First of all I have to thank Stan Ash the chance to write in such an important website like GmChess about spanish language chess websites. I won't say "spanish websites", because many of them are from American countries (most of them from Argentina). We are currently colaborating in some ways and I hope my website Hechiceros del tablero (http://www.hechiceros.net) will share more interestes with 14th World Champion Alexander Khalifman's website.

Spanish readers usually visit many chess webpages in English, as we learn this language in the school, but I'm afraid only a few English readers visit chess websites in Spanish. I will try to give some information about spanish chess pages.

I begin with the most visited pages. There are five important chess pages (attending to the number of visitors):
Superajedrez ( http://www.ciudadfutura.com/superajedrez),
Ajelibre (http://www.geocities.com/gonzalez_6620/),
Ajedrez de Estilo ( http://ajedrez.w3.to/),
Ajedrez Actual ( http://ajedrezactual.com)
and Hechiceros del tablero, my own website ( http://www.hechiceros.net).

Some comments about these:

1.Superajedrez is from Argentina and looks like the most visited website in Spanish, at least attending to the statistics they offer. His director is Maximiliano Alvarez. Superajedrez has good colaborators and good material, but his webmaster usually fills his homepage with links to articles in newspapers and some tournaments from time to time. We have to make an exception in these days, because they are the official site of Linares Open.

2.Ajelibre is from Argentina too. His director is Julio Alberto Gonzalez, a catholic priest. He is improving very much his web, adding much more material each day comparing to last months. Maybe public FIDE statistics have given him motivation to work more. Maybe it is because he has some special help due to his job (direct help from heaven)

3. Ajedrez de Estilo is from Argentina too. They have a good design and they also have good colaborators. This web is one of the pioneers when we speak about chess websites in Spanish.

4. Ajedrez actual is from Spain. Webmasters are Joaquin and Simon Hernandez, father and son. They only give information about tournaments. Their design is good and people like their headlines, very clear to read. I think this web is a bit cool, only giving results and games and some comments from time to time.

5. Hechiceros del tablero is the newest among these. I must confess it is difficult to be objective when I write about my own website, but I think we are the most complete chess website in spanish language. We have material about all subjects on chess and related matters, including tournaments, openings, tactics, endgames, problems, jokes, downloads, etc. We have just improved what was our main problem, the design.

Let's speak about other pages, as good and important like these, but less visited as they don't update so much, they don't offer so much material, or just the webmaster works with more relax.

Ajedrez Hoy (http://www.ajedrezhoy.com) is IM Llanos web academy, from Argentina. He offers good classes and all kind of chess material (analysis, comments, news, etc)

Ajedrez 21 (http://www.ajedrez21.com) is a site to play chess with a java program. I think it is a good club of chessfriends.

Club Fianchetto (http://clubfianchetto.netfirms.com) is a very good page with fantastic articles on theory, some by IM Sergio Minero.

Ajedrez Noticias Diarias (http://www.geocities.com/Yosemite/Falls/4480/betaclub.html) is a good page by Toni Ayza. His speciality is news from Catalonia, but he gives information about all the world too.

Ajedrez en Villa Martelli (http://escavm.tripod.com/index.html) is the website of this club, with information on chess in Argentina and articles by IM Sergio Slipak

Ajedrez en Mexico (http://members.tripod.com/aacevedo/). Good information about mexican chess.

Basque Chess Page (http://members.nbci.com/gerardof/). Information on basque chess

Universal Email Chess Club (http://www.uecc.net/). The name is english, but the page is spanish. A very good site to find people to play by email.

Don't forget, english readers: there is spanish chess and there are good spanish chess websites.

Name: Juan Carlos Ruiz
Nationality: Spain
Work as a teacher of Philosophy.
Doctor in Philosophy.
Master in Sociology. Degree in Sports Nutrition.
Writer in several media about nutrition and doping in chess
Director of "Hechiceros del tablero".
Contact: hechiceros@wanadoo.es