The

Women's World Chess Championship The Women's World Chess Championship (WWCC) is played to determine the world champion in women's chess. Like the World Chess Championship, it is administered by FIDE. Unlike with most sports recognized by the International Olympic Committee, wher ...

was held from 16 March to 7 April 2015 in

Sochi Sochi ( rus, Со́чи, p=ˈsotɕɪ, a=Ru-Сочи.ogg) is the largest resort city in Russia. The city is situated on the Sochi River, along the Black Sea in Southern Russia, with a population of 466,078 residents, up to 600,000 residents in ...

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia, Northern Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the ...

. It was a 64-player knockout tournament. It was originally scheduled from 11 to 31 October 2014 but problems in finding a sponsor and host city eventually forced international chess organisation

FIDE The International Chess Federation or World Chess Federation, commonly referred to by its French acronym FIDE ( Fédération Internationale des Échecs), is an international organization based in Switzerland that connects the various national c ...

to announce the postponement of the Championship on 24 September 2014, scheduling it for early 2015 in Sochi. The unclear state of the tournament was highly criticised by the

Association of Chess Professionals The Association of Chess Professionals (ACP) is a non-profit organisation which aims to protect the rights of professional chess players, address their concerns and to promote chess worldwide through the organisation of high level chess tournament ...

(ACP). In the final, Ukrainian Mariya Muzychuk, seeded 8th, defeated Russian

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 ...

, seeded 31st. As a result of this victory, Muzychuk was awarded the title of Grandmaster (GM), qualified for the FIDE World Cup 2015, and earned the right to defend her title in a 2016 match against the winner of the Women's FIDE Grand Prix Series 2013-14, Hou Yifan.

Participants

The players were selected through national chess championships, zonal tournaments and continental chess championships. 51 players from women's continental and zonal qualifiers: Europe 28, Asia 12, Americas 8 and Africa 3. The qualified players were announced on 22 January 2015, subject to signing the contract. Three former world champions were in the field:

Alexandra Kosteniuk Alexandra Konstantinovna Kosteniuk (russian: Алекса́ндра Константи́новна Костеню́к; born 23 April 1984) is a Russian chess grandmaster who is the former Women's World Rapid Chess Champion in 2021, and the for ...

seeded 5th,

Antoaneta Stefanova Antoaneta Stefanova ( bg, Антоанета Стефанова; born 19 April 1979) is a Bulgarian chess grandmaster and Women's World Champion from 2004 to 2006. She has represented Bulgaria in the Chess Olympiad in 2000 and the Women's Chess ...

9th and

Anna Ushenina Anna Yuriyivna Ushenina (; born 30 August 1985) is a Ukrainian chess grandmaster who was Women's World Chess Champion from November 2012 to September 2013. Personal life Ushenina lives in Kharkiv, where she was born. She is of Jewish ethnicit ...

15th. Notably, women's world number one and defending champion Hou Yifan from

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...

opted not to play, because of a prior commitment to a chess tournament in

Hawaii Hawaii ( ; haw, Hawaii or ) is a state in the Western United States, located in the Pacific Ocean about from the U.S. mainland. It is the only U.S. state outside North America, the only state that is an archipelago, and the only stat ...

. Also absent from the world top-10 were Nana Dzagnidze and Kateryna Lagno (they were replaced by two spots from E13). The participating players were seeded by their

FIDE rating The Elo rating system is a method for calculating the relative skill levels of players in zero-sum games such as chess. It is named after its creator Arpad Elo, a Hungarian-American physics professor. The Elo system was invented as an improved c ...

of March 2015. # , GM, 2581 (R) # , GM, 2557 (WC) # , GM, 2552 (E12) # , GM, 2530 (E12) # , GM, 2529 (E12) # , GM, 2528 (E12) # , GM, 2527 (R) # , IM, 2526 (R) # , GM, 2522 (R) # , GM, 2513 (E12) # , GM, 2495 (E13) # , GM, 2492 (WC) # , GM, 2488 (E12) # , WGM, 2487 (R) # , GM, 2486 (WC) # , IM, 2484 (PN) # , GM, 2483 (E12) # , GM, 2482 (E12) # , IM, 2481 (E12) # , IM, 2479 (R) # , GM, 2477 (Z2.1) # , GM, 2475 (E12) # , WGM, 2473 (AS13) # , GM, 2471 (PN) # , GM, 2463 (E13) # , IM, 2459 (E12) # , WGM, 2459 (E13) # , IM, 2459 (Z3.5) # , IM, 2457 (E12) # , WGM, 2456 (J13) # , WGM, 2456 (E12) # , WGM, 2444 (Z3.5) # , WGM, 2444 (Z2.4) # , IM, 2443 (J12) # , IM, 2443 (E13) # , IM, 2438 (E13) # , IM, 2436 (E13) # , IM, 2419 (E13) # , IM, 2415 (AS12) # , IM, 2395 (E13) # , IM, 2384 (E13) # , WGM, 2381 (E12) # , GM, 2379 (E13) # , IM, 2377 (E13) # , IM, 2374 (E13) # , IM, 2367 (E13) # , WGM, 2365 (Z3.5) # , WGM, 2354 (Z3.7) # , IM, 2349 (Z2.5) # , WGM, 2349 (Z3.5) # , WGM, 2337 (Z3.4) # , WGM, 2322 (Z2.3) # , WGM, 2322 (Z2.1) # , WIM, 2302 (Z3.1) # , WGM, 2284 (E13) # , WIM, 2267 (Z2.2) # , WGM, 2261 (Z3.3) # , WIM, 2219 (AM) # , WGM, 2192 (Z2.1) # , IM, 2182 (Z3.6) # , WIM, 2130 (Z3.2) # , WIM, 2071 (AF) # , WGM, 2058 (AF) # , WIM, 2022 (AF)

Qualification paths

*WC: Semi-finalists of the

Women's World Chess Championship 2012 The Women's World Chess Championship 2012 was a knockout tournament, to decide the women's world champion. The title was won by Anna Ushenina of Ukraine for the first time. Defending champion Hou Yifan went out in the second round. The tournament ...

and runner-up of

2013 File:2013 Events Collage V2.png, From left, clockwise: Edward Snowden becomes internationally famous for leaking classified NSA wiretapping information; Typhoon Haiyan kills over 6,000 in the Philippines and Southeast Asia; The Dhaka garment fact ...

*J12 and J13: World Junior Champions 2012 and 2013 *R: Rating (average of all published ratings from February 2013 to January 2014 was used) (5) *E12 and E13: European Individual Championships 2012 and 2013 (28) *AM: American Continental Chess Championship 2014 *AS12 and AS13:

Asian Chess Championship The Asian Chess Championship is a chess tournament open to all players from Asian chess federations ( FIDE zones from 3.1 to 3.7). It's held with the Swiss system and consists in two divisions, Open and Women's, the latter of which is reserved to f ...

s 2012 and 2013 *AF:

African Chess Championship The first African Chess Championship was played in 1998. Ibrahim Hasan Labib and Mohamed Tissir both shared first place with 7/10, but the former took the title. The 2007 championship was the FIDE Zone 4 qualifier for the Chess World Cup 2007, th ...

2013 (3) * Z2.1 (3), Z2.2, Z2.3, Z2.4, Z2.5, Z3.1, Z3.2, Z3.3, Z3.4, Z3.5 (4), Z3.6, Z3.7: Zonal tournaments *PN:

President nominee (2)

Nationalities in the field

Russia sent the most players with ten, one more than China. Note that 26 of the players came from countries which were former Soviet republics.

Schedule and prize money

Two days per match were followed by possible tie-breaks on the next day if the match was tied. The only rest day was 1 April the day after the semi-finals. The total prize-money was 450,000 US dollars, the same as in 2010 and 2012.

Results

Final match

The final was the only match of the tournament which consisted of four classical games (from 2 to 5 April 2015), played on consecutive days with a rest-day between the semi-final tie-breaks and match 1. Eventual tie-breaks, if needed, were scheduled to play on 6 April 2015, in the same manner as the whole tournament: two rapid games (25+10), i.e. 25 minutes for the whole game plus 10 seconds increment, the two rapid games (10+10), two blitz games (5+3) and an armageddon decider. Pogonina had the white pieces in the first game. Before the final they had met only once, in the 2007 European Individual Chess Championship, which ended in a draw. In the final game 4, white pieces belonged to Muzychuk, who opened the game with her favorite 1.е4. Pogonina responded with her favorite 1...е5. In the Scotch Four Knights Game she tried to avoid the main variations by putting the bishop to b4 via c5. The idea allowed Black to duck the home preparation of Muzychuk. White, however, achieved a spatial advantage and overall more favorable game after the opening. Later White decided to advance kingside pawns, weakening own king. The Black also had pawn weaknesses and a sharp and dynamically balanced position emerged. On the move 41 Muzychuk carried out a simplifying combination, transposing to an

endgame Endgame, Endgames, End Game, End Games, or similar variations may refer to: Film * ''The End of the Game'' (1919 film) * ''The End of the Game'' (1975 film), short documentary U.S. film * ''Endgame'' (1983 film), 1983 Italian post-apocalyptic f ...

with two strong passed pawns against a knight. Pogonina was left with no winning chances, and the game ended in a draw on the move 56 after the move repetition. :

Bracket

Players were seeded by their March rating. The standard bracket is used, i.e. seed #1 plays #64, #2 plays #63 and so on. The draw of who plays white first is done at the opening ceremony. Pairings published on 3 March.

References

External links

Official websiteRegulations, etc
{{World championships in 2015 Women's World Chess Championships 2015 in chess 2015 in Russian women's sport Sports competitions in Sochi International sports competitions hosted by Russia Chess in Russia 21st century in Sochi March 2015 sports events in Russia April 2015 sports events in Russia Women's sports competitions in Russia