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unusual facts about Candidates Tournament


Mikhail Botvinnik

Botvinnik asked to be allowed to play in the 1956 Candidates Tournament, as he wanted to use the event as part of his warm-up for the next year's title match, but his request was refused.


Daniela Nuțu-Gajić

She scored 8.5/13 and finished equal third, with Pia Cramling and Nana Ioseliani, in the Interzonal in Havana 1985, but Cramling won the play-off matches and qualified into the Candidates Tournament ahead of her.

Gyula Sax

Gyula Sax participated twice in a row in the Candidates Tournament after qualifying at the Subotica Interzonal in 1987 and at the Manila Interzonal in 1990 respectively but was eliminated in the Candidates in 1988 by Nigel Short (+0=3−2) and in 1991 after extra-time by then sixty years old Viktor Korchnoi (+1=6-1; +0 =1-1 rapid chess).

Igor Bondarevsky

Bondarevsky played in the 1948 Interzonal at Saltsjöbaden, sharing sixth-ninth place, and qualifying for the Candidates Tournament at Budapest 1950, but he was unable to play because of illness.

Michael Stean

In many respects, the partnerships that developed were reasonably successful; Korchnoi brushed aside some powerful rival Candidates like Boris Spassky, Robert Hübner and Lev Polugaevsky en route to his two finals with Karpov.

Raymond Keene

Keene brought Victor Korchnoi and Garry Kasparov together for their 1983 Candidates' semi-final match in London as part of the 1984 World Championship cycle; the semi-final match between Vasily Smyslov and Zoltán Ribli was also played at the same site.

Rustam Kasimdzhanov

The 2004 championship also earned him one of sixteen places in the Candidates Tournament for the FIDE World Chess Championship 2007.


see also

Anne Sunnucks

Although this result qualified her to play in the next event in the Women's World Championship sequence, she was a major in the Women's Royal Army Corps and the authorities would not allow her to travel to the USSR where the 1955 Women's Candidates tournament was being held.

Arthur Bisguier

After a poor performance in the U.S. Open in 1953, he entered the Philadelphia Candidates' Tournament for the U.S. Championship and came through with a first place finish and another over-2600 performance.

Interzonal

They were joined by Vasily Smyslov (loser of the 1958 rematch for the championship with Mikhail Botvinnik), and Paul Keres, who had finished second at the 1956 Amsterdam Candidates tournament.

Maia Chiburdanidze

She has attempted to regain the world title but, with the rise of the Chinese women and the formidable Polgár sisters, this has proved difficult and her best performance since 1991 has been 1st in the Tilburg Candidates tournament of 1994, losing the playoff to Zsuzsa Polgár by 5½–1½.

Oscar Panno

(He crushed the future World Champion Spassky in their individual game.) This result was probably the peak of his career, as it advanced him to the 1956 Candidates tournament in Amsterdam, the winner of which would play a 24 game match for the World Championship with Mikhail Botvinnik.

Women's World Chess Championship 1986

In a change from the knock-out system used in the last five championship cycles, the Candidates Tournament in this cycle was contested as a double round-robin tournament in Malmö in February 1986.

Women's World Chess Championship 1988

Like the previous cycle, the Candidates Tournament in this cycle was contested as a double round-robin tournament in Tsqaltubo in January 1988.

Women's World Chess Championship 1996

The championship match was played in Jaén in 1996 and, like the Candidates Tournament, dominated by Polgar who won 6 games (against 2) and in the end defeated champion Xie Jun by four points.