Maria Kursova (russian: Мария Курсова, hy, Մարիա Կուրսովա; born 3 January 1986) is a Russian-Armenian

chess Chess is a board game for two players, called White and Black, each controlling an army of chess pieces in their color, with the objective to checkmate the opponent's king. It is sometimes called international chess or Western chess to dist ...

player. She was awarded the title of

Woman Grandmaster FIDE titles are awarded by the international chess governing body FIDE (''Fédération Internationale des Échecs'') for outstanding performance. The highest such title is Grandmaster (GM). Titles generally require a combination of Elo rating and ...

by FIDE in 2007. Kursova was world girls champion and European girls champion in her age category.

Career

Born in

Severodvinsk Severodvinsk ( rus, Северодвинск, p=sʲɪvʲɪrɐdˈvʲinsk) is a city in the north of Arkhangelsk Oblast, Russia, located in the delta of the Northern Dvina, west of Arkhangelsk, the administrative center of the oblast. As of the ...

, Kursova won the

World Youth Chess Championship The World Youth Chess Championship is a FIDE-organized worldwide chess competition for boys and girls under the age of 8, 10, 12, 14, 16 and 18. Twelve world champions are crowned every year. Since 2015, the event has been split into "World Cade ...

s in the Girls U10 category in 1996. She also won three medals at the

European Youth Chess Championship The European Youth Chess Championship is organized by the European Chess Union (ECU) in groups under 8, 10, 12, 14, 16 and 18 years old. The first tournament was held in 1991, and the under 8 category was introduced in 2007. Until 2002 there was als ...

s: in 1998 she took the bronze medal in the Girls U12 section, three years later Kursova won the Girls U16 title, and in 2003 she tied with

Natalia Pogonina Natalia Andreevna Pogonina (russian: Ната́лья Андре́евна Пого́нина; born 9 March 1985) is a Russian chess player who holds the FIDE title of Woman Grandmaster (WGM). She is the runner-up of the Women's World Chess Ch ...

for first place, placing second on countback, in the Girls U18 event. Kursova competed in the

Women's World Chess Championship 2006 The Women's World Chess Championship 2006 took place from March 10–27, 2006 in Ekaterinburg, Russia. For the fourth time, the championship took the form of a 64-player knock-out tournament. The tournament was won by Xu Yuhua, who beat Alisa Ga ...

as one of the FIDE president nominees. Kursova defeated

Zhao Xue Zhao Xue (; born 6 April 1985) is a Chinese chess player. She is the 24th Chinese person to achieve the title of Grandmaster. Zhao was a member of the gold medal-winning Chinese team at the Women's Chess Olympiad in 2002, 2004 and 2016, and ...

in the first round to advance to the second. She lost to

Ekaterina Kovalevskaya Ekaterina Kovalevskaya (russian: Екатерина Ковалевская; born 17 April 1974, in Rostov-on-Don) is a Russian chess player with the FIDE titles of International Master (IM) and Woman Grandmaster (WGM). She won the Russian Women's ...

and was therefore eliminated from the competition. Kursova switched her national federation to Armenia in 2011. She won the Armenian women's championship in 2012 and 2018. Kursova played for the Armenian team in the

Women's Chess Olympiad The Women's Chess Olympiad is an event held by FIDE (the International Chess Federation) since 1957 (every two years since 1972), where national women's teams compete at chess for gold, silver and bronze medals. Since 1976 the Women's Chess Olympia ...

, Women's

World Team Chess Championship The World Team Chess Championship is an international team chess event, eligible for the participation of 10 countries whose chess federations dominate their continent. It is played every two years. In chess, this tournament and the Chess Olympiads ...

, and Women's

European Team Chess Championship The European Team Championship (often abbreviated in texts and games databases as ''ETC'') is an international team chess event, eligible for the participation of European nations whose chess federations are located in zones 1.1 to 1.9. This more ...

.20 years translating experience-see "Zurich 1953"

References

External links

* *
Maria Kursova
chess games at 365Chess.com * {{DEFAULTSORT:Kursova, Maria 1986 births Living people Chess woman grandmasters Armenian female chess players Russian female chess players World Youth Chess Champions People from Severodvinsk Russian emigrants to Armenia Naturalized citizens of Armenia