Tunde Onakoya, a master of the game of chess from Nigeria, made history under the glow of neon lights at Times Square on Saturday morning to set a new world record for the longest continuous chess marathon.
Beginning on Wednesday evening, Tunde embarked on a marathon of the mind that would test not only his mastery of the chess board but ultimately his physical and mental endurance.
Tunde was aiming to break the previous record for the longest chess marathon, set at 56 hours 9 minutes by Norwegian players Hallvard Haug Flatebø and Sjur Ferkingstad in 2018.
At the target record time of 58 hours, Tunde would need to play through two sleepless nights while maintaining the relentless concentration required to win a chess game. Every move, strategy and decision would have to be calculated with precision, even as the hands of the clock marched forward and the mind grew tired.
This challenge was made more difficult by his opposition, Shawn Martinez, a formidable national chess master from the United States who ranks in the top 100 of 5000 players in New York.
As Nigerians have come to know from previously covered marathon attempts, particularly Hilda Baci’s 93-hour record, Guinness World Record marathons can be as physically and mentally taxing as traditional athletic marathons.
And as hours turned into days and the games stretched into a gruelling marathon of wits and endurance, Tunde soon found himself at a crossroads. He had to choose between his health and the noble cause of raising $1 million to empower children across Africa through the #Chessinslumsafrica foundation.
Like any human, the toll of a night without sleep can be too much to bear. Tunde eventually succumbed to intense vomiting and stomach pain.
However, he remained steadfast in his pursuit of greatness and his desire to secure a sustainable future for many unprivileged children in Africa who would eventually benefit from still-to-come donations.
“When given the choice to quit, he said I will play on for the dreams of millions of children,” wrote The Gift of Chess on X.
Who is Tunde Onakoya?
“It is possible to do great things from a small place.” – Tunde Onakoya
Tunde Onakoya is the visionary behind the Chess in Slums Africa Foundation, a non-profit, that focuses on teaching children in disadvantaged communities the strategic game of chess while providing them with opportunities for quality education.
Tunde’s passion for teaching chess to children dates back to his own experience as a young child growing up in the neighbourhood of Isale Odo in Ikorodu. Circumstances forced Tunde to stay at home after completing his primary school education. It would take his mother, working tirelessly as a cleaner, two years to save enough money for his secondary school education.
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Chess would become Tunde’s salvation. His path to redemption. During this challenging period, he learnt the game of chess at a barber’s shop, and this newfound interest would provide him the needed comfort from his circumstances. Years later, Tunde’s interest would develop into the largest chess programme in Africa – The Chess in Slums Africa.
Oluwadunsin Deinde-Sanya chronicles the birthing of the programme in a 2021 feature: “One day, he went to visit someone in the Majidun community and saw a lot of children in slums, many of whom were not attending schools. Chess had given Tunde a lot of life-changing opportunities, and he wanted to do the same for the children he saw in Majidun
“He called his friends and went to Majidun with them. They gathered about five kids and taught them how to play chess. 5 became 10, 20, 35 – and then about a hundred. That was his turning point.”
Chess in Slums Africa has since executed notable socio-economic interventions and projects in Majidun, Makoko and Oshodi, impacting the lives of many children.
The Record-breaking Marathon
According to laid-down rules, Tunde could only take five minutes as a break for every hour. Alternatively, he could choose to accumulate the breaks of six hours to take a longer 30-minute rest. Although the specifics of how Tunde observed his breaks are not explicitly known, the nature of the rules meant Tunde and his opponent, Shawn Martinez, could only rest for 5 hours throughout those exhausting 60-hour marathon.
Before the record-breaking marathon attempt, Tunde had established himself as a national hero with his project for inner-city children. As a result, it wasn’t surprising that his progress was monitored closely by Nigerians both at home and in the diaspora.
Tunde eventually surpassed his target time of 58 hours on Saturday morning, reduced to tears at the thought of achieving a feat of such magnitude. Despite achieving this monumental feat, he exhibited great tenacity by continuing to play until he reached the 60-hour mark.
Tunde describes this journey as “the story of becoming.” He said: “I like to use this analogy of the Pawn in the game of chess, that the Pawns journey seems invaluable and almost insignificant to the outcome of the game but when the Pawn is able to march on to the final round, it can undergo a transformation and it becomes a Queen and the most powerful piece on the chessboard and that is the story of every African Child-it’s the STORY OF BECOMING.
“And whatever capacity, whatever you can do whether you are just given just a fraction of your income, your resource, your time, of your volunteering time, progress compounds and we must act like all those things really do matter in the grand scheme of things.”
