Julia Antolak, a chess player from Solny and a third-year student of Scandinavian Studies at the University of Gdańsk, obtained during the Women's Chess Bundesliga the third and last required norm for obtaining the highest female chess title - Grandmaster (WGM). After the approval of these norms by the International Chess Federation (FIDE) at the next congress our chess player will be the 21st grandmaster in the history of Polish chess. 

The last congress of the strongest women's league in the world was played in Baden-Baden. In the last three matches played by Julia Antolak, she won twice and had one draw. It was after this draw with former World Champion and this year's World Cup winner Alexandra Kosteniuk, one of the strongest Russian chess players, that she could celebrate winning the grandmaster title. 

- Winning the Grandmaster title means a lot to me, I have been training chess for over 15 years and I have been waiting for it for a long time - said our chess player. - The competition held in Germany was very difficult, I knew what was at stake in the game with the former world champion Alexandra Kosteniuk. Fortunately, despite big emotions, I managed to win the last standard and the grandmaster title. I hope that this is only one of my successes, and bigger achievements are still ahead of me - she announced. 

In March this year, Julia Antolak was also the gold medallist of the World Academic Championships in online chess. It is worth mentioning that only 20 women in the history of Polish chess have held the title of grandmaster. The 21-year-old will hold the title as the 21st woman in Poland. 

The TuRa Harksheide team, whose colours were represented this year by our two players Julia Antolak and Maria Gościniak, took 7th place in the 12-team league, ensuring themselves a place among the best for the next season. Julia scored 8 points in 11 games for the team, while Marysia added 2 points to her team's tally.