Maltese Chess Championship
The Maltese Chess Championship is the yearly chess championship organised by the Malta Chess Federation in Malta which determines the national champion. Initially it consisted of an Open Championship.
Now the National championships also include the Junior Championships, the Rapid Championships and the Blitz Championships.
The current open National Champion is David Cilia Vincenti. Jack Mizzi holds the other 3 National titles: National Junior Champion, National Rapid Champion and National Blitz Champion.
Malta Open Championships[edit]
The first recorded open championship was held in 1923 and was won by Oscar Serracino-Inglott. Harry Camilleri won the championship a record eighteen times, first in 1965 and last in 2005, at the age of 72.
The current Malta Open Chess Champion is David Cilia Vincenti.
Candidates phase[edit]
To qualify for the Final phase of the Open Championship a player needs to have either placed first or second in the previous year or have placed in the top N of the Candidates phase of that year. N is determined by the number of participants.[1]
Preliminaries Phase[edit]
To qualify for the Candidates, a player must have reached an established Elo rating, currently 1700, or have placed in the top N of the Preliminaries.[1] The youngest player to have won the Preliminaries in Malta is Jack Mizzi.[2]
Past Winners of Final Stage[edit]
Malta Rapid Championships[edit]
Since 2017, the Malta Chess Federation started organising the Malta National Rapid Championship.
In 2021 an online Rapid Gran Prix was held and this was won by Jack Mizzi.[4] The 2022 Malta Rapid champion was Jack Mizzi.[5][6]
# Year Winner 1 2017 Jake Darmanin 2 2018 Jake Darmanin 3 2019 Jake Darmanin 4 2021 Jack Mizzi[7] 5 2022 Jack Mizzi
Malta Blitz Championships[edit]
Since 2017, the Malta Chess Federation started organising the Malta National Blitz Championship.
In 2021, an online Blitz Gran Prix was held and this was won by Jack Mizzi.[4] The 2022 and 2023 Malta Blitz champion was Jack Mizzi.[6][5] Jack Mizzi set a new Malta Chess record when he won the 2023 Blitz championship with a perfect 9-0 score.[8]
# Year Winner 1 2017 Jake Darmanin 2 2018 Jake Darmanin 3 2019 Matthew Fleri 4 2021 Jack Mizzi 5 2022 Jack Mizzi 6 2023 Jack Mizzi
Malta Junior championships[edit]
The first Malta Junior Championship was held in 1946 but the Malta Chess Federation only has records since 1987.[9]
The current Malta junior champion is Jack Mizzi.[10][11]
# Year Winner[9] 1 1987 Duncan Vella 2 1988 Joseph Stafrace 3 1989 Joseph Stafrace 4 1990 Joseph Stafrace 5 1991 Duncan Vella 6 1992 Timothy Mifsud 7 1993 Timothy Mifsud 8 1994 Timothy Mifsud 9 1995 Peter Pullicino 10 1996 David Cilia Vincenti 11 1997 Colin Pace 12 1998 Timothy Mifsud 13 1999 Colin Pace 14 2000 Daniel Abela 15 2001 Daniel Abela 16 2002 Daniel Abela 17 2003 Charles Sinn 18 2004 Mark Cardona 19 2005 Mark Cardona 20 2006 Mark Cardona 21 2007 Robert Zerafa 22 2008 Robert Zerafa 23 2009 Robert Zerafa 24 2010 Andre Xuereb 25 2011 Jake Darmanin 26 2012 Jake Darmanin 27 2013 Jake Darmanin 28 2014 Jake Darmanin 29 2015 Jurgen Grima 30 2016 Jamie Farrugia 31 2017 Steve Mizzi 32 2018 Matthew Fleri 33 2019 Cosmin Alexa 34 2021 Matthew Fleri 35 2022 Jack Mizzi[7] 36 2023 Jack Mizzi[12] 37 2024 Jack Mizzi[13]
References[edit]
- ^ a b Malta Chess Federation (22 January 2022). "MCF Statute" (PDF). Malta Chess Federation. Retrieved 29 December 2022.
- ^ Weenink, Steffie (2019-03-15). "WATCH: This 12-Year-Old Boy Might Be Well On His Way To Becoming Malta's Youngest Chess Champion". Lovin Malta. Retrieved 2022-12-29.
- ^ "Past Malta Champions - Malta Chess Federation". 2021-01-08. Retrieved 2022-11-12.
- ^ a b "Jack Mizzi wins Blitz and Rapid Online Grand Prix - Malta Chess Federation". 2021-05-30. Retrieved 2022-12-04.
- ^ a b "Chess: Jack Mizzi jirbaħ żewġ titli nazzjonali f'ġurnata waħda - ONE". 2022-12-10. Retrieved 2022-12-29.
- ^ a b "Jack Mizzi inkurunat Champion nazzjonali taċ-Chess". NETnews (in Maltese). 2022-12-05. Retrieved 2022-12-29.
- ^ a b "Jack Mizzi", Wikipedija (in Maltese), 2022-12-17, retrieved 2022-12-17
- ^ SportsDesk (2023-10-06). "Jack Mizzi in record run at the Malta Blitz Chess Championship". SportsDesk. Retrieved 2023-10-06.
- ^ a b "Past Malta Junior Champions - Malta Chess Federation". 2021-01-25. Retrieved 2022-11-12.
- ^ "16-year-old Jack Mizzi makes waves at international chess tournament". www.guidememalta.com. Retrieved 2022-11-12.
- ^ "Chess-Results Server Chess-results.com - Malta Junior Championship 2022". chess-results.com. Retrieved 2022-11-12.
- ^ "Chess-Results Server Chess-results.com - Malta Junior Chess Championships 2023". chess-results.com. Retrieved 2023-03-18.
- ^ "Chess-Results Server Chess-results.com - Junior Championships U14-U20s 2024". chess-results.com. Retrieved 2024-03-18.
Other Links[edit]
- On the 18th victory of Harry Camilleri The Malta Independent