9th Chess Olympiad — Dubrovnik 1950

◇The Olympiad returns

Dubrovnik 1950 was the first Chess Olympiad since Buenos Aires 1939, the intervening years lost to the Second World War. Sixteen nations came to the walled Adriatic city and played a single round-robin over fifteen rounds at four boards a match, the title decided on total board (game) points — sixty available to each team. The Soviet Union, by now the world's dominant chess power, did not enter, leaving the field open to the strongest of the rest.

The tournament also left something lasting: the Dubrovnik chess set, designed for the event, became one of the most admired and widely copied chess sets.

◇The hosts take gold

Yugoslavia won it, finishing on 45½ board points — its first Olympiad title. Argentina took silver on 43½ and West Germany the bronze on 40½, edging the United States by half a point, with the Netherlands fifth on 37 and Belgium sixth on 32. The Yugoslav side of Gligorić, Vasja Pirc, Petar Trifunović, Braslav Rabar, Milan Vidmar Jr. and Stojan Puc combined front-line strength with unusual depth.

The individual boards were shared out widely. Miguel Najdorf of Argentina and West Germany's Wolfgang Unzicker tied for the board-one prize on 11/14; Julio Bolbochán of Argentina scored a superb 11½/14 on board two; and the hosts took the lower boards, Trifunović best on board three and Rabar an emphatic 9/10 on board four.

◇A first for the women's game

Dubrovnik also saw a first: Chantal Chaudé de Silans, playing for France, became the first woman to play in an official Chess Olympiad. For Yugoslavia the win was the start of four decades among the world's strongest chess nations, with Gligorić its leading player.