Five days of competition for Gibraltar Backgammon Championship

The 8th Gibraltar Backgammon Championship was held at the Sunborn Hotel recently.

The event attracted 96 players from 28 countries with some of the best players in the world including current World Champion Johan Moazed from Sweden.

Participants came from as far as Australia, United Arab Emirates and the United States as well as many European countries.

The Championship was a festival of backgammon with numerous events held over the five days of competition.

This included a Masters and an Intermediates event, doubles, seniors, ladies, speed gammon and a team event as well as various jackpots.

The event was once again expertly run by Arda Findikoglu from Turkey and his team. Mr Findikolgu is generally considered to be the foremost backgammon tournament director in the world.

The winner in the Masters category and 8th Gibraltar Backgammon Champion was Bulgarian master Bogidar Iliev beating Geoff Hall from the UK in the final.

Geoff Hall is no stranger to Gibraltar having won the championship two years ago.

This year not only did he reach the final in the Masters category, he also came away with the first place in doubles (partnering Chris Rodgers) and in the team event (with Chris Rodgers and Julian Minwalla).

One of the stars of this year’s competition was Gibraltar’s Mike Nicholls who reached three finals and won the GIB Challenge. Mike Nicholls was also awarded the Mario Fabbri cup for the best local player.

For the first time, a Master of the Rock competition open only to local players was held. The winner was Manolo Britto who took away a fantastic backgammon board.

Many matches were streamed live on Youtube with expert commentary by James Macnaughtan and Chris Bray.

“We would like to thank everyone who contributed to making this another special and successful event,”

“Backgammon is thriving in Gibraltar and our international event has put Gibraltar firmly on the world backgammon map as one of the major events in the backgammon calendar.”

“We are already looking forward to the 9th Gibraltar Backgammon Championship which is scheduled for January 28 to February 1, 2026.”