2008 World Mind Sports Games

The first World Mind Sports Games (WMSG) were held in Beijing, China from October 3 to 18, 2008, about two months after the Olympic Games.[1][2][3] They were sponsored and organised by the International Mind Sports Association with the General Administration of Sport of China and the Beijing Municipal Bureau of Sport.[4][5]

UK players for the Individual Women's Go competition at the first World Mind Sports Games, 2008 in Beijing

Five mind sports participated in the first Games: bridge, chess, draughts (checkers), go (weiqi), and xiangqi (Chinese chess).[6][7] Thirty-five gold medals were contested by 2,763 competitors from 143 countries.[8]

According to the World Bridge Federation, it incorporated the World Team Olympiad (1960–2004) and some established youth events in the Games "as the stepping stone on the path of introducing a third kind of Olympic Games (after the 'regular' Olympics and the Paralympics)".[9]

Events

Bridge
Main article: Bridge at the 2008 World Mind Sports Games

The World Bridge Federation organized eleven events in Beijing that constituted the "World Bridge Games" including nine WMSG medal events. Six were among the established world bridge championships contested in even-number years.[lower-alpha 1] The other three were for "youth" under age 28, a one-time compromise.[9][lower-alpha 2] More than 1400 players participated, about half of all players in the Games. Entries from European Bridge League countries[lower-alpha 3] won 22 of the 27 medals, led by Norway with six medals including two gold.

Event Gold Silver Bronze
WMSG medalists in bridge
Open Teams Italy  England Norway
Women Teams  England China United States
Open Individual Tor Helness Geir Helgemo Andrey Gromov
Women Individual Catarina Midskog Anne-Fréderique Lévy Yan Ru
Youth Individual Salih Murat Anter Radu Nistor Lars Arthur Johansen
Youth Pairs Mehmet Remzi Şakirler / Melih Osman Şen Lotan Fisher / Ron Schwartz Joanna Krawczyk / Piotr Tuczyński
under-28 Teams Norway  Poland China
under-26 Teams Denmark  Poland Norway
under-21 Teams France  England China

Two other events were continued by the WBF from its quadrennial "Olympiad" program, as part of its new "World Bridge Games" but separate from the WMSG (non-medal events sharing the facilities). Japan won the third Senior International Cup, for national teams of seniors (age 58+). 'Yeh Bros' from Chinese Taipei won the second Transnational Mixed Teams, for teams of any nationality comprising mixed pairs, one man and one woman.[10]

Chess
Main article: Chess at the 2008 World Mind Sports Games

The World Chess Federation organized ten events in Beijing, all of them in rapid or blitz chess.

Event Gold Silver Bronze
Men's Individual Blitz Martyn Kravtsiv Yuriy Drozdovsky Hristos Banikas
Women's Individual Blitz Alexandra Kosteniuk Antoaneta Stefanova Hou Yifan
Men's Individual Rapid Bu Xiangzhi Anton Korobov Zhang Zhong
Women's Individual Rapid Antoaneta Stefanova Zhao Xue Huang Qian
Mixed Pairs Blitz Carlos Matamoros Franco / Martha Fierro Krishnan Sasikiran / Tania Sachdev Valeriy Aveskulov / Tatjana Vasilevich
Mixed Pairs Rapid Ni Hua / Hou Yifan Dao Thien Hai / Le Kieu Thien Kim Ehsan Ghaem-Maghami / Atousa Pourkashiyan
Men's Teams Blitz Hungary China Ukraine
Women's Teams Blitz Russia China Vietnam
Men's Teams Rapid China Ukraine  Iran
Women's Teams Rapid China Ukraine Russia

Draughts
Main article: Draughts at the 2008 World Mind Sports Games

Under the auspices of the World Draughts Federation 288 players participated in five medal events in Beijing. There was a strong regional showing as twelve of the fifteen medals were won by players from Russia, Latvia, Moldova, and Ukraine.

Event Gold Silver Bronze
International Draughts 100sq (Men) Alexander Georgiev Alexander Getmanski Guntis Valneris
International Draughts 100sq (Women) Zoja Golubeva Tanja Chub Tamara Tansykkuzhina
Russian Draughts 64sq (Women) Viktoriya Motrichko Elena Miskova Julia Romanskaia
Brazilian Draughts 64sq (Men) Oleg Dashkov Ion Dosca Sergey Belosheev
Checkers (Mixed) Alex Moiseyev Ron King Raivis Paegle

Go
Main article: Go at the 2008 World Mind Sports Games

Under the auspices of the International Go Federation 560 players participated in six medal events in Beijing. South Korea won half of the 18 medals and all were swept by competitors from Eastern Asia.

Event Gold Silver Bronze
Men's Individual Kang Dongyun 7p[lower-alpha 4] Park Jungsang 9p Li Zhe 6p
Women's Individual Song Ronghui 1p Lee Minjin 5p Pak Chi-eun 9p
Open Jo Tae-Won 7d [11] Ham Youngwoo 7d Lee Yong Hee 6d
Men's Team South Korea China Japan
Women's Team China South Korea Japan
Pair Go Huang Yizhong 7p ／ Fan Weijing 2p Chou Chun-Hsun 9p ／ Hsieh Yi-Min 4p On So Jin 4p ／ Lee Ha Jin 3p

Xiangqi

Xiangqi, or "Chinese chess", was the fifth sport to participate in Beijing, where 125 players participated in five events. Although the World Xiangqi Federation was not a member of IMSA at the time, the sport was included in the Beijing games as a traditional Chinese sport with a large number of players, especially in China. The host country won all five gold medals.

Event Gold Silver Bronze
Rapid (Men) Wang Yang Jiang Chuan Zhao Ruquan
Individual (Women) Wang linna Zhao Guanfang Ngo Lan Huong
Individual (Men) Xu Yinchuan Hong Zhi Look Kongdwa
Team (Women) China Australia Vietnam
Team (Men) China Vietnam Hong Kong

Medals

Teams from the host country China won one-quarter of the 105 medals, including one-third of the gold.

  *   Host nation (China)

RankNationGoldSilverBronzeTotal
1 China (CHN)*128626
2 Russia (RUS)4138
3 South Korea (KOR)2439
 Ukraine (UKR)2439
5 Norway (NOR)2136
6 Turkey (TUR)2002
7 England (ENG)1203
8 Bulgaria (BUL)1102
 France (FRA)1102
10 Latvia (LAT)1023
11 United States (USA)1012
12 Denmark (DEN)1001
 Ecuador (ECU)1001
 Hungary (HUN)1001
 Italy (ITA)1001
 North Korea (PRK)1001
 Sweden (SWE)1001
18 Vietnam (VIE)0235
19 Moldova (MDA)0213
 Poland (POL)0213
21 Australia (AUS)0101
 Barbados (BAR)0101
 Chinese Taipei (TPE)0101
 India (IND)0101
 Israel (ISR)0101
 Netherlands (NED)0101
 Romania (ROU)0101
28 Commonwealth Games Federation (CGF)0022
 Iran (IRN)0022
 Japan (JPN)0022
31 Greece (GRE)0011
 Malaysia (MAS)0011
 Singapore (SIN)0011
Totals (33 nations)353535105

See also

Notes
  1. World-level bridge competition comprises some series contested every two years, some every four years, thus in odd-number or even-number years but not both.
  2. Youth events are defined by age under 26 (U26) and age under 21 (U21).
    • A mid-summer notice implies that one-time compromise will be extended to feature U28 youth at least once more in 2012. See the main article for more information. Clarification is anticipated for mid-November.
  3. Several national bridge organizations from the Mediterranean and Western Asia are members of the European Bridge League Archived 2012-05-05 at the Wayback Machine.
  4. The numbers and letters after the players' names refer to their professional or amateur ranks.

References
  1. First World Mind Sports Games to be held in Beijing. news.xinhuanet.com
  2. China to host Bridge Games Archived 2008-09-28 at the Wayback Machine The News–International, Pakistan.
  3. Beijing hosts first 'Mind Games', BBC News, 3 October 2008, by Shirong Chen. Retrieved 2011-05-23.
  4. A successful first edition of The World Mind Sports Games Archived 2011-03-22 at the Wayback Machine. International Mind Sports Association.
  5. Introduction of the 2008 World Mind Sports Games Archived 2012-03-20 at the Wayback Machine. British Go Association. No date. Retrieved 2011-05-23.
    • Evidently this is a translation from Chinese.
  6. The first international mind sports games "IMSA Cup". FIDE (chess).
  7. China to host 2008 World Mind Sports Games Archived 2012-07-09 at Archive.today. latestchess.com
  8. 2008 WMSG Results. 2008 WMSG. Confirmed 2011-05-25.
  9. World Bridge Games Archived 2013-12-20 at the Wayback Machine. World Bridge Federation (WBF). Retrieved 2011-05-24.
  10. 2008 World Mind Sports Games Archived 2012-05-07 at the Wayback Machine. WBF coverage of the bridge competitions. Retrieved 2011-05-24.
  11. "British Go News - Overseas Results". British Go Association. 2008-10-10.
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.