Are Chess Players Really Athletes?

Some games are so deeply sunk into cultures that people don’t realize how relevant they’ve become. Chess, for one, is present in so many countries and cultures, throughout squares, schools, academies, and more, that if you ask if it is more than just a game, most people may not know.

What about you? Would you be so bold as to affirm that chess is a sport?

If your answer is yes, then you are correct! Even though many people still see it as just a game, however complex, difficult, or dynamic, chess is more than that. As a game, chess has been played since the final decades of the 15th century in what is known as its modern version.

However, the first official tournament of chess didn’t happen until 1841 when, in Leeds, a knockout event was disputed. Preceded by the London and Amsterdam tournaments of 1849 and 1851, the first international chess tournament took place in the English capital in the same year, 1851.

This, which is considered to be the first official international chess tournament, was disputed in an eliminatory system, and the German Adolf Anderssen came out as the champion.

However, a consolidated board of chess was lacking at the time, causing autonomous institutions to design and promote the tournaments. Also, due to the travel difficulties, most of the tournaments weren’t exactly international, as pretty much all the players came from European countries.

Only on July 20^th, 1924, in Paris, the “Federation Internationale des Echecs,” or FIDE, was founded under its motto “Gens una sumus”, which means “We Are One Family”.

The intent of internationalizing the game was clear and, even when the world was torn apart by the Cold War, tournaments were played with players from Europe, the U.S., and even the former USSR.

Are Chess Players Athletes?

Chess only came to receive its current status in 1999 when the International Olympic Committee declared the game a sport. With the Sydney Summer Olympic Games on the verge of taking place, chess officials pushed for the sport to become one of the modalities of the games.

That wish, however, wasn’t granted at the time, and, for that matter, it still hasn’t. With every Olympic Games edition, many people who are involved with chess press the Committee to add it as a modality.

Disregarding the recent history and with the hope that in the upcoming Summer Olympics, to be held in Paris in 2024, chess will finally be included in the Games, officials and athletes look forward to representing their countries in the biggest sports event in the world.

Nevertheless, with or without taking place in the Olympic Games, the IOC, the most important sports organization in the world, confirms that chess is a sport. That, in its turn, confirms the prognostic that chess players are indeed athletes.

If the game has been considered a sport, how can it not be played by athletes? Would you agree, or do you still think chess to be just a game?