Gwaze is one of two players to have recorded the “highest” perfect score at an Olympiad with 9 points in 9 games (the other was Alexander Alekhine in 1930).
Robert Gwaze (b. 1982) is a Zimbabwean chess player born in Harare, Zimbabwe . He is a former student at Prince Edward School, in Harare. At age 15 he was a Zimbabwe National Chess Champion at both junior and senior levels.
Robert Gwaze; Country Zimbabwe Title; International Master FIDE rating 2422 (June 2020)
Olympic medal 2002
Men’s Chess Individual Gold Medal Representing Zimbabwe All-Africa Games 2011 Maputo
Gwaze won the African Junior Championships in Kenya in 1998, and got the International Master (IM) norm. Probably his greatest success was at the 2002 Chess Olympiad tournament in Bled , Slovenia when he achieved a rare perfect score , winning all nine of his games on first board for Zimbabwe, an achievement that only he and Alexander Alekhine did.
In 2007, he won the African Individual Chess Championship in Windhoek, Namibia, earning a spot in the 2007 Chess World Cup .
In this qualification tournament for the 2010 Chess World Championship Gwaze was eliminated in the first round by fifth-seed Alexei Shirov.
In 2010 he came first in the Cuca Trophy international tournament in Luanda , Angola.
He took part in the Chess World Cup 2011, but was eliminated in the first round by former FIDE World Champion Ruslan Ponomariov .
When asked about his favourite chess book he mentioned Bobby Fischer’s My 60 Memorable Games.
The 35th Chess Olympiad, organized by the Fédération Internationale des Échecs and comprising an open and women’s tournament, took place between October 25 and November 11, 2002, in Bled, Slovenia. There were 135 teams in the open event and 90 in the women’s event.
Both tournament sections were officiated by international arbiter Geurt Gijssen (Netherlands). Teams were paired across the 14 rounds of competition according to the Swiss system. The open division was played over four boards per round, whilst the women’s was played over three. In the event of a draw, the tie-break was decided by 1. The Buchholz system; and 2. Match points.
The time control for each game permitted each player 90 minutes for all their moves, with an additional 30 seconds increment for each player after each move, beginning with the first.
In addition to the overall medal winners, the teams were divided into seeding groups, with the top finishers in each group receiving special prizes.
Both reigning world champions, Vladimir Kramnik (classical) and Viswanathan Anand (FIDE), were absent from the tournament.
Meanwhile, the Russian team with two ex-champions, Kasparov and Khalifman, won their sixth consecutive title. Hungary and Armenia took silver and bronze, respectively.
Here we feature the first round game that Gwaze played a top player from Finland.
Current information of the opponent; Tomi Nybäck is a Finnish chess grandmaster and poker player. He won the Finnish Chess Championship in 2008 and is the No. 1 ranked Finnish player as of February 2018. He played for the Finnish team in the Chess Olympiads of 2002, 2004, 2006, 2008,…
Born: April 3, 1985 (age 35 years), Järvenpää, Finland
Title: Grandmaster (2003)
FIDE rating: 2576
Peak rating: 2656 (March 2011)
[Event “Bled Olympiad”] [Site “Bled SLO”] [Date “2002.10.26”] [Round “1”] [White “Robert Gwaze”] [Black “Tomi Nyback”] [Result “1-0”] [WhiteElo “2280”] [BlackElo “2445”] [EventDate “2002.10.26”] [ECO “B07”]
1. e4 d6 2. d4 Nf6 3. Nc3 g6 4. f3 c6 5. Be3 b5 6. Qd2 Nbd7 7. g4 Nb6 8. g5 Nfd7 9. d5 Ne5 10. dxc6 Nbc4 11. c7 Qxc7 12. Nd5 Qb7 13. Bxc4 Nxc4 14. Qc3 Rg8 15. Bf2 Be6 16. O-O-O Rc8 17. Qb3 Bg7 18. c3 Nxb2 19. Qxb2 Bxd5 20. Rxd5 Bxc3 21. Qe2 Qc6 22. Kb1 e6 23. Rd1 Qa6 24. Bd4 Qa3 25. Qxb5+ Kf8 26. Qb3 Qa5 27. Rc1 Qxg5 28. Ne2 Ke7 29. Qb7+ 1-0
