Germany and Chess (Deutschland und Schach)

I'm taking German in school now and I'm curious to know about the place/popularity of chess in Germany.

Ich habe Deutschklasse in der Schule also ich bin neugierig ueber Schach im Deutschland. Ich weiss nicht ob Schach im Deutschland populaer (oder nicht populaer) ist. Ist es modisch Kultur oder nicht?

Ich ziehe Antworten auf English vor weil ich weiss weniger woerter als ein Deutschlaender. Danke

Chess is still popular in Germany, although unfortunately less so than 10-15 years ago.

Many german players only play it as a hobby though, because it is very difficult here to earn enough money playing chess so you can live in modest comfort.

In the highest german chess league, the Schach-Bundersliga clubs tend to pay players from all over the world to become a part of their team, with the top teams overdoing it quite a bit, imho.

For example, this is a link showing the members of the OSG Baden-Baden bundesliga team, who are infamous for this practice: http://schachbundesliga.de/ligen/aufstellung.php?menuid=93&topmenu=80&keepmenu=inactive&keepmenu=inactive

As you can see, some of the top names only play rarely - like Anand only played in the top game vs. Werder Bremen - but still that list contains a rather silly amount of imported players.

This of course only adds to less german players finding our premier chess league very attractive for professional play.

But you will find tons of small clubs with hobbyists and chess enthusiasts all over the country, making up for the difficulties with professional chess here in Germany.

Edit: Werder Bremen has only 4 german players in their team, out of 17, btw. http://schachbundesliga.de/ligen/aufstellung.php?menuid=98&topmenu=80&keepmenu=inactive&keepmenu=inactive

I played for SK Franken of Schweinfurt in the Landesliga Nord for one season while stationed in Germany and had a great time.

While there I also visited the famous chess cafe in Frankfurt and played blitz for marks until I lost about $200. in one day there !  It was a lot of fun.

I also recall playing a blitz ( 5-0 ) tournament there in which there were 51 players entered and they made a round robin out of it and I had to play 50 games of blitz !  LOL 

I'm assuming it took a few days Reb? Over 8 hours of blitz, not counting the time in between rounds is pretty heavy.

So would you say that chess is more mainstream in Germany than America?

 Definitely !  I was in Schweinfurt which is rather small and there were 3 very active chess clubs there. I have been told that in Hamburg there are something like 40 or more chess clubs !  Here in Lisbon there are about 24 chess clubs....

I think its more popular than in America, but still far from mainstream these days.

Some years back we used to have live TV coverage of some major chess events with really good comments by players like Helmut Pfleger, Robert Hübner and the charming Vlastimil Hort. I really miss those shows.

My dad often mentions how when he was a kid, it was always big news when Bobby Fischer played and all of his games would be posted on tv. I guess all we need to get chess back to mainstream is a 5 decade long ideological war between the 2 biggest superpowers and all of their spheres of influence. That way battles can only be fought over chess boards and in olympic arenas