Nana Alexandria – a Pillar of Women's Chess
13.10.2009
– Born in Poti, Georgia (USSR), Nana learned chess at the age of four. At ten she started formal lessons and within six months became the girls’ champion of Tbilisi. By the age of twenty she had won the USSR Women’s Championship three times. Traumatically she missed becoming World Champion by tiny margins, but devoted her life to promoting women's chess. Today Nana Alexandria turns sixty.
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Nigel Davies:
A busy person’s opening system
Players with interests and commitments away from the chess board often find it difficult to compete against those with more study time. Their opponents come to the board armed with the latest theory and can bash out moves well into the middle game. On this DVD Nigel Davies addresses this issue by demonstrating a simple and easy to learn opening system designed for the busy person.
More information...
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Nana Alexandria – a Pillar of Women's Chess
By Elmer Dumlao Sangalang
Nana Alexandria in 1989
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Until a few decades ago, women chess players were an obvious minority in the
chess playing population. Rated women chess players, an even much smaller entity.
FIDE had separate listings of men and women players. The top places in the International
Rating List were monopolized my men. And the best women chess players belonged
to only a few European countries.
Today, women’s chess has gone a long way. If there’s one particular
individual who can be credited for its tremendous growth and development, it’s
none other than International Woman Grandmaster Nana Alexandria. From 1986 to
2002, Nana was Chairperson of the Commission for Women’s Chess, FIDE’s
permanent committee tasked to promote and develop chess activities for women
and the preparation of programs aiming, progressively, at a better representation
of women in all aspects of chess activities. She was the ideal choice for the
job because of her keen understanding of the means to stimulate interest in
chess.
Nana has accomplished much for women’s chess. She’s the brain behind
the Women’s Chess Oscar Award, the institution of the different age-group
Championships for Girls and the synchronization of the men’s and women’s
championship cycles. Through her recommendations, many open tournaments now
offer prizes to top women players. And lately, she has realized her dream of
staging the Women’s World Team Championship and the inclusion of an all-women
team in the World Team Championship.
Nana in 1975
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Nana Alexandria’s ideas were drawn from her vast experience as an outstanding
chess player. Born on October 13, 1949 in Poti, Georgia (USSR), Nana learned
chess at the age of four from her father, a mathematician. At ten she started
formal lessons in the famous Georgian chess school of V. Karseladze. Within
six months she became the girls’ champion of Tbilisi. She reached master
strength at fifteen. By the age of twenty, Nana had won the USSR Women’s
Championship for the third time, an achievement that was never equaled.
The year 1975 was very significant for Nana. This was when she suffered a heartbreaking
loss to Nona Gaprindashvili, 8½-3½, on her first attempt to win
the world women’s title. In the ninth game where she had a tremendous
advantage, she blundered away a piece and lost. Psychologically beaten, she
was not able to recover and lost three games in succession. In 1981, she got
another crack at the world title, this time against Maya Chiburdanidze. She
lacked self-confidence and did not expect to win the match when suddenly she
found the title within her grasp.
From 1969 through1986, Nana played for the USSR in six Olympiads, invariably
contributing significantly to the effort of winning the gold medal every time.
She participated in three more Olympiads from 1992 to1996 as Captain of the
victorious Georgian Women’s Team. Moreover, Nana was a three-time Champion
of Georgia, a three-time USSR Women’s Champion, and the first placer in
about 20 important international tournaments.
1981 Women's World Championship Match Maia Chiburdanidze vs Nana Alexandria
Among the well-known grandmasters she has beaten are Jan Timman and Aivars
Gipslis. This is not surprising since Nana was seconded by Mark Dvoretsky, one
of the world’s best trainers, and theoretician Viktor Gavrikov. Her constant
trainer was master David Janoev, an Honored Trainer of Georgia.
Nana Alexandria in 1986...
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...at
the 1990 Novi Sad Olympiad |
...and
in 1996 |
Nana is a popular TV and print journalist. She has written many articles for
various chess journals throughout the world (Georgia, Russia, Latvia, Yugoslavia,
Spain, USA, Australia, and Holland) in Georgian, Russian and English languages
and two books: "8:8 – Victory and Defeat" in Russian
and Georgian (2005), and "Georgian Women Chess Phenomenon" in English.
She has also made the documentary film, “Georgian Gambit”, in three
languages (Georgian, English and German).
Nana
Alexandria at the Olympiad in 1996
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Her best and favorite games? In terms of content and quality of play, the fourth
match game against Nana Ioseliani in the 1981 Final Candidates’ Match
stands out among the best. But the one that brings fondest memories is her game
as black against E. Rubtsova in 1962. “This was my first game that appeared
on the papers of the Sports Magazine. I was twelve years old then. There was
the photo article about me with this very game entitled, ‘Remember this
girl!’ It was my first tournament outside of Georgia”, Nana recalls.
If Nana had not pursued an active chess career, she would have been a teacher
at the Tbilisi University. She is a philologist by education, and did postgraduate
work in literature. She had varied hobbies such as collecting postcards and
photos of famous international artists. Because of her love for music, she studied
piano for five years. At school she did well in mathematics. In summary, Nana
is a well-rounded individual with wide-ranging interests.
Nana is not just brainy. Twenty-nine years ago, she captured the hearts of
many when her lovely face appeared in Chess Life (USCF) magazine. She
has retained her beauty and charm and – more importantly – when
she could only manage to tie the score of her second challenge match for the
world crown in 1981, Nana Alexandria was undaunted. She remained competitive
and aspired for an even greater, more valuable goal – advocating the cause
of women’s chess with intensity and determination to see to it that women
chessplayers enjoy virtually the same recognition and privileges accorded their
male counterparts.
Nana Alexandria at the Manila Olympiad 1992, being interviewed by Elmer
Dumlao Sangalang
On the occasion of the 60th anniversary of her birth, I wish to congratulate
Nana Alexandria, on behalf of the world chess fraternity, for her accomplishments
and pray that she will achieve even greater successes on and off the chessboard!
And thank you very much, our dearly beloved Nana, for all your wonderful gifts
to chess!
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