Uganda Boasts Another Elite Chess Champion

A 17-year-old Ugandan girl has won a World Title at the World Chess Olympiad. Gloria Nansubuga, who started playing chess at the age of 4, is now the third highest-ranked Woman Fédération Internationale des Échecs or World Chess Federation master.

At age 13, Gloria Nansubuga dominated chess competitions within her country. She was the top Under 14 player and 6th overall of the total female chess players in Uganda. On the continent of Africa, among girls under 14, she ranked 4 out of 25 and 142 out of 2,649 total chess female players in Africa. Worldwide, Nansubuga was ranked 6,205 out of 168,055 female chess players.

In America, we probably know Gloria Nansubuga best from her depiction in Disney’sThe Queen of Katwe, a movie about Phiona Mutesi, another Ugandan chess champion who has changed the face of the game the world over. Glora Nansubuga was responsible for teaching Phiona how to play chess.

The FIDE World Chess Olympiad is an intense chess tournament which puts intellect and skill to the test, for every elite chess player within this competition. There are 11 rounds, 185 teams from 183 countries, and 919 total players. The women’s’ competition consists of 151 teams from 149 countries, with 749 total players which include almost all of the women’s world chess elite. Within FIDE there are four levels of mastery, Grandmaster (GM) 2500+, International master (IM) 2400+, FIDE master (FM) 2300+, and Candidate master (CM) 2200+. Nansubuga bypassed Woman Candidate Master (WCM) to become Woman FIDE Master (WFM). This move made Gloria Nansubuga the first Ugandan to make this type of leap in a tournament.

Uganda has a roster of elite players, Phiona Mutesi and Ivy Amoko are Uganda’s first chess players who have actually earned titles and attained the Woman Candidate Master Ranking. 17-year-old Gloria Nansubuga has now pushed the envelope even further with her newest feat. We are looking forward to what these ladies have in store and how they are single-handedly changing the face of the elite chess playing world.

Source: All Africa