Loek van Wely

Loek van Wely ( born October 7, 1972 in Heesch, Noord-Brabant ) is a Dutch chess player in the world's elite.

Van Wely learned chess already as a 4 year old. He was trained as a teenager by the International Master Cor van Wijgerden and was already in the 1980s, one of the greatest hopes of his country. In 1992 he won the World Open in Philadelphia. In the same year he first played for the national team at the Chess Olympiad in Manila ( 4, -2, = 3) and opted for a professional career. FIDE A year later he was awarded the Grandmaster title. In 1994 he won the Capablanca Memorial in Havana ( category 10), 1995, the Tournament of Buenos Aires ( category 11), 1996, the New York Open. In the FIDE World Chess Championship 1997 in Groningen, he came to the quarter- finals. He played against 1997 Jeroen Piket competitions draw in Monaco 4:4 ( 2, -2, = 4) and 1998 against Jan Timman in Breda 5:5 ( 3, -3, = 4). In 1999, he won the Rubinstein Memorial Tournament in Polanica, one year later, he shared in the same place the second place with Alexei Shirov. In 2001, he won together with Judit Polgár in Hoogeveen.

Van Wely was the first time national champions of the Netherlands in 2000 and subsequently won also at the following five championships, most recently in 2005 in Leeuwarden. He thus has the record of former World Champion Max Euwe, who also won six Dutch national championships in a row repeated. With the Dortmund Chess days 2005 he was temporarily in the lead, was eventually divided behind Arkady Naiditsch second. He wore at the European Team Championships in Gothenburg in 2005 with a score of 50 % ( 1, -1, = 6) on the first board with help to ensure that the Netherlands won the gold medal.

He played until 2007 for the SG Porz in the chess Bundesliga, in Spain, he plays for the club Iretza -Gros. In October 2001, he had his best position in the world rankings: He was 10th with an Elo of 2714th

Van Wely also worked as Sekundant for Vladimir Kramnik. ChessBase he released two instructional videos on the Sveshnikov Variation and the Botvinnik System of the Slav Defence.