Gata Kamsky

Infobox chess player
playername = Gata Kamsky


caption=
birthname = Gataulla Rustemovich Sabirov
country = USA
datebirth = birth date and age|1974|6|2
placebirth = Novokuznetsk, Russia
datedeath =
placedeath =
title = Grandmaster
worldchampion =
womensworldchampion =
rating = 2723
(No. 17 on the July 2008 FIDE ratings list)
peakrating =2745 (July 1996)

Gata Kamsky real name Gataulla Rustemovich Sabirov (Tatar: Ğata Kamskiy, Ğataulla Rөstəm uğlı Sabirov; Гата Камский, Гатаулла Рөстәм улы Сабиров; Russian: Гатаулла Рустемович Сабиров, Гата Камский) (born June 2, 1974) is a Soviet-born American chess grandmaster. At one point he was the third highest-rated player in the world, but he played almost no FIDE-rated games between 1997 and late 2004. He is rated 2723 in the July 2008 FIDE list, ranking him seventeenth in the world and first among American players.

Early career

Kamsky was born in Novokuznetsk in Russia, in a Tatar family. He won the Soviet under-20 championship twice before 1989, and at age 12, defeated veteran Grandmaster Mark Taimanov in a tournament game. He was possibly the then youngest person to defeat a grandmaster. He also earned his National Master title in that year. In 1989 he moved to the United States with his father Röstäm (also spelled Rustam). Gata's last name, Kamsky, is derived from the stage nickname of his grandparents who were members of the Tatar traveling theater group. Fact|date=April 2008

In 1990, while aged 16 and still untitled, he played in the 64-player Interzonal tournament, the first step towards the World Chess Championship. He finished with 5.5 / 13. [ [http://www.mark-weeks.com/chess/9193$iix.htm 1990 Interzonal] , Mark Weeks' Chess Pages]

In 1990, FIDE awarded Kamsky the grandmaster title. In 1991, he won the U.S. Championship. Kamsky also did well at other prestigious chess tournaments, winning the Las Palmas tournament in 1994.

Fernando Arrabal, Camilo José Cela, Milan Kundera and eight other intellectuals in 1994 demanded, "In order for us to fully enjoy Gata Kamsky’s talent, abuse towards the Kamskys must end." Besides, the dramaturge Fernando Arrabal managed to gather $120,000 to help the young imigrant, who hardly could make a living in Brooklyn. Gata declared "We have tender special feelings for Arrabal. Not only has he lent us a hand when we were going through hard times, he is also a man of exception, a gift God sent to us."Fact|date=December 2007

World Championship Candidate (1993-1996)

In 1993, the rival organisations FIDE and PCA each held Interzonal tournaments. Kamsky played in both, and in both cases qualified for the respective Candidates Tournaments. The Candidates tournaments were largely dominated by Kamsky and Viswanathan Anand.

In the first round of the 1994-95 FIDE Candidates matches, Kamsky beat Paul van der Sterren (+3=3−1). Kamsky's quarter-final match against Anand, held in July and August 1994 in Sanghi Nagar, India, was more dramatic. After draws in the first two games, Anand won the next two games to take an imposing 3–1 lead. Game 5 was drawn. Kamsky then scored 4.5–.5 in the remaining five games to win the match 6–4 (+4=4−2). In the semi-final, held in Sanghi Nagar in February 1995, Kamsky routed Valery Salov 5.5–1.5 (+4=3−0).

In 1996, Kamsky played a 20-game match against Anatoly Karpov for the FIDE World Chess Championship 1996 title at Elista in Kalmykia, losing 7.5–10.5 (+3=9−6).

In the 1994-95 PCA Candidates matches, Kamsky beat Vladimir Kramnik in the quarter-finals in New York in June, 1994. In September, 1994 Kamsky beat Nigel Short in the semi-finals in Linares, Spain. In the March 1995 final against Anand in Las Palmas, the FIDE result was reversed, with Kamsky losing (+1=7−3).

In the September 1994 match against Short, there was a highly publicized confrontation between Kamsky's father, Rustam Kamsky, and Short. [ [http://groups.google.com.au/group/rec.games.chess/browse_thread/thread/894867ff4aec6414/500aee5e0ceffba2 PCA Candidates Report] , The Week in Chess, Issue 3, 1 Oct 1994] [ [http://www.chessninja.com/dailydirt/2006/10/kamskyshort_19942006.htm Kamsky-Short, 1994/2006] , The Daily Dirt Chess Blog, Mig Greengard, 10 Oct 2006. Includes a posted response by Gata Kamsky]

Inactivity (1996-2004)

After losing the match to Karpov, Kamsky gave up chess. He graduated from Brooklyn College in 1999. Later he attended medical school for a year. He then attended and graduated from law school at Touro Law Center in New York.

Kamsky's next rated games after his loss to Karpov were in 1999, when he returned to play in the FIDE Knockout World Championship event in Las Vegas, where he played a two-game match against Alexander Khalifman. Kamsky won the first game, lost the second game, and then lost the rapid play-off games.

Comeback (2004 onwards)

Kamsky did not play another game in public until June 15, 2004, when he participated in the 106th New York Masters [ [http://www.newyorkmasters.com/xtables/xtable106.html] 106th New York Masters Crosstable] , playing four games in a day with a time control of 30 minutes for all his moves. His two wins and two draws were enough for him to tie for first place with four others. He subsequently played in several other editions of the weekly event with mixed success, before returning to regular chess in the 2005 U.S. Championship held in November-December 2004 where he scored a respectable but unspectacular 5.5-3.5. He was rated number 19 in the world on the April 2005 FIDE Elo rating list, at 2700. He retained this rating on the July 2005 list, but moved up to number 18, after a good unbeaten result at the 2005 HB Global Challenge tournament, held in Minneapolis in May, 2005. He has since returned to international chess, most notably finishing second behind Veselin Topalov at the M-Tel Masters event. Soon after, Kamsky led the US team to the bronze medal at the International Chess Olympiad at Turin. On July 4, 2006, he tied for first place with nine others at the World Open, winning about $7,000. A number of successes in 2007 marked his return to the playing level he had before his retirement, hinting at the possibility of becoming again a challenger for the very top of the world's chess hierarchy.

In 2005, Kamsky played in the FIDE World Cup Tournament, and qualified for the Candidates Tournament for the FIDE World Chess Championship 2007, in May-June 2007. He won his first round match against Étienne Bacrot (+3-0=1), but was eliminated when he lost his second round match to Boris Gelfand +0-2=3.

In November-December 2007, Kamsky won the Chess World Cup 2007. In the final he defeated Alexei Shirov (+1-0=3). This earned him a match against Veselin Topalov in 2008, for the right to challenge for the World Chess Championship 2009.

Illustrative game

Here Kamsky, as Black, crushes future World Champion Kramnik en route to winning their 1994 Candidates match:

;Kramnik-Kamsky, World Championship Quarter-Finals Match, New York 1994 1.Nf3 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nc3 Bb4 4.g3 O-O 5.Bg2 c5 6.O-O Nc6 7.d4 cxd4 8.Nxd4 Qe7 9.Nc2 (White allows Black to ruin his pawn structure, and soon sacrifices one of his weak c-pawns. He hopes that his two bishops will give him sufficient compensation, but will find that he is unable to use them effectively.) Bxc3 10.bxc3 Rd8 11.Ba3 d6 12.Rb1 Qc7 13.Nd4 Nxd4 14.cxd4 Qxc4 15.Qd2 Qa6 16.Rb3 Rb8 17.e4 Bd7 18.Rf3 (trying to get play on the king-side, but Kamsky's pieces now overrun the queen-side) Ba4! (disdaining 18...Nxe4 19.Qf4 f5 20.g4 opening lines for White's pieces) 19.Re1 Rbc8 20.Bf1 Bb5 21.Bh3 Qa4 22.d5 Rc2 23.Qe3? exd5 (White is in deep trouble. If now 24.exd5? Re8 wins) 24.e5 d4! 25.Qg5 Re2! (Exploiting White's weak back rank. Now White sacrifices material for a fearsome-looking attack against g7, but Kamsky has calculated exactly.) 26.exf6 Rxe1+ 27.Bf1 (27.Kg2? Bf1+ 28.Kg1 Bxh3#) Rxf1+ 28.Kg2 Rg1+! 29.Kh3 (29.Kxg1? Qd1+ 30.Kg2 Qf1#) Bd7+ 30.Kh4 g6 31.Qh6 d3+ 32.Rf4 (32.Kg5? Qg4#) Qxf4+! 33.Qxf4 (33.gxf4 Rg4+ 34.Kh3 Rg5+! 35.Kh4 Rh5+ wins the queen) Rh1! 34.g4 h6! (Now White's attack is over and Black's pawns join in attacking White's king, threatening ...g5+.) 35.Kh3 (35.Qxh6? Rxh2+) g5! 36.Qd4 Rg1 37.f3 d2! 38.Qxd2 (38.Qxg1 Ba4 and Black queens) Bb5! 0-1 (39...Bf1+ will win White's queen)

References

External links

* [http://01chess.com/index.php Gata Kamsky International Chess & Sports Foundation] , Kamsky's official website.
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* [http://www.olimpbase.org/players/11xhpxlc.html OlimpBase]
* [http://profiles.chessdom.com/gata-kamsky Kamsky biography] at chessdom.com

###@@@KEY@@@###succession box
before=Lev Alburt
title=United States Chess Champion
years=1991
after=Patrick Wolff