Mykolaiv resident becomes European checkers champion

The Italian city of Chianciano Terme hosted the European Youth Checkers 100 Championship. In the blitz competition, Matvii Kolesnikov from Mykolaiv won the title of European Champion 2025 among cadets.

This was reported by Draughts in Ukraine.

Having scored 16 out of 18 possible points, in the classical program, the boy entered the top five (shared 2-5 places), and in the fast game (rapid) he took fourth place. The tournament took place on August 1-9 and brought together athletes of different ages and from different countries to compete for the title of best in three disciplines: classic, rapid and lightning game. In total, 186 draughtsmen from 12 European countries took part in the competition, namely: Azerbaijan, Belgium, Estonia, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Poland, Hungary, Ukraine, France, and the Czech Republic. Ukraine was represented by 11 athletes from Dnipropetrovs'k, Zakarpattia, Zaporizhzhia, Mykolaiv, Poltava, Kharkiv regions and the city of Kyiv.

That year, Matviy Kolesnikov won the 64th Draughts Championship in Kamianske with 15 out of 18 points and became the Ukrainian Draughts Champion ahead of schedule. The competition brought together athletes from five regions of the country. For six days, men and women competed for championships in separate championships. As in October 2024, when similar competitions were held, but in international checkers, the winners were representatives of Mykolaiv and Kamianske, respectively. At the October championship, Matvii was also declared the winner , with a significant advantage in points. The winner was announced one round before the end of the competition.

Катерина Глушко