Tuesday, November 01, 2005

Kamsky Finish 16th

Today, Australian sporting history was made. The mare MaKybe Diva became the first horse to win three Melbourne Cups. For our foreign readers, the Cup is the equivalent to the Kentucky Derby (US) or the Queen's Plate (Canada) or Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe (France). Basically, it's THE race.

So why in the world are we talking about this in a chess blog? Well, because it just so happens that one 'Kamsky' ran in the race and finished 16th place! I wonder if the horse was named after you-know-who. We must find out.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

You should all know about the Man behind the horses name like Pendragon:-

"...Dato' Tan Chin Nam, the honorary life president of the Malaysian Chess Federation (MCF), has a penchant for naming his horses after chess players and chess terms. I have heard his horses have been named Gufeld and Bishop's Opening, among others; though it turns out that Fischer doesn't belong to him.

There's an even closer connection between racing and chess, thanks again to Tan. A horse of his called Saintly (not all his horses have chess names) won the prestigious Melbourne Cup in Australia two years ago so Tan has allowed this name to be used in conjunction with an international chess tournament in Sydney..." ~ Quah Seng Sun, 29/01/1999
http://chesscolumn.20m.com/1999/99jan29.html

Further Reading:-
Hawkes out to spoil Bart's party again
http://foxsports.news.com.au/story/0,8659,17055273-32343,00.html

Bart's check mate
http://theage.com.au/articles/2005/09/08/1125772640399.html?oneclick=true

Quiet achiever heading for another Melbourne Cup
http://www.diviplus.com/racing-news/quiet-achiever-heading-for-another-melbourne-cup/

& many more...

The Closet Grandmaster said...

Cheers mate...I know about Dato Tan's penchant but did not remember it. Let me see if I can do some research and find out if Kamsky was owned by Dato Tan.

Anonymous said...

You can just ask me Amiel. The answer is "yes". However his connections strongly advised me not to back it :)

Cheers,
Jase