SAMARKAND — I run World Chess, so I know most of the people at the Expo, the building that houses the FIDE Olympiad and Congress. Some of the people I see every month. Some I see exactly once every four years, at this event. We pick the conversation up where we left it, as if the last election were last week.
The political chess world — the one that decides on elections — is tiny. It is small enough that I know these people's families, because they bring them along to tournaments, congresses and Olympiads. I know whose kid has grown up since the last election. I've had lunch with wives and husbands who have no vote and hold stronger opinions than the delegates. It is a family reunion.
I am happy to see them, and I mean it. I say so now because the rest of this is about the election.
The vote is on Saturday. Roughly 200 federations get one vote each, and they have three tickets to choose from. They are Timur Turlov with Viswanathan Anand, Jan Henric Buettner with Malcolm Pein, and Wadim Rosenstein with Gordon Tang. Whoever wins runs world chess for the next four years.
On the floor, it looks like a trade fair.
The candidates have booths, and they are huge. They are the kind of booth you see from a company launching a phone, not from a man asking the delegate from a small island federation for one vote. Mr. Rosenstein’s campaign has two booths. A few of the booths have robots.
The WR team is everywhere. I heard that Rosenstein brought approximately 30 people to Samarkand. I forget who told me, which says something about how information moves here. Buettner's team, I'm told, is five.
So that is thirty against five. Rosenstein is the candidate who dropped off the online presidential debate shortly after his opening remarks and never came back. In Samarkand he has returned thirty times over.
There is also a VIP room, and people negotiate in it. The delegates and the candidates teams have access to the room, which is stacked with a giant screen, the bar, and a desserts table (mostly Russian-style sweets). Out on the floor, everyone is for transparency, development, and the future of the game. In the VIP room, people count.
Now the rumor. I want to be careful, because it is only a rumor. I have not confirmed it, and nobody involved has said a word to me about it: Rosenstein and Buettner have a bet on whether Buettner clears 30 votes, and that a Bentley is at stake: if Buettner clears 30 votes, Rosenstein will buy a car for Buettner. If it’s less than 30, then Buettner owes Wadim a car. I assume, this alleged bet could have come out of negotiations: ‘You lost anyway — let’s make those votes count!”.
On Saturday somebody wins, and everybody goes home. In four years we will all be back with the same faces and lanyards.