Frode Elsness

Who is Frode Elsness?

Frode Elsness is a Norwegian chess player who holds the title of International Master, as well as the 2008 Norwegian Chess Championship. Elsness plays for the chess club in Moss. He has represented Norway three times in the Chess Olympiad, 1996, 2000 and 2004. Apart from chess, Elsness is a medical doctor.

Elsness was away from chess after dropping out of the Gausdal Classics tournament in 2001. The cause was an incident in the fifth round game against Kristian Trygstad, where Elsness was trying to win a rook and pawn versus rook endgame. Theoretically, the position should have been drawn, but Trygstad was in time trouble, and had asked the arbiter to declare the game drawn based on article 10.2 of the laws of chess, which allows the arbiter to end the game if the opponent is "making no effort to win the game by normal means". The arbiter Hans Olav Lahlum postponed the decision and watched the game's progress before granting Trygstad's claim when his time expired. Elsness played round 6, but dropped out of the tournament in protest against the decision in the Trygstad game. Elsness' return to organized chess came in 2004, where he finished fourth in the Norwegian championship. In 2007, Elsness won the Open Norwegian Championship for rapid chess.