“She smiles at her competitors, but inside she's a killer”: Who is Silvia Alexieva, the world chess vice-champion ?

Silvia Alexieva est vice-championne du monde en catégorie “senior plus” DR – Lionel_Royet

Grand maître international, la française d’origine bulgare est aussi présidente du club d’échecs de Caissargues. Elle coorganise, ce dimanche, une double compétition.

This Sunday, the eve of Epiphany, the Bedos hall in the small town of Caissargues will welcome a multitude of chess players for the aptly named Tournament of Kings, coupled with the Roza Lallemand Trophy. Among the organizers, a queen of the discipline: Silvia Alexieva, recently crowned vice-world champion in the “seniors plus” category in Porto Santo (Portugal) and also humble president of the Caissargues chess club.

How did this great chess player, who acquired the status of international grandmaster, get there?? The story begins in Bulgaria, at the very beginning of the 80s. Silvia is 6 years old and, in this country that is still communist (it will be until 1990), chess is an integral part of sports education. A sport ? “Yes, you could say it's a sport, or an art, or a science, smiles the champion.But you know, a game of chess can last six hours, it requires a lot of concentration… Physically, you have to manage that.”

In short, little Silvia joined the chess club in her neighborhood in Sofia and quickly got into the game. At 16, she was selected for the national youth team and headed towards a professional career. “I started traveling, since we did all the youth competitions, world championships, European championships, etc. We went to many countries. And at 25, in France, I met love.” Love's name is Didier Collas, also a great chess player (he is now an international master). He remembers having rubbed shoulders with the young Bulgarian several times. A player “optimistic, combative, who fights until the end. We crossed paths at many tournaments and once, we left together.”

The couple, who settled in Clermont-Ferrand and then in Saint-Affrique (Aveyron), lived for chess. “When we were on vacation, we would skim tournaments. After a while, our son got a bit fed up!”, Didier Collas recalls with humor.

Silvia, a naturalized French citizen, was crowned French women's chess champion in 2007. The family ended up settling in Nîmes in 2014. Now separated, Didier and Silvia remain “on very good terms”. They are still regularly found at tournaments.

The explosion of licensees

In 2019, with friends, Silvia launched the Caissargues chess club, which she chairs. Quickly, the number of licensees exploded with the Covid period and the broadcast of the Netflix series The Queen's Gambit. “People didn't know what to do and they discovered chess,” Silvia jokes. At the same time, the champion continues her career. Captain of the French women's team, she becomes, in 2024, European senior plus champion and obtains the medal of the city of Caissargues from the hands of Olivier Fabregoul, an admiring mayor: “ I like it a lot and I love this club.”