I was unaware there was a World Open speed tournament. How good is this guy? I checked on “Checkmate” and learned his ‘quick’ rating is about 250 points higher than his ‘reg’ rating. Anyone got a list of all the previous winners of the World Open speed tournament?
gadsdentimes.com/article/201 … /120909884
Armchair Warrior
I remember reading about that. I think its kind of a side tournament. Its most definately not the main event of the World Open.
Not to minimize the skill required to win it. But certainly doesn’t have the same coverage of the main event.
Not really sure why blitz (aka 5min chess, or whatever flavor it might be with delay clocks) never took off. Seemed to be doing quite well in the 90’s but for some reason it kinda died out as a major tournament. Is there chess “blitz” organization anymore?
No there isn’t. WBCA went away. FIDE has gone after the blitz market and USCF made some changes to help align some popular blitz time controls between USCF and FIDE (like g/3 +2).
Orrin Hudson’s MSA, which you imply that you examined, shows that he hasn’t won any section of any event with “World Open” in the title someplace.
There is a World Open Blitz Championship every year. It usually starts around 11pm on the evening of the last round of the World Open. The tournament typically has two sections, an Open and a U2000 or U1800. I doubt that anyone has a complete list of the past winners of the tournament. It’s really just another side event of the World Open, albeit one that typically draws over 100 players.
Orrin Hudson is a good motivational speaker, and a nice guy. Be Someone is a good charitable organization. But “World Open speed champion”? Not so much. 
My guess is that either the interviewee, the paper, or both engaged in a little creative captioning.