Echesspedia

City in the East of France which hosted many important chess festivals. The organisation was leaded by the well-known International Arbiter Jean Paul Touze with the generous financial and political support of the former Mayor of the city Jean Pierre Chevenement.
The first international tournament of Belfort was the 1979 World Cadet Championship won by the Argentine Marcelo Tempone. Four years later, Kiril Georgiev of Bulgaria became there the World Junior Champion. The peak came in 1988 with the GMA World Cup won by Garry Kasparov and it continues until 2004 with the Grand Prix of Belfort (Open) and the Master Comtois (a Round Robin, which reached category XV in 2003). Two women tournaments were also organized in 2002 and 2003, the first was won by Natasa Bojkovic and the second by Inna Gaponenko. Finally, in 2005 the city welcomed thousands of young chess players to participate in the World Youth Chess Championships.

Mikhail Gurevich and the participants in 2003

The winners of the Grand Prix and Master were: 1988 Margeir Petursson, 1989 Radovan Govedarica, 1990 Dimitry Komarov, 1991 Andrei Sokolov, 1992 Evgeniy Ragozin, 1993 Evgeniy Ragozin, 1994 Srefan Djuric, 1995 Manuel Apicella, 1997 Jean Marc Degraeve, 1998 Mikhail Gurevich, 1999 Viktor Bologan, 2002 Hicham Hamdouchi, 2002 Borsov, 2003 Mikhail Gurevich 2003 Igor Miladinovic and 2004 Andrei Istratescu.