Some Answers
to Open Letter
of GM Igor GLEK

Dear GM Glek,

I have read your open letter and I know that many of questions are not related with organisation but some of them are, that I answer below:

Venue: If you go to Turkish Chess Federation website you will find the address of the hotel on Internet and you will understand what kind of hotel it is. http://www.tsf.org.tr. So, please go to our website where you read regulations you will find hotel information published on the 1st of May not only this but also you are able to visit hotel even on the net virtually. First of all please take under consideration that as TCF we never organise such as important event in a 4-stars hotel. The quality is very important for us. I am sure you as a famous GM know the difference between a hostel and a luxury hotel. What we offer you is described and shown on the net you may check.

Cost: You are very very optimistic about hotels in Turkey thank you for that (the tournament is not in Antalya is in Istanbul). But there is not any price as you have mentioned in Istanbul maybe not even in Antalya for this season. You may check the hotel door price (even agency prices which is very confidential), which is in Istanbul! I attach the e-mail message sent by General Director of Hotel. Also you have to take under consideration that we do not use only rooms but also halls, a lot of facilities, also many rooms for arbiters and organisation. Therefore, the cost is more than the normal time even. Full board, all hotel-facilities are allocated to chess, all tournament halls, and continuous free tea-coffee service during the tournament hours. Who does provide such as conditions nowadays? Who does also provide 120,000 USD prize fund? (Turkish contribution and also you know that FIDE makes the same). We are proud of being organisers of this very important event. But anybody is able to organise tournaments with better conditions, if they fulfil official procedures of ECU and FIDE. There is a procedure of bidding, please check from www.eurochess.org. We have declared by our bid, hotel price and conditions and also prize fund. It was the best proposal made. It was accepted by ECU. If there is any better condition someone offered or still offers please tell us where and who does give it. You may ask the conditions of the hotel to GM Igor Miladinovic, GM Hristos Banikas, GM Vasil Spasov, GM Ioannis Nikolaidis, IA Rumen Angelov who have participated to Balkan Individual Championships 2001 in this hotel. Also you may ask the opinion of GM Azmaiparashvili and Mr.Boris Kutin President of ECU about the quality they have made official inspection.

Please do not forget that we have got tournament after an official bid procedure only two months ago. This procedure was 100% legal and authorised by tournament regulations of ECU GA.

You mention the critics about financial side of the tournaments but you do not mention the best prize fund for the chess history for a European Championship. Please do not forget that even as country we make it net prize fund for chess.

Why players can not choice hotel is very clear, we make contract with some sponsors and we get the tournament with these conditions. It is a rule that accepted by General Assembly of ECU. We applied and we have got the tournament by official rules. We would be very happy when we send players to tournaments to have exception to stay in official hotel. But this is the rule authorised by ECU GA, which is the highest authority in Europe under FIDE.

Your calculation about the cost of the hotel is different than our calculation. 17 nights are enough (You mention 19 nights). 17 x 64 in double room= 1,088 USD or 17x80=1,360 USD for single. For two free days and one tie-break please check the tournament regulations of ECU. It was the same in Batumi last year. The number of rounds is another subject not related with TCF, I may agree. You may pay by credit cards but we do not recommend due to exchange rate commissions. Also please take under consideration that these prices are legal from 29th May till 15th June.

European Individual Chess Championship is not a private tournament that is the reason we do not expect whatever we want. Even we do not expect anything illegal for private tournaments. We try to do the best for chess. We spend additional 80-100 thousand USD for this tournament as organiser. We may do that because our country invests on chess as we did in Olympiad 2000, we will do in future as well. We are proud of spending money for chess and we will do it in future again.

Your open letter is a good luck for our federation to clear some points. No body is professional here to make money from chess organisation. It is very clear that by having a basic 4 operation arithmetical calculation everybody can understand that it is impossible to make money from this tournament except if the number of participants for men over 450.

Dear GM,
Unfortunately it is very difficult to find million dollars for chess from sponsors nowadays, we find only a few hundreds. I hope you may do it for better or someone else could. We spend our time, energy and money to organise an excellent tournament by some conditions, which is more than good, and we do not make money from this event even we expend some.

I hope this is a satisfactory answer for you and hope also to see you in Istanbul to understand realities. I attach the budget for these two tournaments please check it.

I want to thank you very much for your e-mail and open letter at least it gave us a chance to explore our situation better to chess world.

I am sure as an excellent chess person you will find the truth.

Ali Nihat YAZICI
President of TCF
International Chess Organiser (FIDE)

 
The Budget of European Men and Women Individual Championships (13 May)
Expected!!

Costs: 230,000 USD

- 70 people accommodation: 28 Arbiters, 22 Turkish players, 7 members of appeals committee, organisation staff total approximately 60,000 USD But hotel gives 15 free rooms: the net will be 25,500 USD.
- Expenses for tournament: Bulletin, internet connection, photocopier, presents, phone and secretarial expenses, prospectus, score sheets, logo design, communication etc. approximately: 13,400 USD
- Stipends: Arbiters, Appeals Committee, Bulletin Team, Media Correspondent, organisational staff: approximately 23,600 USD
- Transfers: We do not make any profit from airport transfers but fortunately we do not loose either. We pay for airfare of appeals committee: approximately 3,500 (including chief arbiters)
- Prize Fund: 120,000 + 35,000 = 155,000 USD (TCF Contribution)
- Plus contingency (9,000USD) we hope that it will be zero.

Revenues: 230,000 USD

From Sponsor:
- From hotel accommodation: 140,000 USD. (300 participants - men and women)
- Additional contribution is 90,000 USD by sponsor (federation, etc.)
 
P.S. By Turkish Laws sponsors of sport events are given tax exemption from their annual profits!!