Chess grandmaster Magnus Carlsen returns to a tournament after a dispute over jeans is resolved
NEW YORK– High-ranking chess player Magnus Carlsen returns to the World Blitz Championship on Monday after the governing body agreed to relax a dress code that saw him fined and denied a late-round match in another tournament. refusing to change jeans.
International Chess Federation President Arkady Dvorkovich lamented the opposition and said in a statement on Sunday that he would have World Blitz Championship tournament officials consider allowing “suitable jeans” with a jacket and other “elegant minor deviations” from the dress code to stand.
He said Carlsen’s stance – which culminated in his departure from the tournament Friday – highlighted the need for more discussion “to ensure that our rules and their application reflect the evolving nature of chess as a global and accessible sport.”
Carlsen, meanwhile, said in a video posted to social media on Sunday that he would play – and wear jeans – in the World Blitz Championship when it starts on Monday.
“I think the situation was handled poorly on their side,” said the 34-year-old Norwegian grandmaster. But he added that he loves blitz – a fast form of chess – and wanted fans to be able to watch, and was encouraged by his talks with the federation after Friday’s showdown.
“I think we all actually want the same thing,” he suggested in the video on the YouTube channel of his Take Take Take chess app. “We want the players to feel comfortable, but also to be relatively representative.”
The events started with Carlsen wearing jeans and a sport coat on Friday at the Rapid World Championship, which is held separately from but in conjunction with the blitz event. The chess federation said Friday that long-standing rules ban jeans at those tournaments, and players will be housed nearby to easily change clothes if necessary.
An official fined Carlsen $200 and asked him to change pants, but he refused and was not paired for a ninth-round match, the federation said at the time. The organization noted that another grandmaster, Ian Nepomniachtchi, was fined earlier in the day for wearing sneakers, changing clothes and continuing to play.
Carlsen has said he offered to wear something else the next day, but officials were unyielding. He said that “it became a bit of a matter of principle” so he quit the fast and blitz championships.
In the video posted on Sunday, he questioned whether he had indeed broken a rule and said the change of clothes would have needlessly interrupted his concentration between matches. He called the punishment “incredibly severe.”
“Of course I could have changed. Obviously I didn’t want that,” he said, and “I stand by that.”