Is Chess a Sport?

663 words 

“Sport”, from Old French: desport, meaning “leisure”

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According to writer David Shenk the game of chess helps to explicate humanity’s understanding of war, art, science and the human brain – sounds good but no mention of sport?(a) Is chess a sport? Well, the IOC(b) thinks it is…in 1999 the world’s peak sporting body gave it official recognition and featured it as an exhibition event in the 2000 Sydney Olympics. And this was not a new idea, back in 1924 there were attempts to include chess in the Summer Games. That didn’t come to fruition although it did lead to the creation of the International Chess Federation (FIDE) and the game’s own Olympics-like event, the biennial Chess Olympiad, which is totally separate and distinct from the IOC’s quadrennial event. Mind you, that IOC bestowed its imprimatur on chess shouldn’t surprise, in recent times the Olympic czars have proactively been on a crusade, extending the boundaries of what constitutes sport, witness recent additions to the Olympic portfolio such as skateboarding, rap dancing and climbing walls Spiderman-style.

Chess is a game, there’s no debate about that, but is it a sport as well as a game?…this is a highly contentious issue. The detractors would say that it doesn’t pass the pub test: to qualify as a sport, they would stress, it needs to be an active physical game, whereas chess, conversely, is a strategic board competition based on mental dexterity. They see an intellectual pursuit, not a display of athleticism. Critics of the chess as sport argument point to it’s absence of major physical exertion, gross motor skills and bodily athleticism. But using this criteria for a sport raises some interesting analogies, for instance, a doubter might ask, where is the physical or bio-mechanical exertion in darts? Yet most people think this beer-friendly activity is a sport and it has the accreditation. I have heard darts described as a “competitive precision sport” (cf. a “pub diversion”).  And there are a number of other different activities/games recognised as sports which don’t exhibit “major physical exertion”, eg, croquet, bowls, billiards, snooker, angling etc., you might even argue golf𖤗 (‘What constitutes a sport?”, BBC Bitesize, www.bbc.co.uk).

Aside from referencing the acknowledgment of the IOC, those advocating that chess is a sport would contend that it involves both physical and mental stress, long games at elite level—often running to six, seven or even more hours at a stretch—which require immense reserves of stamina and concentration. With such powers of endurance a prerequisite, players can experience elevated blood pressure levels and breathing rates. Getting your chess game to an elite standard requires a similar dedication and devotion to practice as the regimen of a professional athlete. Organisationally, chess played at the highest level follows the protocols of established sports – strict code of rules, governing body, global rankings, organised international events, etc.

The answer might depend on where you sit on the question of chess and physical activity and people have a bias on either side of the case. Perhaps a less contentious compromise would be, as some proponents have argued, to accept the idea of chess as a “mind sport”. The Council of Europe’s charter on sport is interesting in it’s definition of sport, the criteria must include physical activity, the participation doesn’t have to be organised, but one of it’s aims should be to “express or improve physical fitness”. On this basis we are automatically excluding chess, darts and angling, among others.

𖤗 there is some inconsistency in this debate, chess is accepted as a sport by the IOC, but on the other hand, the move in 2015 to have the card game bridge recognised as a sport was rejected by Sport England on the grounds that it did not involve physical activity 

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(a) The Immortal Game: A History of Chess or, How 32 Carved Pieces on a Board Illuminated Our Understanding of War, Science, and the Human Brain, David Shenk (2008)

(b) International Olympic Committee