Maaja Ranniku was an Estonian chess

Chess

Chess is a two-player board game played on a chessboard, a square-checkered board with 64 squares arranged in an eight-by-eight grid. It is one of the world's most popular games, played by millions of people worldwide at home, in clubs, online, by correspondence, and in tournaments.Each player...

 player (represented the Soviet Union

Soviet Union

The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....

 until 1991).

She was twice the winner of the Women's Soviet Championship

Women's Soviet Chess Championship

The Women's Soviet Chess Championship was played in the Soviet Union from 1927 through 1989 to determine the women's chess national champion.-List of winners:Winners of more titles* 5 titles : Valentina Borisenko, Nona Gaprindashvili...

: in 1963 (after beating at tiebreak Tatiana Zatulovskaya

Tatiana Zatulovskaya

Tatiana Yakovlevna Zatulovskaya is a Soviet, Russian, and Israeli chess player, Woman Grandmaster, and the 1993 Senior Women's World Chess Champion...

 4-2) and 1967.

She was awarded the title of Woman International Master

Chess titles

A chess title is a lifetime title created by the world chess organization FIDE bestowed upon players based on their performance and rank. Examples of chess titles are Master and Grandmaster.- Over board chess :...

 in 1964.

Maaja Ranniku participated to many Estonian Championship

Estonian Chess Championship

The first unofficial Estonian Chess Championship was held in 1903, organized by a chess club formed in Reval in 1903 and named for the famous Russian master Mikhail Chigorin. After the World War I, when Estonia became an independent country, official Estonian championships started...

s, winning the women's title 10 times (1961, 1963, 1967, 1973, 1981, 1982, 1984, 1987, 1988, and 1991).

At the 1964 women's Candidates Tournament, played in Sukhumi

Sukhumi

Sukhumi is the capital of Abkhazia, a disputed region on the Black Sea coast. The city suffered heavily during the Georgian-Abkhaz conflict in the early 1990s.-Naming:...

, she placed 6th in a field of 18 players.

In 1992 she played with the Estonian team at the 30th Chess Olympiad

30th Chess Olympiad

The 30th Chess Olympiad, organized by the FIDE and comprising an open and women's tournament, as well as several events designed to promote the game of chess, took place between June 7 and June 25, 1992, at the Philippine International Convention Center in Manila, Philippines.-Individual...

 in Manila

Manila

Manila is the capital of the Philippines. It is one of the sixteen cities forming Metro Manila.Manila is located on the eastern shores of Manila Bay and is bordered by Navotas and Caloocan to the north, Quezon City to the northeast, San Juan and Mandaluyong to the east, Makati on the southeast,...

, scoring 6½ points out of 11 games played.

She had many good results in international tournaments:

• 1969 : first place at Budapest
  Budapest
  Budapest is the capital of Hungary. As the largest city of Hungary, it is the country's principal political, cultural, commercial, industrial, and transportation centre. In 2011, Budapest had 1,733,685 inhabitants, down from its 1989 peak of 2,113,645 due to suburbanization. The Budapest Commuter...
  
  
• 1971 : first place at Braşov
  Brasov
  Brașov is a city in Romania and the capital of Brașov County.According to the last Romanian census, from 2002, there were 284,596 people living within the city of Brașov, making it the 8th most populated city in Romania....
  
  
• 1973 : second place at Vrnjačka Banja
  Vrnjacka Banja
  Vrnjačka Banja is a town, municipality, and a resort, mineral spa located in Raška District of Serbia. It contains the world's only hot spring with a temperature measuring exactly that of the human body ....
  
  
• 1978 : third place at the women's zonal tournament in Frunze

A photograph of her is published here.

External links