Hicham Hamdouchi

Hicham Hamdouchi, Warsaw 2013
Association	Morocco (until 2009, since 2016) France (2009 to 2016)
Born	October 8, 1972 Tangier , Morocco
title	International Master (1989) Grand Master (1994)
Current  Elo rating	2561 (August 2020)
Best Elo rating	2628 (July 2011)
Tab at the FIDE (English)

Hicham Hamdouchi ( Arabic هشام الحمدوشی; * October 8, 1972 in Tangier ) is a chess player from Morocco who also has French citizenship and played for France from 2009 to 2016. Before moving to the French Chess Federation and after returning to the Moroccan Chess Federation, he was or is the strongest Moroccan player and one of the leading grandmasters in Africa.

Life

Hicham Hamdouchi, 2009

The eleven-time Moroccan individual champion learned chess at an early age, but was able to take part in major tournaments for the first time at the age of 15. When he had a good success at a national tournament in Casablanca in 1988 , a few months later he was allowed to represent Morocco at the Chess Olympiad in Thessaloniki . A year later he was included in the Africa team that played at the team world championship in Lucerne . The 17-year-old managed to beat the American grandmaster John Fedorowicz in this tournament .

In the early 1990s he moved to Montpellier and played successfully at European tournaments: He won in Sitges and Ceuta in 1992 , where he achieved his first grandmaster norm. With a victory at the Grand Masters tournament in Montpellier in 1993, he secured the title that FIDE awarded him that same year. Hamdouchi was the second African to receive this title after the Tunisian Slim Bouaziz . In 1994 he won in Casablanca, in 1995 he won the championship of the Arab countries in Dubai . In 1996 he again won a strong grandmaster tournament in Montpellier, where he now studied economics. In 1998 he won in Malaga , Bozen and Djerba .

After finishing his studies, he moved to the vicinity of Barcelona . In 2000 he won again in Montpellier, in 2001 he first won the championship of Morocco in Rabat , then in Cairo the continental championship of Africa in front of the South African Watu Kobese . In 2002 he won the Open in Nice and Coria del Rio as well as a strong Grandmaster tournament in Belfort . In the same year he won the Arab Championship in Casablanca in front of the Grand Master Muhammad al-Mudiyahki from Qatar .

At the FIDE World Championships 2004 in Tripoli Hamdouchi got into the third round, in which he was eliminated against the eventual runner-up Michael Adams with 0.5: 1.5. In the same year he won the Arab Championship again in Dubai. In 2005 he won in Castelldefels and was second at the Rapid Chess Grand Prix in Bordeaux behind former world champion Anatoli Karpow , to whom he lost in the 2-3 final. Hamdouchi qualified with a victory (after a playoff with the Tunisian grandmaster Slim Belkhodja ) over the zone tournament of Taza for the World Cup in Khanty-Mansiysk 2005, in which he was eliminated in the first round against the Israeli Emil Sutovsky . He won in Salou in 2006 (shared with Kevin Spraggett , among others ), in Saint-Affrique in 2007 and in Geneva in 2008 .

He was last among the top 80 of the FIDE world rankings in January 2003. Since March 2009 he has been playing for the French Chess Federation. In 2013 he won the national championship in Nancy after a playoff against Jean-Marc Degraeve . Hamdouchi has been married to the Romanian women's grandmaster Adina-Maria Bogza since 2007.

National team

Hamdouchi took part with the Moroccan national team in eight chess Olympiads between 1988 and 2006 and achieved third place in the individual ranking of the first board in 1990 and 2006 . With the French team he took part in the 2013 European Team Championship and came in second.

societies

In the French team championship Hamdouchi played for Montpellier Echecs until 2009 , and since then for Clichy Echecs-92 , with whom he became champions in 2012 , 2013 , 2014 , 2016 and 2017 . He won the Belgian team championship in 2012 with Cercle des Echecs de Charleroi , and in 1999 he played in the Swiss National League A for the Club d'Echecs de Genève . In Spain he played for RC Labradores Sevilla in 2000 , in 2009, 2010 and 2012 for the Gros Xake Taldea team , with whom he also took part in the European Club Cup four times .

Web links

Commons : Hicham Hamdouchi  - Collection of Images

• Portrait (french)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Hicham Hamdouchi's results at the Chess Olympiads on olimpbase.org (English)
2. ↑ Hicham Hamdouchi's results at the European Team Championships on olimpbase.org (English)
3. ↑ Hicham Hamdouchi's results at Spanish team championships on olimpbase.org (English)
4. ↑ Hicham Hamdouchi's results at European Club Cups on olimpbase.org (English)