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Interzonal chess tournaments [1] were tournaments organized by the World Chess Federation FIDE from the 1950s to the 1990s. They were a stage in the triennial World Chess Championship cycle and were held after the Zonal tournaments, and before the Candidates Tournament. Since 2005, the Chess World Cup has filled a similar role.
In the first year of the cycle, every FIDE member nation would hold a national championship, with the top players qualifying for the Zonal tournament. The world was divided into distinct zones, with the USSR, United States and Canada each being designated a zone, thus qualifiers from these three zones went directly to the Interzonal. Smaller countries would be grouped into a zone with many countries. For example, all of South America and Central America combined originally formed one zone.
The top players in each Zonal tournament would meet in the Interzonal tournament, which would typically have between 20 and 24 players. The top finishers (e.g., the top six in 1958) would qualify for the Candidates Tournament, which would take place the following year. They would be joined in the Candidates by the loser of the previous candidates' final and the loser of the previous world championship match. The winner of the Candidates tournament would play a 24-game match with the World Champion the following year, and need to win outright to gain the title.
For instance, in the World Chess Championship 1963 cycle, nine different Zonals were played. Each qualified between one and four players for the Interzonal, depending on the strength of the region, with 23 players qualifying for the Interzonal. The Interzonal was played in January to March 1962, with the top six players qualifying for the Candidates. They were joined by Mikhail Tal (loser of the 1961 match for the championship with Mikhail Botvinnik), and Paul Keres, who had finished second at the 1959 Candidates tournament. Those eight played a quadruple round-robin in the Candidates tournament in May and June 1962. The winner was Tigran Petrosian, who then played Botvinnik in a match for the championship in 1963.
Thus, Interzonal tournaments were held approximately every three years from 1948 until 1993 (1948, 1952, 1955, 1958, 1962, 1964, 1967, 1970, 1973, 1976, 1979, 1982, 1985, 1987, 1990, and 1993). However, by 1972 the system was becoming unwieldy. The number of top-level players had grown, with the increasing popularization of chess, and the cost of staging these events had become too great. It had become impractical to put all of the top players into a round robin tournament, so in 1973 the system was changed to two Interzonals (with the first three in each qualifying for the Candidates). In 1982 it changed again to three Interzonal tournaments, where the top two players qualified from each. Further increases in the number of qualifiers led to the Interzonal being staged as a single Swiss system tournament in 1990 and 1993.
The last FIDE Interzonal was in 1993. The short-lived Professional Chess Association also held one Interzonal, in 1993.
The system was dropped altogether from the mid-1990s, being replaced by a series of short, knockout-style matches among qualifiers. From 1998 to 2004, these tournaments were for the FIDE World Championship.
Since 2005, the Chess World Cup has filled a somewhat similar role to the Interzonal. As with the Interzonals, players qualify via zonal tournaments, although some leading players are seeded directly into the World Cup. The winner (and sometimes also the runner-up) qualifies for the Candidates Tournament. (In contrast to the Interzonal, from which six or more players would qualify).
See Candidates Tournament for a table of Interzonal, Candidates and World Championship results since 1948.
The International Chess Federation or World Chess Federation, commonly referred to by its French acronym FIDE, is an international organization based in Switzerland that connects the various national chess federations and acts as the governing body of international chess competition. FIDE was founded in Paris, France, on July 20, 1924. Its motto is Gens una sumus, Latin for 'We are one Family'. In 1999, FIDE was recognized by the International Olympic Committee (IOC). As of December 21, 2023, there are 201 member federations of FIDE.
The World Chess Championship is played to determine the world champion in chess. The current world champion is Ding Liren, who defeated his opponent Ian Nepomniachtchi in the 2023 World Chess Championship. Magnus Carlsen, the previous world champion, had declined to defend his title.
David Ionovich Bronstein was a Soviet chess player. Awarded the title of International Grandmaster by FIDE in 1950, he narrowly missed becoming World Chess Champion in 1951. Bronstein was one of the world's strongest players from the mid-1940s into the mid-1970s, and was described by his peers as a creative genius and master of tactics. He was also a renowned chess writer; his book Zurich International Chess Tournament 1953 is widely considered one of the greatest chess books ever written.
Efim Petrovich Geller was a Soviet chess player and world-class grandmaster at his peak. He won the Soviet Championship twice and was a Candidate for the World Championship on six occasions. He won four Ukrainian SSR Championship titles and shared first in the 1991 World Seniors' Championship, winning the title outright in 1992. His wife Oksana was a ballet dancer while his son Alexander was also a chess master. Geller was coach to World Champions Boris Spassky and Anatoly Karpov. He was also an author.
The Candidates Tournament is a chess tournament organized by FIDE, chess's international governing body, since 1950, as the final contest to determine the challenger for the World Chess Championship. The winner of the Candidates earns the right to a match for the World Championship against the incumbent world champion.
Lajos Portisch is a Hungarian chess Grandmaster, whose positional style earned him the nickname, the "Hungarian Botvinnik". One of the strongest non-Soviet players from the early 1960s into the late 1980s, he participated in twelve consecutive Interzonals from 1962 through 1993, qualifying for the World Chess Championship Candidates Cycle a total of eight times. Portisch set several all-time records in Chess Olympiads. In Hungarian Chess Championships, he either shared the title or won it outright a total of eight times. He won many strong international tournaments during his career. In 2004, Portisch was awarded the title of 'Nemzet Sportolója', Hungary's highest national sports achievement award.
At the World Chess Championship 1963, Tigran Petrosian narrowly qualified to challenge Mikhail Botvinnik for the World Chess Championship, and then won the match to become the ninth World Chess Champion. The cycle is particularly remembered for the controversy surrounding the Candidates' Tournament at Curaçao in 1962, which resulted in FIDE changing the format of the Candidates Tournament to a series of knockout matches.
The Interregnum of World Chess Champions lasted from the death of incumbent World Chess Champion Alexander Alekhine on 24 March 1946, until Mikhail Botvinnik won a specially organized championship tournament to succeed him on 17 May 1948.
The 1951 World Chess Championship was played between Mikhail Botvinnik and David Bronstein in Moscow from March 15 to May 11, 1951. It was the first match played under the supervision of FIDE; and the first to use a qualifying system of an Interzonal and Candidates Tournament to choose a challenger - a system which stayed in place until 1993.
A World Chess Championship was played between Mikhail Botvinnik and Vasily Smyslov in Moscow from March 5 to April 27, 1957. Botvinnik had been World Champion since 1948, while Smyslov earned the right to challenge by winning the 1956 Candidates tournament. This was the second World Championship match between the pair, after the drawn 1954 match.
A World Chess Championship was played between Tigran Petrosian and Boris Spassky in Moscow from April 9 to June 9, 1966. Petrosian won.
The 1972 Women's World Chess Championship was won by Nona Gaprindashvili, who successfully defended her title against challenger Alla Kushnir. This was the third consecutive title match between the two strongest female players of their time.
The 1975 Women's World Chess Championship was won by Nona Gaprindashvili, who successfully defended her title against challenger Nana Alexandria. This was Gaprindashvili's fourth title defense - and the last successful one.
The 1981 Women's World Chess Championship was won by Maia Chiburdanidze, who successfully defended her title against challenger Nana Alexandria after a closely fought match, which ended in an 8-8 tie.
The 1988 Women's World Chess Championship was won by Maia Chiburdanidze, who successfully defended her title against challenger Nana Ioseliani.
The 1993 Women's World Chess Championship was won by Xie Jun, who successfully defended her title against challenger Nana Ioseliani in the title match.
The 1999 Women's World Chess Championship was won by former champion Xie Jun, who regained her title after defeating Alisa Galliamova. Previous to the match, reigning champion Susan Polgar had been stripped of her title after much controversy.
The Women's World Chess Championship was established by FIDE in 1927. The format and regularity of the event has changed many times.
The 1948 Interzonal tournament was a major qualification event for the 1951 World Chess Championship, held in Saltsjöbaden, Sweden from 16 July to 14 August in 1948. It was the first Interzonal tournament organised by FIDE, which was at the time emerging as the game's international governing body. The 20 player round robin tournament was won by David Bronstein, who along with seven other players advanced to the 1950 Candidates Tournament.
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