Major historic
\nevents can be life-changing in the life of an athlete. Such is the case of
\nRomanian-born chess player Juan Iliescu, whose contribution to Argentinian
\nchess has been most notable. Born Ion Traian Iliescu on April 18, 1898 in
\nBraila, Ion Iliescu was a seaman in the Romanian navy when Romania entered the
\nwar in 1916 on the side of the Entente. He was taken prisoner by the German
\narmy, and was released at the end of the war, after 18 months of captivity in
\nHavelberg, Germany. Upon his release he decided to roam the world. He reached
\nParis, a city his French mother had told him stories about, then crossed
\nAntwerp, Brussels and Ostend. In 1921 he crossed the Atlantic, reaching Buenos
\nAires, Argentina. He could neither speak Spanish, nor play chess, a sport
\nwidely spread amongst inmates.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
He did learn to
\nplay it at Caf\u00e9 Marzotto in Buenos Aires, from two players with diverging
\nplaystyles. Over the next two years he managed to beat all players that
\nfrequented the venues. He started playing in professional tournaments in 1924,
\nand in 1928 he won his first major competition, under his Hispanicized name,
\nJuano Iliesco. He then starting coaching chess players at San Lorenzo de
\nAlmagro, a local sports club. He is widely acknowledged for his notable
\ncontribution to the development of chess in Argentina. This is noted down in
\nthe book Lights and shadows of Argentinian chess (Luces y sombras del ajedrez
\nargentine), published in 2014. In 1939 Argentina was the first country outside
\nEurope to host the chess Olympiad. That year Juan Iliesco won the Argentinian
\nchess championship, but he was denied the title, as he wasn’t an Argentinian
\nnational. When rules changed, Juan Iliesco won and received the champion’s
\ntitle in 1943. A year later he missed another title, losing the playoff against
\nHector Rossetto. <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
He defeated all
\nof Argentina’s top-notch players, including those who settled there during the
\nwar, the most famous of whom is Miguel Najdorf, one of the best chess players
\nin the world in the late ’50s. Iliesco defeated Najdorf at the tournament held
\nin Mar del Plata in 1941. Najdorf at the time was the Olympic vice-champion
\nrepresenting Poland. Juan Iliesco went on to become a chess sports commentator,
\nfeaturing as a contributor to El Dia and La Plata sports magazines in the
\n1960s. He passed away on February 2, 1968 in Mar del Plata, where he spent the
\nlast years of his life. <\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
(Translated by V. Palcu)<\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Ion Iliescu had a major contribution to the development of chess in Argentina<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":93,"featured_media":120861,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[40940],"tags":[37264,33729,32197],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-120860","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sport","tag-argentina","tag-chess","tag-ion-iliescu"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n