Chess: Olympic sport?: Curling?!?!

kcdusk

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Such an idea may seem absurd to some people, but the World Chess Federation has been lobbying the International Olympic Committee for years to include chess in the Games. As part of its efforts, the federation even instituted drug testing to bring chess into compliance with the committee’s rules.

In making a case for chess, Kirsan Ilyumzhinov, the president of the federation, has said that curling is essentially “chess on ice.”

“there are ground rules: ice or snow. Chess has none of these.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/18/crosswords/chess/making-the-case-for-chess-as-an-olympic-sport.html?_r=1&ref=chess
 

Scott Tortorice

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See how the Olympics has become a collection of silly sports (for the most part, anyway), I don't see why Chess should be excluded at this point. Or Starcraft. :D
 

peterk1

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Somewhat related to the current topic. Since becoming a paying member of chess.com I've been poking around the site a lot more and looking at stuff I ordinarily wouldn't.

I just discovered that they have clubs and teams and most countries have national teams with an annual world cup. I just joined team Canada and signed up for a couple of tournaments. Ah, all those maple leafs look truly majestic all in a line like that, don't they?

http://www.chess.com/groups/team_match.html?id=96021

Pretending that you are in the Olympics playing for your country sounds like a nice way to keep the motivation level up.
 
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