The 21st ASEAN University Games, held in Malang and Surabaya, East Java, concluded successfully from Jun. 25 to Jul. 6, 2024.
Over 5,000 student-athletes from 11 Southeast Asian countries participated in the event. Indonesia sent 392 student-athletes from various universities, competing in 247 events across 18 sports.
In chess, Indonesia emerged as the overall champion, defeating five other countries—Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Vietnam, and Timor Leste—by winning five gold medals and one bronze.
Azarya Jodi Setyaki, a master’s student in Law at UGM’s Jakarta Campus, was one of the representatives on the men’s chess team. He won a gold medal in the men’s individual standard chess event.
“I feel happy to contribute gold for Indonesia and proud to bring a good name to my university,” Jodi, as he is commonly known, said in a phone statement on Monday (Jul. 8).
Jodi admitted that his self-preparation leading up to the competition might not have been as complex as that of athletes in other sports.
“The challenge was on the day of the match because I had to maintain stamina with a rather packed match schedule. Every day, we played from 08.30 AM, and the total number of rounds we played over five days was 21,” he explained.
The 2024 AUG standard chess competition used a seven-round Swiss system with a time control of 90 minutes plus a 30-second increment per move for each player.
Jodi scored the highest points at 6.5 to secure the gold medal in the men’s individual standard chess event. With dominance in the individual category, the Indonesian team automatically won the gold medal in the team standard chess event.
“I hope chess will receive more attention in the future, especially in developing athletes from a young age for regeneration so that we can produce new chess grandmasters,” Jodi concluded.
He is optimistic that chess will continue to produce quality athletes. After August 2024, Jodi will compete in four more tournaments from July 10 to August 22 in preparation for the September National Sports Week (PON).
Besides chess, other sports contested in AUG 2024 included basketball, volleyball, beach volleyball, futsal, sepak takraw, handball, petanque, bridge, pencak silat, judo, wushu, karate, taekwondo, athletics, archery, rock climbing, swimming, and tennis.
The Indonesian contingent emerged as the overall champion with 126 gold, 99 silver, and 71 bronze medals.
Author: Triya Andriyani