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Reykjavik Bridge Festival. January 27-30 – It was in the Summer of 1972 that Fridrik Olafsson, a great Icelander chess player, invited Bobby Fisher and Boris Spasskj in his country for the battle of the century. That seed grew up and the Iceland today has eleven chess Grand Masters in 320.000 inhabitants, and the State Television broadcasts chess matches instead of football ones. That seed grew up.
The Icelandic way to the victory worked in the same way in Bridge: they sow the cultural background and fruits have ripened. In 1981 they established the Reykjavik Bridge Festival, they learnt from the giants and ten years later they became giants themselves, winning the Bermuda Bowl (the Team: Guðmundur Páll Arnarson, Örn Arnþórsson, Jón Baldursson, Guðlaugur Jóhannsson, Þorlákur Jónsson, Aðalsteinn Jörgensen. So spelled by Wikipedia).
It is not casual, then, that the start will be given by the Minister of Education, Katrin Jakobsdottir: there, the mind sports are regarded as sciences. The Festival is a meeting point of champions from all the world; in the article by BridgeTopics.com are some important names, I just report another pair: Sandra Penfold and Brian Senior from England.
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by Paolo Enrico Garrisi