June 15, 2008 from: Lawrence Day

[chesspotzer]

June 15, 2008
from: Lawrence Day


I am the Chair of the Olympic Committee and so I had the pleasant task
of sending out the official invitations to our prospective
representatives. For my own first Olympic invitation back in 1968 the
memorable communication was a registered letter from John Prentice the
C.F.C. President, typed by a clunky Underwood typewriter on onionskin
paper. It was a big thrill to receive it. Now I'm in charge of the
invites myself and communications are by email which is certainly a
lot faster. The invitees this year were chosen by a combination of a
mathematical formula which averages National and International ratings
for active players, plus each team having one player chosen by
individual selection. That is a safeguard in case the numbers do not
tell the full story; however this year the numbers and the human
choice produced the same players: Thomas Roussel-Roozmon for the
National Team and Irina Barron for the Women's. A pity is that FIDE
has reduced the National Teams from six players to five. This cost us
an invitation for young International Master Tomas Krnan. He played
well at the Turin 2006 games and had an excellent performance in the
2007 Canadian Open at Ottawa where he shared second prize.

All of the participants invited for the Women's Team embraced their
opportunity with enthusiasm and have agreed to play. For the National
Team, Grandmaster Kevin Spraggett, who is now based in Portugal,
declined. Luckily we had four eager acceptances. Grandmaster Pascal
Charbonneau who now works in New York, is trying to arrange the time
considerations to make his participation possible. A highlight of our
experience at Turin 2006 was GM Charbonneau defeating current World
Champion Vishy Anand in a dramatic Canada-India match.

http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1417848

So let's hope Pascal can juggle his work schedule to play in Dresden.


--Lawrence Day