The beginning of the International Chess Federation’s (FIDE) International Chess Championship Final kicks off on Nov. 20 and will last until mid-December. The match will be between reigning champion Ding Liren, a Chinese grandmaster, and the winner of the 2024 Candidates Tournament and Indian Grandmaster Gukesh Dommaraju.
The championship consists of 14 games.
“The player who scores 7.5 points or more wins the Match, and no further games are played,” according to FIDE. “If the score after 14 games is equal, the winner is decided on a tiebreak.”
Ding recently defeated two grandmasters, Norwegian Magnus Carlson and Russian Ian Neponmiachtchi, in thrilling head-to-head matches, putting him as many people’s favorite for the 2024 World Championship.
His upcoming opponent, Dommaraju, is the youngest challenger in the game’s history and is considered to be the underdog in this lineup by many spectators. At only eighteen years old compared to Ding’s 32, Dommaraju won five games and lost only one, placing him in the final by a half-point.
With this high-stakes, intensive world championship on the horizon, chess is once again in the spotlight for even those who do not keep up with the game. A complex, strategy-based board game, chess has an estimated 605 million players worldwide and has been played for centuries. Despite its widespread popularity, many still question whether it qualifies as a sport or not.
Chess is recognized as a sport by the International Olympic Committee, which, in theory, could be evidence of its validity. Similarly, over 100 countries recognize chess as a sport, including the United States. Many people, however, hold firm in their belief that chess is only a game.
“I don’t really think chess is a sport,” said Milly Peta, a sophomore economics major. “I think of a sport as something very physical, and chess doesn’t seem that physical.”
Many sports are based on athletic capabilities and prowess, while chess is focused mainly on logical, mental or strategic capabilities, skills which are far more commonly associated with games. Recent studies, however, have exposed the falsehood of the assumption that chess lacks physical effort.
“A chess player can burn up to 6,000 calories a day while playing in a tournament,” reports an article by sports news station ESPN.
“Grandmasters sustain elevated blood pressure for hours in the range found in competitive marathon runners,” said Robert Sapolsky, who studied stress in primates at Stanford University.
The ESPN article, titled “The grandmaster diet: How to lose weight while barely moving,” goes on to determine that the average competitive chess player will lose two pounds per day during a game, or 10-12 pounds over a 10-day tournament.
Despite the fact that players remain seated for the duration of a chess match, it is evident that professional chess has demands equivalent to that of many universally recognized sports, such as running.
There are a few key differences, however, between the physical exertion associated with chess and other physical activities. Weight loss and high blood pressure during intense exercise are caused by elevated heart rates associated with cardio and endurance. Weight loss and high blood pressure in chess, however, are largely caused by mental stress. Losing weight cannot always be equivilated with positive physical health.
During a professional chess game, high levels of stress cause elevated heart rate, which in turn often lead to a loss of appetite. A professional chess player eats significantly less during a tournament than in their day-to-day, due to a lack of free time, loss of appetite and intense focus for hours at a time during a game that cannot be broken for eating. Similarly, in-game anxiety can lead to sweating or rapid breathing, which over many hours or days, can contribute to incremental calorie loss.
Additionally, it is important to note that, unlike many sports, chess poses practically no risk of injuring oneself. In sports such as running, high impact and intense, acute muscular strain puts athletes at high risk of physical injury. In high contact sports like soccer or rugby, athletes risk dangerous falls that can lead to broken bones, concussions or even long term damage. Chess, in harsh contrast, needs no muscular strain and demands no contact with a competitor.
When presented with information about the physical demands of chess, Drake Wood, a sophomore political science student, reconsiders his stance when taking into account the new information. Though he originally doubted chess could qualify as a sport, upon learning of the physical changes many gradnmasters see throughout competition, Wood reevaluated.
“In that case, I do think chess is a sport,” Wood said. “Before, I thought it was just like a puzzle. But I didn’t know it burned so many calories.”
This seems to be the common opinion amongst GCSU students. Mackenzie Pepitone, a freshman graphic design student and recreational chess player, initially had negative remarks on chess classifying as a sport.
“Chess is not a sport because for something to be a sport your whole body should be moving,” Pepitone said. “It’s a great game, but not a sport.”
However, after learning about the calories burned and weight lost during a professional chess match, students have differing opinions.
“Maybe it is a sport, then,” Pepitone said. “I knew it was hard mentally, but not physically.”
In the end, it is up to the individual to decide whether or not they consider chess a sport. The consensus amongst GCSU students, however, seems to be that leisurely, non-physically taxing chess is not a sport. Competitive, physically demanding chess, however, is seen as more of a sport when students learn the physical impacts of stress and pressure on the players.
