The people behind the game
Olga Rubtsova
Excelled both over the board and by correspondence, winning world championships in both forms of the game.
- Born
- 1909
- Died
- 1994
- Country connections
- Soviet Union
At the board
The games. The ideas.
Explore classic encounters and championship battles. Play every move, or jump straight to the moments that tell the story.
1956 · Women’s world championship · Round 24
The final round in Moscow
Rubtsova’s last-round victory in the three-player 1956 championship ends in a king-and-pawn position.
Read the position
Every move sets the scene.
Use the controls to explore the full game, or select an annotated moment below. Each explanation describes the position immediately after its highlighted move.
Complete move list 28 moves
The journey
A remarkable path.
Rubtsova’s career crossed two different forms of competition. After holding the over-the-board women’s title, she became the first women’s world correspondence champion in 1972. She entered the World Chess Hall of Fame in 2015. [1]
Explore the championship record →The championship record
Time with the crown.
- 1956–1958Women’s world championship
Reigns are periods of title ownership, not a count of championship victories. Open-ended reigns reflect the record checked on 18 October 2026.
Sources & credits
Biographical details and title records checked . Country connections describe the player’s career and background, rather than a live federation listing.
Portrait: ICCF · CC BY-SA 3.0. Displayed in monochrome and cropped.
