Echesspedia

The Turkiye Satranc Federasyonu has been a member of FIDE since 1962. The history of Turkish Chess goes back to the eighteenth century. The Turkish Chess Federation was established in 1954 as an autonomous federation. In 1991, it was connected to the Government under the General Sport and Youth Directorate. This was very important since chess was accepted as a 100% sport in Turkey.

Turkey has been a prolific organiser since the late 1990s with the Olympiad in Istanbul in 2000 and many World and European individual and team championships.

The country has participated in 23 Olympiads (without 1976 and 1978) since 1962 and collected four individual medals. The best team ranking was 33th in 1968.

Since 2001, TCF has been very active in organizing tournaments, around 100 international tournaments, including many European and World Championships. Istanbul will host once more the Olympiads in 2012.

Today, TCF has more than 100,000 licenced members and became autonomous on 7 May 2004. On 26 December 2004, Yazici already elected President in 2000, was reelected again for two terms.

Chess is an elective course in Turkey in all primary schools, where there are 16 million primary school children. The aim of TCF to recruit 2,000,000 registered members by 2012.

Turkey had by the end of 2011 five Grandmasters, thirteen International Masters and a total of sixty two titled players. The best players are Mikhail Gurevich, Suat Atalik, Baris Esen, Mustafa Yilmaz and Emre Can.

The national champions were: 1966 Siracettin Bilyap, 1967 Ismet Ibrahimoglu (Cavit Uzman), 1968 Nevzat Suer, 1969 Nevzat Suer (Akdogan Erozbek), 1970 Ismet Ibrahimoglu (Nevzat Suer), 1971 Ismet Ibrahimoglu, 1972 Ferit Boysan, 1973 Nevzat Suer, 1974 Ilhan Onat, 1975 Ilhan Onat, 1976 Feridun Oney (Ali Ipek), 1977 Ergun Gumrukcuoglu, 1978 Turhan Yilmaz, 1979 Turhan Yilmaz, 1980 Ergun Gumrukcuoglu (Ali Ipek, Ates Ulker), 1981 Suat Soylu, 1982 Ilhan Onat, 1983 Adnan Sendur, 1984 Can Yurtseven, 1985 Ates Ulker, 1986 Turhan Yilmaz, 1987 Suat Atalik, 1988 Suat Atalik, 1989 Turhan Yilmaz, 1990 Cem Karadag, 1991 Hakan Erdogan (Hakan Han), 1992 Hakan Han (Ali Ipek), 1993 Can Arduman, 1994 Can Arduman (Hakan Han), 1995 Ali Ipek, 1996 Can Arduman (Turhan Yilmaz), 1997 Can Arduman, 1998 Can Arduman, 1999 Umut Atakisi (Hakan Erdogan, Kivanc Haznedaroglu), 2000 Tamer Karatekin, 2001 Umut Atakisi, 2002 Can Arduman (Serkan Yeke), 2003 Kivanc Haznedaroglu, 2004 Turhan Yilmaz, 2005 Umut Atakisi, 2006 Mikhail Gurevich, 2007 Suat Atalik, 2008 Mikhail Gurevich, 2009 Mustafa Yilmaz, 2011 Emre Can.

The national team in 2009