Mind Sports Olympiad Running Winter Games Event

The Mind Sports Olympiad has been held annually since its inception in 1997. Last year as with many other events it was held in cyberspace, something that may present a few logistical problems for the organisers but is incredibly convenient for competitors, not to mention a lot less expensive.

For those of you sitting in your living rooms slowly going nuts, Etan and his team are putting on a mini-event as a stop gap to the summer when, hopefully, everything will be back to normal as opposed to the “new normal”.

There are no medals or prizes, so no entry fees either. Registration opens on February 12 for tournaments which will run from February 19-21.

The restricted list of games includes Crazyhouse Chess and Hyper Backgammon.

If you are a regular chess player, all that opening and middlegame theory you spent countless hours learning won’t do you any good with this variant.

Hyper Backgammon isn’t so bad; instead of 15 counters, the players start with only 3 each, so it is impossible to make a prime, but if are on the bar and think you will always be able to re-enter, take a gander at this game (pictured).

Battle Sheep and Circle Of Life are new games while Lines Of Action has been around for decades and is a regular MSO game.

If the worldwide lockdown continues, we will quite likely see more events of this nature.