Malawi, who forfeited in the last round, was one of the teams staying about an 40-60 minutes away. Malawi delegate told me that his team was forfeited because they arrived late. What he didn’t tell me was that their tram had broken down. The arbiters didn’t accept the argument. These are very young federations and it is doubtful that they will have good memories of their first Olympiads.

Regarding the zero grace period, remember, I said that it should be part of a well thought out plan. So I’ll agree that it was a bad idea if it was sprung as a surprise on the participants, and due consideration was not given to the difficult travel logistics in Dresden. Perhaps a team warning could have been given for the first offense, and forfeiture only on any subsequent infractions.

http://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=5105

However, I think they’d better make some changes to the Olympiad. I just talked to a high-ranking FIDE official. He told me when he inspected the site in Dresden, he told the site managers that people would have trouble seeing the lower boards. They responded (paraphrase), “Who wants to see them anyway!?”

We have lots of elitism in chess and some of these rules are indicative of this. Actually Kirsan Ilyumzhinov stated in his address at the General Assembley that he is trying to appeal to the International Olympiad Committee and international sponsors. Is the Olympiad the place to do it?

With computers around the future of Chess is threatened,it will not be suprising if the game is played out soon i.e solved .

I’m more concerned about using such a rule at the Olympiad, a tournament with so many logistical challenges. You were in Turin, so you know. Unlike Turin, teams were spread out all over Dresden… some as far as an hour tram ride away. There was no Olympiad village where players were a 10-minute walk from the venue.

The issue is how this thing was thrown into the Olympiad which is a festive and celebratory tournament. Why didn’t they choose Corus, Dortmund, Linares or a top tournament? Simply put… they were chicken. Will this new rule help sponsorship or hurt? This rule may bring more risk than reward. Think about a top player forfeiting with major sponsors watching. Some players even used the late arrival as a stage (Kasparov) while others are just chronically late. Let’s see if they are serious about this when top tournaments come around next season.

Maybe some type of gradualism or middle ground. A player survey at the Olympiad showed a favortism toward the 15-minute grace. However, the issue remains… lateness.

We can reliably trace the evolution of chess back at least 14 centuries. And during that time there have been many changes. Some trivial (2 color squares), some monumental (expanding the moves of the Queen, Bishop and Pawn). There is nothing sacred about the 1 hour grace period that players have for being present at the start of the game. If eliminating the grace period is part of a well thought out plan to improve the staging of tournaments, then we should do it and not cling to customs that may have long ago lost their relevance.