place 

- European Team Chess Championship (Greece, 2017) - 2nd place 

- European Team Chess Championship (Georgia, 2019) - 1st place.

 

Led by Sergei Rublevsky, the Russian national women’s team won gold medals at the World Chess Olympiad in Tromso (2014), the World Team Championship in Khanty-Mansiysk (2017), and the European Team Championships in Reykjavik (2015), in Crete (2017), and Batumi (2019).  

Under the guidance of Mikhail Kobalia, the Russian youth team won the World U16 Olympiad in 2011 and 2012 (Turkey) and 2017 (India). The Russians won the medal table in the European youth championships starting from 2011. The young Russian players showed the best team results in the World youth championships in 2011 (Brazil), 2012 (Slovenia), 2016 (Russia), 2017 (Uruguay), and 2019 (India, China).

Dmitry Oleynikov is the author of the “Leaders of Soviet Chess / Illustrated Album (2020)” published by the Chess Federation of Russia. 

The book contains biographies of the leaders of Soviet chess: people who made intellectual entertainment an integral part of national culture. The book tells about the best men and women chess players who won the highest chess titles. Many details of their biographies have been recovered in archives. In addition, the introductory chapter "Century Traditions" tells about the history of chess in Russia, about tsars’ and the aristocracy’s passion for the game and about patrons of chess in the pre-revolutionary era.

There are many illustrations in the book, which show the country's chess life, and many of them, found in archives and provided by private collectors, were published for the first time. The proposed materials of the book "Leaders of Soviet Chess" are a tribute to the memory of those people who formed the national chess school.

 

About the Awards: 

Trainers

Mikhail Botvinnik Award for the best achievement by a trainer in Open Section competitions

Vakhtang Karseladze Award for the best achievement by a trainer in women's competitions

Mark Dvoretsky Award for the best achievement by a trainer in junior competitions

Samuel Reshevsky Award for the best achievement by a trainer of a youth prodigy (U-14) in competitions

Yuri Razuvaev Award for special contribution to grassroots education, and social impact

Tigran Petrosian Award for special contribution to trainer education 

Vasily Smyslov Award for the best academy or chess school, to be voted on by the current FIDE endorsed academies

Liu Wenzhe Award to recognize the first coach, as endorsed by one or more leading chess players

Online Chess Training Award for delivery or innovation in online chess training


Book Authors

Yuri Averbakh/Isaac Boleslavsky Award for best book

 

Information about the Award