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The Mind Sports Organisation (MSO) is an association for promoting
mind sport A mind sport, is a game of skill based on intellectual ability. Etymology The first major use of the term was as a result of the Mind Sports Olympiad in 1997. The phrase had been used prior to this event such as backgammon being described as ...
s including
Contract Bridge Contract bridge, or simply bridge, is a trick-taking card game using a standard 52-card deck. In its basic format, it is played by four players in two competing partnerships, with partners sitting opposite each other around a table. Millions ...
,
Chess Chess is a board game for two players, called White and Black, each controlling an army of chess pieces in their color, with the objective to checkmate the opponent's king. It is sometimes called international chess or Western chess to dist ...
, Go,
Mastermind Mastermind, Master Mind or The Mastermind may refer to: Fictional characters * Mastermind (Jason Wyngarde), a fictional supervillain in Marvel Comics, a title also held by his daughters: ** Martinique Jason, the first daughter and successor of th ...
, and
Scrabble ''Scrabble'' is a word game in which two to four players score points by placing tiles, each bearing a single letter, onto a game board divided into a 15×15 grid of squares. The tiles must form words that, in crossword fashion, read left t ...
. Since 1997 it has annually organised in England a multi-sport competition, the
Mind Sports Olympiad The Mind Sports Olympiad (MSO) is an annual international multi-disciplined competition and festival for games of mental skill and mind sports. The inaugural event was held in 1997 in London with £100,000 prize fund''Mind Sports Olympiad Su ...
. The MSO was founded in conjunction with the first Mind Sports Olympiad. Beside the main event, always in England and usually in London, it has supported similar events elsewhere, including
Milan Milan ( , , Lombard: ; it, Milano ) is a city in northern Italy, capital of Lombardy, and the second-most populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a population of about 1.4 million, while its metropolitan city h ...
;
South Korea South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia, constituting the southern part of the Korean Peninsula and sharing a land border with North Korea. Its western border is formed by the Yellow Sea, while its eas ...
,MSO Korean Contest Will Be Held on 22 July, Korea JoongAng Daily, 14 July 1999

Retrieved 30 April 2011 and
Prague Prague ( ; cs, Praha ; german: Prag, ; la, Praga) is the capital and List of cities in the Czech Republic, largest city in the Czech Republic, and the historical capital of Bohemia. On the Vltava river, Prague is home to about 1.3 milli ...
.Looking forward to the Mind Sports Olympiad, Radio Prague, Jan Velinger, 17 September 200

Retrieved 30 April 2011


Mind Sports Olympiad

The first Mind Sports Olympiad was held in London's Royal Festival Hall in 1997. It brought together an unprecedented number of strategy games and events. William Hartston in '
The Independent ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publish ...
said, "The biggest gamesfest ever to hit these (or perhaps any other) shores".William Hartston
South Bank Brain Show''
''
The Independent ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publish ...
'' 21 June 1997, retrieved 2 August 1997 The inaugural MSO along with a very large number of games, introduced two new events of their own creation the Pentamind and the Decamentathlon. These were two events to parallel the multi-event games in athletics of the modern pentathlon and the decathlon. This was part of the ambition to create an Olympics of the mind.''The Mind Sports Olympiad Supplement'' s, ''
The Times ''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper '' The Sunday Times'' (f ...
'', July - August 1997 The Mind Sports Olympiad returned to London with sponsorship in both 1998 and 1999. Despite a falling out between the organisers (see controversy below) a successful event was held in Alexandra Palace the next year in 2000.Paul Sussman
''Fierce rivalry in 'Olympics' for brainboxes''
24 August 2000 The Mind Sports Olympiad main event continued to happen but without sponsorship the tournaments were held at a number of different universities. The event was still going strong for the years 2001 - 2006.David Ward
''Cerebral Athletes Play Mind Games''
'' he Guardian', 22 August 2005, retrieved 2 August 2009 The main 2004 event featured a separate event for schools, featuring competitions and activities in chess, Go, quizzes and intelligence puzzles. But in 2007 the Mind Sports Olympiad was reduced to a much smaller venue in Potters Bar due to no sponsorship and no advertising.Stephen Moss
''This time it's Personal''
The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...
, 27 August 2007 In 2008 the MSO saw a revival returning to a central London venue, the Royal Horticultural Halls,
Westminster Westminster is an area of Central London, part of the wider City of Westminster. The area, which extends from the River Thames to Oxford Street, has many visitor attractions and historic landmarks, including the Palace of Westminster, B ...
and again on 21–31 August 2009.Information about venue for MSO XIII, http://www.boardability.com/mso/venue.html, 2 August 2009 The 2010 event was held at the Soho Theatre in London.Account of MSO XIV, http://www.boardability.com/result.php?id=mso14 , 15 February 2011 In 2011, the Mind Sports Olympiad moved to a bigger venue, the University of London Union. The 16th MSO will take place once again at the University of London Union in 18–27 August 2012. Over the last few years, MSO has been flourishing both at its satellite events and at the main event in London, which attracted almost 800 entries in 2011. MSO London is a truly global event, and the 2010 Pentamind World Champion Paco Garcia De La Banda hails from Spain, while the 2011 Pentamind World Champion Andres Kuusk is from Estonia. The most widely read chess magazine in the world, Chess Life, featured an article in February 2012 about in the inauguration of Diving Chess into the 2011 Mind Sports Olympiad.


Venues

The Mind Sports Olympiad main event has been annual since 1997 at the following locations in England: * 1997 Royal Festival Hall, London * 1998 Novotel Hotel, Hammersmith * 1999
Kensington Olympia Kensington (Olympia) is a combined rail and tube station in Kensington, on the edge of Central London. Services are provided by London Overground, who manage the station, along with Southern and London Underground. It is in Travelcard Zone 2. ...
, London * 2000 Alexandra Palace, London * 2001 South Bank University, London * 2002 Loughborough University,
Loughborough Loughborough ( ) is a market town in the Charnwood borough of Leicestershire, England, the seat of Charnwood Borough Council and Loughborough University. At the 2011 census the town's built-up area had a population of 59,932 , the second large ...
* 2003
Manchester University , mottoeng = Knowledge, Wisdom, Humanity , established = 2004 – University of Manchester Predecessor institutions: 1956 – UMIST (as university college; university 1994) 1904 – Victoria University of Manchester 1880 – Victoria Univer ...
,
Manchester Manchester () is a city in Greater Manchester, England. It had a population of 552,000 in 2021. It is bordered by the Cheshire Plain to the south, the Pennines to the north and east, and the neighbouring city of Salford to the west. The t ...
''Manchester Hosts 9th Mind Sports Olympiad'', '' Manchester City Council News'', 2 August 2005, retrieved 31 July 2009 * 2004 Manchester University, ManchesterDon's diary:games and gold medals in Mind, The Times Higher Education, David Levy, 17 October 2003

Retrieved 20 April 2011 * 2005 Manchester University, ManchesterMind games tournament under way,
BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...
...
Manchester, 19 August 200

Retrieved 30 April 2011 * 2006 University of Westminster, Westminster University, London * 2007 Potters Bar * 2008 Royal Horticultural Halls, London * 2009 Royal Horticultural Halls, LondonCheam man's mind bending puzzles at mental olympiad, Sutton Guardian, Kevin Barnesm 28 August 200

Retrieved 30 April 2011 * 2010 Soho Theatre, LondonScrabble, Monopoly and more at xhul games fest, The Jewish Chronicle, Robyn Rosen, 26 August 2010

Retrieved 30 April 2011 * 2011 University of London Union, London.Venue announcement for MSO XV, http://www.boardability.com/venue.php, 15 February 2011 * 2012 University of London Union, London.Venue announcement for MSO XVI, http://www.boardability.com/, 15 February 2012 * 2013 University of London Union, London * 2014 JW3, London


Games at the MSO

The MSO consists mainly of single event competitions most of which are for the nominal title of Olympiad champion, though some trademarked games are authorised by the game designer and publishers as the official world championships. All games, whether an Olympiad or the official World championship, can count towards the Pentamind. Medals, and more recently trophies, are awarded for gold, silver and bronze positions in each competition as well as ranks, with similar awards for the top juniors in each event. In early Olympiads sponsorship allowed for generous financial prizes to go with many of the events. In recent years such prizes have been limited to a small number of events, usually as a result of specific outside sponsorship for that discipline. Notable games include (most other refs mention some of these): The well-known: Chess, Bridge, Draughts, Shogi,
Backgammon Backgammon is a two-player board game played with counters and dice on tables boards. It is the most widespread Western member of the large family of tables games, whose ancestors date back nearly 5,000 years to the regions of Mesopotamia and Pe ...
, Chinese Chess (Xiang-Qi), Othello, Poker,
Cribbage Cribbage, or crib, is a card game, traditionally for two players, that involves playing and grouping cards in combinations which gain points. It can be adapted for three or four players. Cribbage has several distinctive features: the cribbag ...
,
Mastermind Mastermind, Master Mind or The Mastermind may refer to: Fictional characters * Mastermind (Jason Wyngarde), a fictional supervillain in Marvel Comics, a title also held by his daughters: ** Martinique Jason, the first daughter and successor of th ...
And many newer games like: Abalone, Boku, Continuo,
Entropy Entropy is a scientific concept, as well as a measurable physical property, that is most commonly associated with a state of disorder, randomness, or uncertainty. The term and the concept are used in diverse fields, from classical thermodynam ...
,
Kamisado ''Kamisado'' is an abstract strategy board game for two players that's played on an 8x8 multicoloured board. Each player controls a set of eight octagonal dragon tower pieces. Each player's set of dragon towers contains a tower to match each of ...
, Lines of Action (LOA), Pacru,Mike's test for the old grey matter,
Manchester Evening News The ''Manchester Evening News'' (''MEN'') is a regional daily newspaper covering Greater Manchester in North West England, founded in 1868. It is published Monday–Saturday; a Sunday edition, the ''MEN on Sunday'', was launched in February 20 ...
, Patricia Roberts, 8 December 200

 TwixT, Twixt At MSO tournaments, the Decamentathlon is a composite event in which players compete in ten separate
mind sport A mind sport, is a game of skill based on intellectual ability. Etymology The first major use of the term was as a result of the Mind Sports Olympiad in 1997. The phrase had been used prior to this event such as backgammon being described as ...
s. The following mental skills have always been part of the Decamentathlon: memory skills,
mental calculation Mental calculation consists of arithmetical calculations using only the human brain, with no help from any supplies (such as pencil and paper) or devices such as a calculator. People may use mental calculation when computing tools are not availab ...
, IQ,
chess Chess is a board game for two players, called White and Black, each controlling an army of chess pieces in their color, with the objective to checkmate the opponent's king. It is sometimes called international chess or Western chess to dist ...
, Go, othello, 8 by 8
draughts Checkers (American English), also known as draughts (; British English), is a group of strategy board games for two players which involve diagonal moves of uniform game pieces and mandatory captures by jumping over opponent pieces. Checkers ...
, and
creative thinking Creativity is a phenomenon whereby something new and valuable is formed. The created item may be intangible (such as an idea, a scientific theory, a musical composition, or a joke) or a physical object (such as an invention, a printed literary w ...
. MSO also organizes Mental Calculation World Championship separately. The remaining two mental skills have changed over the years and come from this list:
contract bridge Contract bridge, or simply bridge, is a trick-taking card game using a standard 52-card deck. In its basic format, it is played by four players in two competing partnerships, with partners sitting opposite each other around a table. Millions ...
,
Backgammon Backgammon is a two-player board game played with counters and dice on tables boards. It is the most widespread Western member of the large family of tables games, whose ancestors date back nearly 5,000 years to the regions of Mesopotamia and Pe ...
,
Mastermind Mastermind, Master Mind or The Mastermind may refer to: Fictional characters * Mastermind (Jason Wyngarde), a fictional supervillain in Marvel Comics, a title also held by his daughters: ** Martinique Jason, the first daughter and successor of th ...
, and most recently
Sudoku Sudoku (; ja, 数独, sūdoku, digit-single; originally called Number Place) is a logic-based, combinatorial number-placement puzzle. In classic Sudoku, the objective is to fill a 9 × 9 grid with digits so that each column, each row ...
. The MSO introduced the Abstract Games world championship in 2008.Article on abstract games world championships, http://www.boardability.com/game.php?abstract_games, 15 February 2011


Pentamind

This was one of the Mind Sports Olympiad's original events. It was an attempt along with the decamentathlon to produce an event for all-rounders to parallel the Olympic Games with its events the decamentathlon and pentathlon. Unlike the decamentathlon's fixed format (see separate article) the pentamind has very little fixed format. It disallows using games that are considered too similar and normally requires a long event, but otherwise any five events from the schedule could be used. The Pentamind champion is the player with the highest numerical score in "pentamind points" from 5 valid events. This is calculated using the formula 100 x (n - p) / (n - 1), where n is the number of players and p is the player's position in an event. The position is the position before tie-breaks and any split positions are shared amongst all of the tied players. When there are fewer than 10 players in a tournament, the score is multiplied by a secondary factor / (p + 1)


Pentamind World Champions

This event has been won five times by
Demis Hassabis Demis Hassabis (born 27 July 1976) is a British artificial intelligence researcher and entrepreneur. In his early career he was a video game AI programmer and designer, and an expert player of board games. He is the chief executive officer and ...
. * 1997: Kenneth J. Wilshire (Wales) * 1998: Demis Hassabis (England) * 1999: Demis Hassabis (England) * 2000: Demis Hassabis (England) * 2001: Demis Hassabis (England) * 2002: Dario De Toffoli (Italy) * 2003: Demis Hassabis (England) * 2004: Alain Dekker (South Africa) * 2005: Tim Hebbes (England) * 2006: Jan Stastna (Czech Republic) * 2007: David M. Pearce (England) * 2008: David M. Pearce (England) * 2009: Martyn Hamer (England) * 2010: Paco Garcia De La Banda (Spain) * 2011: Andres Kuusk (Estonia) * 2012: Dario De Toffoli (Italy) * 2013: Andres Kuusk (Estonia) and Ankush Khandelwahl (England) * 2014: Andres Kuusk (Estonia) * 2015: James Heppell (England) * 2016: Andres Kuusk (Estonia) * 2017: James Heppell (England) * 2018: Ankush Khandelwal (England)


Structure of the Organisation

When the MSO was initially formed in 1997, the board running it included David Levy, Tony Buzan, and Raymond Keene, David Levy being the original founder of the MSO concept. The current (2012) board consists of David Levy, Tony Corfe and Etan Ilfeld. The Mind Sports Olympiad is run by MSO Limited, which is registered in the UK with company number 04712990, and was incorporated in 2003.


Satellite Mind Sports Olympiads

Several satellite events were held around the world bearing the Mind Sports Olympiad name. These have occurred in
Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a College town, university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cam ...
, England;
Singapore Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, bor ...
;
Seoul Seoul (; ; ), officially known as the Seoul Special City, is the capital and largest metropolis of South Korea.Before 1972, Seoul was the ''de jure'' capital of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North Korea) as stated iArticle 103 of ...
,
South Korea South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia, constituting the southern part of the Korean Peninsula and sharing a land border with North Korea. Its western border is formed by the Yellow Sea, while its eas ...
;
Milan Milan ( , , Lombard: ; it, Milano ) is a city in northern Italy, capital of Lombardy, and the second-most populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a population of about 1.4 million, while its metropolitan city h ...
,
Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...
; Oulu,
Finland Finland ( fi, Suomi ; sv, Finland ), officially the Republic of Finland (; ), is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It shares land borders with Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of B ...
; and
Prague Prague ( ; cs, Praha ; german: Prag, ; la, Praga) is the capital and List of cities in the Czech Republic, largest city in the Czech Republic, and the historical capital of Bohemia. On the Vltava river, Prague is home to about 1.3 milli ...
, The Czech Republic.


Other Mind Sports Events

Several other mind sports events and festivals have been held that have their roots in the original organisation.


World Mind Sports Games

The World Mind Sports Games (WMSG) was created by the International Mind Sports Association (IMSA) as a "stepping stone on the path of introducing a third kind of
Olympic Games The modern Olympic Games or Olympics (french: link=no, Jeux olympiques) are the leading international sporting events featuring summer and winter sports competitions in which thousands of athletes from around the world participate in a vari ...
(after the Summer and the Winter Olympics)".World Bridge Games
. World Bridge Federation. Retrieved 2011-05-27. with the aim to be held alongside the Summer Olympic Games every 4 years. The first WMSG was held in Beijing 2008 to coincide with Olympic host city; the 2012 WMSG was held in Lille, France.


Sport Accord World Mind Games


See also

* World Mind Sports Games * List of all-rounders in games of skill *
List of world championships in mind sports This article gives a list of world championships in mind sports which usually represent the most prestigious competition for a specific board game, card game or mind sport. World championships can only be held for most games or mind sports with ...
* :Mind sports competitions


References


External links


MSO official website
(new)
MSO official website
(old)
Forum thread which provides a link to 2009 info
*
World Mind Sports Games
' — early document by the International Mind Sports Association (no date?) {{Go (game) Mind sports competitions 1997 establishments in the United Kingdom Organizations established in 1997 Clubs and societies in London it:Mind Sports Organisation#Mind Sports Olympiad