Norway Chess

Vårt Team

Kjell Madland

Gründer, styreleder og turneringsdirektør, Norway Chess
Medgründer og styremedlem Norway Summit

Kjell er gründeren av Norway Chess og har jobbet med det fra idé stadiet til hva det er i dag: verdens sterkeste 10-manns turnering anerkjent over hele verden. Kjell er unikt kreativ og har evnen til alltid å kunne tenke utenfor boksen.  

Han har en lang erfaring fra næringslivet. Kjell startet sitt eget byggefirma som 22 åring og har siden det hatt lederstillinger i flere selskaper, blant annet som distriktssjef i GK inneklima, daglig leder i Jadarhus Gjesdal, regionsjef for Norema og som daglig leder i Bryne FK i hele 10 år, derav 4 år i Tippeligaen.  Kjell er like involvert i Norway Chess og alt som følger med som han har vært fra han fikk idéen. I tillegg er han også gründer og styremedlem i Norway Summit. 

Benedicte Westre Skog

Medeier og daglig leder, Norway Chess
Medgründer og daglig leder, Norway Summit 

Benedicte er prosjektleder i Norway Chess. Hun har vært med siden 2015 og har bidratt til en stor del av utviklingen av Norway Chess merkevaren. Benedicte har også hatt  stor innflytelse på å utvikle konseptet Norway Summit helt fra idé stadiet. Hun har i tillegg til oppgavene som daglig leder i Norway Summit, ansvar for programmet, bidragsytere, markedsføring og gjennomføring.

Benedicte har en MSc grad i International Development fra Nederland og har studert i en rekke andre land, blant annet, Canada (BA Honors), India og Mexico.

Benedicte driver også sin egen NGO, Argan Care, som planter trær i den utrydningstruede Argan skogen i Marokko og som bidrar til arbeidsplasser og inntekter til lokalbefolkningen, spesielt kvinner.

Dea Maioli Egeli

Marketing Manager, Norway Chess og Norway Summit

Dea er Marketing Manager for Norway Chess og Norway Summit. Hun startet i mars 2024, og leder selskapets kommunikasjon, og innhold- og produksjonsarbeid. Hun har en rekke ulike ansvarsområder på tvers av ulike markedskanaler. Blant annet kan vi nevne utvikling av strategiarbeid og kreativ implementering på websider, sosiale medier og utforming av grafisk materiale. Hun vil ha ansvaret for å lede markedsføringsarbeidet i Norway Chess og Norway Summit, i tillegg til å jobbe med tekstarbeid og PR.

Dea har bachelor i reklame- og markedsføring fra University of East London og digital markedsføring gjennom Noroff.

Hun har tidligere bakgrunn fra blant annet mediebyrå, Stavanger konserthus, og ladeselskapet amina charging.

Utenfor jobb er hun aktiv som styremedlem i Markedsføringsforeningen i Stavanger, og tidligere bidragsyter til Mablisfestivalen og kvinnenettverket Elleve.

Maria Fragkaki

Social Media Manager

Maria er opprinnelig fra Hellas, og studerte matematikk ved universitetet på Kreta, etterfulgt av markedsføring og ledelse ved Queen Margaret University i Edinburgh.

Med over ti års erfaring innen digital markedsføring, inkludert fire år dedikert til markedsføring innen sjakk, har Maria samarbeidet med 42 selskaper i Hellas, London, India, Brussel, Norge, Berlin og Amsterdam.

I 2020 grunnla hun sitt eget frilansfirma for sosiale medier og merkevarebygging, Lemonpie Agency, og ble en offisiell «social media trainer» for Google i Hellas. Maria jobber med innholdsproduksjon og sosiale medier for Norway Chess.

Anastasia Sorokina

Hoveddommer

Women International Master, International Arbiter Category A, International Organizer and FIDE Trainer.

Anastasi Sorokina, Chairperson of the FIDE Commission for Women’s chess, FIDE Social Project Leader, Women International Master (2001), International Arbiter (2002), FIDE Trainer (2005), International Organizer (2018). Born on 26 January 1980 in Minsk, Belarus. In 2003 moved to Australia and worked as a chess coach in the Queensland School of Chess, and then in Chess Kids in Melbourne, later opened her own chess academy.  Representing the Australian Chess Federation. Now living in Warsaw with husband and 13 yo daughter, where running their family chess club ChessCorner. Owner of the Chess Space Company which specializes in organizing chess events and consulting.Has Bachelor degree in sport and Masters in Strategic Communication and Governance.
From 2021 is running important social projects in FIDE: Infinite Chess – Chess for kids with autism spectrum disorder and Chess for Protection, Girls Club, chess for refugees.Anastasia Sorokina was awarded as FIDE outstanding chess arbiter  2022. During her arbiter career has been Chief Arbiter in the women’s world championship matches, Deputy Arbiter at several Olympiads, Chief and deputy arbiter at numerous FIDE Grand Prix events , as well as numerous other major FIDE tournaments. Has been a Chief arbiter in such prestigious events like London Chess Classic, Norway Chess and Cairns cup.

Fun facts from Anastasia:
– I am from the chess family, my uncle Viktor Kupreichik was the first Belarus Grandmaster. My whole life is connected with chess, I am dreaming to organize Chess Olympiad! During my trainer’s career we trained more than 1000 kids. For now in ChessCorner in Warsaw we have only 3 chess teachers, but back in 2018 in Belarus there were 7 trainers in my Chess Academy. We also ran a programme to teach students of the Pedagogical University who will become the teachers of the primary schools , how to teach kids to play chess. This was an official program for the students of the last course, once a week during the full educational year. We educated almost 100 young teachers.

Tania Karali

Dommer

Category A International Arbiter from Greece.

Karali is the Secretary of the European Chess Union (ECU) Arbiters’ Council, a member of the FIDE Technical Commission and a member of the Board of the Greek Chess Federation.
She speaks five languages (English, Spanish, French, Russian (and Greek, of course!) with different levels of fluency.

She was Deputy Chief Arbiter of the 2nd leg of the FIDE Women’s Grand prix 2022-2023 in Munich, Pairings Officer of three World Rapid&Blitz Championships (Riyadh 2017, Warsaw 2021, Almaty 2022) and have assumed various positions in World and European events, including Fair Play. She has officiated as Chief Arbiter, Deputy Chief Arbiter or Pairings Officer in various World and European online events during the pandemic.

In 2022, she was the Chief Arbiter of the Champions Chess Tour on chess24. In 2020, She wrote a complete manual for the most popular pairing software, Swiss-Manager, which has since been translated in 11 languages (French, Spanish, Catalan, Dutch, Portuguese, Italian, Greek, Czech, Arabic, Persian and Indonesian).

Karl-Johan Rist

Dommer

International Arbiter from Norway.

Appointed as FIDE Arbiter in 2007 and International Arbiter in 2010. Licensed category A in 2014. His international career started in May 1994 as Chief Arbiter in the Open Norwegian Rapid Chess Championship in Øksfjord, Norway, with players from Scandinavia and Russia.  His last international job was Match Arbiter in the World Rapid and Blitz Chess Championship in Almaty, Kazakhstan in December 2022.
During this 29 years he has been both Chief Arbiter, Deputy Chief Arbiter, Sector Arbiter and Match Arbiter in numerous national and international events. Among them five FIDE Chess Olympiads, Khanty Mansiysk, Russia 2010, Istanbul, Turkey 2012, Tromsø, Norway 2014, Baku, Azerbaijan 2016 and Batumi, Georgia 2018. Two FIDE World Cups in Khanty Mansiysk, Russia 2011 and Tromsø, Norway 2013. He has also been Match Arbiter in the ECU European Chess Union Team Championship 2015 in Reykjavik, Iceland, and Chief Arbiter in the ECU Individual Chess Championship 2018 in Batumi, Georgia and Chief Arbiter in the ECU Senior Chess Championship 2018 in Drammen, Norway.
This will be his fifth time arbitrating in Norway Chess. He was Arbiter in the two first editions in 2013, 2014 and Chief Arbiter in 2016.

Anémone Kulczak

Dommer

Anémone Kulczak is a French international arbiter born in 1985 in northern France. Her father taught her to play chess in the early 1990s, then she joined a local club where she competed at regional and national level.

She became nationl arbiter in 2004, and an international arbiter in 2010. She has also been an arbitrer lecturer since 2007 and has trained over 200 French arbiters.  

She holds a master’s degree in Italian language and culture and a bachelor’s degree in human resources. She has successively held the positions of Italian language teacher, general manager of a chess club and human resources manager. She is currently General Secretary of a molecular and cellular biology research laboratory in Nice and teaches human resources management at Université Côte d’Azur. 

She was elected member of the French Chess Federation’s steering committee between 2013 and 2021 and is currently a member of the Board of Directors of the French Chess Federation’s National Training Institute.

She has been arbiter in over 100 chess tournaments in France and abroad. In Norway, she was sector arbiter at the Tromso Olympics in 2014. She has been chief arbiter 7 times at Norway Chess (2021, 2020,2019, 2018, 2017, 2014 and 2013). Having become mom to little Emma in January 2022, she has decided to put her international arbiter career on hold and returns to arbitering this year for the 11th edition.

Fun fact:

She was the first woman to referee a chessboxing competition in France, a sport in which competitors simultaneously alternate on a ring rounds of blitz chess and boxing until one wins by knockout or checkmate.

Thanasis Serntedakis

Electronic chess boards operator & Arbiter

Thanasis Serntedakis is an International Arbiter from Greece. During the pandemic, he was an arbiter in chess24’s online events such as the Magnus Carlsen Invitational and the Chessable Masters, featuring top players.

Since 2016, he has been an electronic chess board operator responsible for the live transmission of the games in various tournaments including the European Team Championship, the Asian Indoor Games, and the European Club Cup.
Furthermore, he is the author of the Chess Claim Tool, an application to help arbiters with draw claims during an official game of chess. The tool has been successfully utilized in numerous FIDE-rated events, including the 2023 World Blitz & Rapid Championships in Samarkand.

Mehmet Ismail

Game Theory Expert

Mehmet Ismail, currently a lecturer in economics at King’s College London’s Department of Political Economy, has a diverse academic background. He holds a PhD in Economics from Maastricht University and during this period, he had the opportunity to work with esteemed game theorist and political scientist, Steven Brams, at New York University. Mehmet also holds a masters in applied mathematics from the University of Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne and spent a semester at Bielefeld University as part of the Erasmus Mundus QEM programme.

Beyond academia, Mehmet is an ardent chess enthusiast and a former professional backgammon player. His passion for games goes much further than just playing; he is intrigued by the multifaceted world of games, exploring everything from theoretical foundations and practical applications to game design, fairness and gameplay itself.