Tigran Petrosian
Tigran Petrosian (Armenian Տիգրան Պետրոսյան ), English transcription: Petrosian, also known as Tigran Petrosian Wartanowitsch (Russian Тигран Вартанович Петросян; born June 17, 1929 in Tbilisi, † 13 August 1984 in Moscow) was a Soviet chess Grandmaster of Armenian origin and 1963-1969 world Chess Champion. 1966 Petrosian defended his title against Boris Spassky, to whom he lost the title later.
Life
Tigran Petrosyan father was caretaker at the Officers of Tbilisi. Here Tigran Petrosian looked at the soldiers to play chess, at age 12, he learned the game itself One of his first chess books was The Practice of My System by Aaron Nimzowitsch that shaped his style. Soon he was discovered by the chess coach Ebralidze and cared for. By the early death of his parents in 1944, Petrosian was an orphan.
At 17 he was a 8:6 victory against competition Genrich Gasparjan Master of the Armenian SSR and youth champion of the USSR. In 1951, he finished tied for second place in the 19th USSR Championship. Since 1949 he lived in Moscow. In 1952 he was awarded the title of International Grandmaster for second place in the Stockholm Interzonal. At the Candidates tournament in 1953 in Zurich, he finished 5th, 1956 in Amsterdam, and in 1959 in Yugoslavia, he reached # 3
In 1959 he won the first USSR Championship, the second time he succeeded in 1961. 1962, he won the Candidates Tournament in Curaçao.
Through his competition victory against Mikhail Botvinnik Petrosian 1963 World Champion ( 5 wins, 2 losses, 15 draws). Referee of the competition were Gideon Ståhlberg and Harry Golombek, as secondary Danten Petrosyan acted Isaac Boleslawski and Alexei Suetin. Botvinnik was able to keep the match balanced to the 14th game, but then lost the 15th, 18th and 19th game, which his resistance was broken. Botvinnik wrote of the Match: The new world champion is essentially different in its style of other grandmasters. To adapt to this style is not an easy thing.
Petrosian defended the title in 1966 against Boris Spassky (4 wins, 3 losses, 17 draws), but then lost it in 1969 against the same opponent ( 4 wins, 6 losses, 13 draws).
Later, he took several more attempts at the world title, but lost knockouts in 1971 against Bobby Fischer, 1974, 1977 and 1980 respectively against Viktor Korchnoi. Petrosyan died in 1984 in Moscow of stomach cancer.
He is considered one of the greatest defensive player in chess history and was hard to beat. So he lost in ten Chess Olympiads, the most important club competition, of 130 matches only one (1972 in Skopje against the German grandmaster Robert Hübner ). His Olympic record is impressive, 79 wins, 50 draws and against only one defeat mentioned. Petrosian took to lose 80 percent of the possible points from his 130 games. Therefore, one of his nicknames was the best goalkeeper of Armenia. In individual tournaments he often had to draw lots in order to reach the first place, was in duels but a feared opponent. Because of his deafness he was insensitive to interference from noise. Famous were his positional exchange sacrifice, including in his game against Samuel Reshevsky at the Zurich Candidates Tournament 1953.
His highest Elo rating was historic 2796th This he reached in July 1962. From May 1961 to January 1964 he was number 1 in the world rankings.
1968 doctorate Petrosian at the Faculty of Philosophy in Moscow with the topic, some problems with the logic of chess thinking and received a medical degree. From 1963 to 1966 he was editor in chief of the magazine Shakhmatnaya Moskva, 1968-1977 editor in chief of the leading Russian chess magazine 64 A collection of lectures Petrosyan chess to practical issues published in 1988 in German translation under the title The Chess University (ISBN 3-283-00234-7 ).
In Armenia, it is regarded as a national hero, numerous streets and chess clubs are named after him. 2005 Aparan a monument to him was erected. Another monument in his honor there is in the Armenian capital Yerevan.
In the women's Indian Defense, the system is 4 a2 -a3 named after him, that arises from its prophylactic style.