Harbour.Space: Trail of Triumphs

When we set out to build a competition-grade programming culture, our goal was simple: prepare small, tight-knit teams to punch well above their weight on the world stage. The last few seasons show that the model works.

2022 — double podium, first-ever top placements   

Team RAW POTS (Maksym Oboznyi, Marco Meijer, Danil Zashikhin) won gold at the Southwestern Europe Regional Contest (SWERC) — Harbour.Space’s first regional title — and another Harbour.Space squad took silver the same season. RAW POTS’ win is recorded by SWERC/ICPC officials and covered by our university news.

2023 — momentum continues at Southwestern Europe Regional Contest

At the next SWERC, Harbour.Space returned to the podium: team P+P+P earned silver and a second Harbour.Space team took bronze, sealing back-to-back qualifications to the ICPC World Finals.

2024 — European champions and fourth in the world

Harbour.Space won a gold medal at the ICPC World Finals, finishing 1st in Europe and 4th in the world — ahead of storied programs like Stanford, MIT, Cambridge and Oxford. The medal-winning team was Batyr Sardarbekov, Yahor Dubovik, and Sergei Zolotarev, coached by Kamil Dębowski. (University announcements; ICPC standings for the 47th World Finals list Harbour.Space’s team P+P+P among gold medalists.)

2025 - Thailand National Contest awards

Harbour.Space-trained teams received two awards at the Thailand National Contest Harbour.Space@UTCC announced a 1st Runner-up finish and additional recognition for our Thailand-trained students at the 2025 national contest.

Our coaching philosophy is built around:

• Elite mentorship. World-finalist coaches (led by Kamil Dębowski) oversee year-round training blocks, problem-set curation, and simulation matches that mirror ICPC conditions. 
• Deep contest literacy. We analyse regional ecosystems like SWERC — problem styles, pacing, and penalty dynamics — to map precise training cycles for each team. (See SWERC rules/medal structure.)
• A global training network. Through partnerships and community initiatives (e.g., Codeforces educational rounds we support), our students regularly spar with international peers and alumni.

This system has produced multiple SWERC medals and a World Finals gold within two seasons —evidence that focused coaching and an industry-embedded curriculum can reliably deliver award-winning performances on the sport’s biggest stages.

Building on this performance and our coaching consortium, we have applied to train a Spanish national team and received official accreditation from the International Olympiad in Artificial Intelligence (IOAI) to select, prepare, and field Spain’s national teams at IOAI 2026. We are opening a new chapter and aim to reach new heights in the UAE, carrying forward the same evidence-based methods that powered our SWERC titles and ICPC World Finals gold.