Guinness World Records to review chess rules

Guinness World Records to review chess rules

Guinness World Records is to review its rules for breaking a new chess record, after questions were raised over the way in which an Israeli became the new record holder.

6:06PM GMT 09 Nov 2010

Israel’s Alik Gershon, 30, took the record for the most simultaneous opponents less than three weeks ago – when the chess grandmaster played against 525 at once on Tel Aviv’s central Rabin Square. He beat 454 of them, tied with 58 and lost against 11, while two were disqualified for moving pieces out of turn.

By beating more than 80 per cent of more than 501 players, he snatched the record from Israel’s arch rival, Iran last month.
The record, initiated by the Israel Chess Federation (ICF) and the Jewish Agency, was supervised, and approved, by a referee brought over from London on behalf of Guinness World Records.

But Israel’s biggest-selling daily, Yediot Ahronot, ran a large story on Friday, alleged the ICF failed to meet the requirement that all opponents be registered as chess federation members and have collected a minimum of 1,200 points.

It said many of the opponents were pupils from a Tel Aviv junior high school, bussed to Tel Aviv’s Rabin Square, and quoted some of them as saying they knew little or close to nothing of chess.

Yigal Alon, the ICF General Manager, said his federation chose the junior high school because it had a chess academy, which taught the game to most pupils.

He admitted an estimated 100 were registered with the ICF only 72 hours before the event, and that the youngest opponent was around six years old, but said most were junior high pupils, aged at least 12.

He added 1,200 points are handed out automatically to everyone on signing up with the chess federation – so there was no need to have won or tied a certain amount of games in the federation’s leagues.

The Israeli federation did not follow lower standards than previous record holders in Iran, Bulgaria or the United States, and even exceeded the Guinness requirements because at least 20 players had a rating of more than 1,800 points, he insisted, adding that the newspaper published the article without having read the agreement he signed with Guinness.

Guinness World Records International Marketing Manager Justine Bourdariat confirmed the record was authentic, saying her company’s guidelines were followed.

She added however that Guinness was now reviewing its guidelines and looking into opening a professional category.

“The (current) record category for ‘the most simultaneous games of chess by an individual different opponents’ is based on the number of participants playing against one individual and is not a professional category,” she said.

Source: http://www.telegraph.co.uk