Veselin Topalov; Bulgarian: born 15 March 1975, is a Bulgarian chess grandmaster. He currently has the second highest rating in the world, and was the challenger facing world champion Viswanathan Anand in the World Chess Championship 2010, losing the match 6½-5½.
Topalov became the FIDE World Chess Champion by winning the FIDE World Chess Championship 2005. He lost his title in the World Chess Championship 2006 match against Vladimir Kramnik.
Topalov won the 2005 Chess Oscar. He was ranked #1 in the world from April 2006 to January 2007, during which his Elo rating of 2813 had been surpassed only by Garry Kasparov and Magnus Carlsen in chess history. He regained the world #1 ranking again in October 2008, and officially remained #1 until January 2010, when he fell to #2 behind Magnus Carlsen.
He has been ranked number one a total of 27 months in his career, fourth all-time since the inception of the FIDE ranking lists in 1971 behind only Garry Kasparov, Anatoly Karpov, and Bobby Fischer.
Early career (1989-2005)
Topalov was born in Rousse, Bulgaria. His father taught him to play chess at the age of eight. Topalov had a difficult childhood, but he quickly established himself as a chess prodigy. At age 12, Topalov began working with Silvio Danailov, in a training/mentoring relationship that continues today. Danailov himself was a master who nurtured ambitions as a player. Once he saw Topalov, however, he sacrificed his own career. Canadian Grandmaster Kevin Spraggett wrote: "Danailov took Topalov to his apartment and told him ‘From now on, you live here and this will become your new home. I am not just your trainer, but I am also your mother and your father. I am your cook. I am the one who will wash your clothes. I am the one who will pay your bills and expenses to tournaments. All I want from you is to think only about chess!"
In 1989 he won the World Under-14 Championship in Aguadilla, Puerto Rico, and in 1990 won the silver medal at the World Under-16 Championship in Singapore. He became a Grandmaster in 1992. Topalov has been the leader of the Bulgarian national team since 1994. At the 1994 Chess Olympiad in Moscow he led the Bulgarians to a fourth-place finish.
Over the next ten years Topalov won a number of tournaments, and ascended the world chess rankings. He played in Linares 1994 (6½/13), Linares 1995 (8/13), Amsterdam 1995. In 1996, he won Amsterdam (1st equal with Kasparov), Vienna (ahead of Karpov), Novgorod and Dos Hermanas (1st-2nd with Kramnik, ahead of Anand, Kasparov, Illescas, Kamsky, Gelfand, Ivanchuk, Shirov and J. Polgar). As early as 1996, he was being invited to "supergrandmaster" events for the world's elite such as Las Palmas (5/10), the first category 21 tournament, played in December 1996, with Kasparov, Anand, Kramnik and Karpov participating.
Topalov's loss to reigning Classical World Champion Garry Kasparov at the 1999 Corus chess tournament is generally hailed as one of the greatest games ever played. Kasparov later said, "[During the game] He looked up. Perhaps there was a sign from above that Topalov would play a great game today. It takes two, you know, to do that."
In the knockout tournaments for the FIDE World Chess Championship, he reached the last 16 in 1999, the quarter-finals in 2000, the final 16 in 2001, and the semi-finals in the 2004 tournament. In 2002, he lost the final of the Dortmund Candidates Tournament (for the right to challenge for the rival Classical World Chess Championship) to Peter Leko.
Topalov scored his first "super-tournament" success at Linares 2005, tying for first place with Garry Kasparov (though losing on tiebreak rules), and defeating Kasparov in the last round, in what was to be Kasparov's last tournament game before his retirement. He followed this up with a one point victory (+4 =5 −1) at the M-Tel Masters 2005 tournament, ahead of Viswanathan Anand, Vladimir Kramnik, Ruslan Ponomariov, Michael Adams, and Judit Polgár. The average rating of the participants was 2744, making this super-GM, double round-robin tournament the strongest in 2005.
FIDE World Chess Champion 2005
On the strength of his rating, Topalov was invited to the eight-player, double round-robin FIDE World Chess Championship in San Luis, Argentina, in September-October 2005. Scoring 6½/7 in the first cycle, Topalov had virtually clinched the tournament at the halfway mark, before drawing every game in the second cycle to win by 1½ points to become FIDE World Chess Champion. The average rating of the field in the championship was 2739, and Topalov's performance rating was 2890.
The unification of the FIDE World Title (held by Topalov) and the Classical Chess World Title (held by Vladimir Kramnik) was fervently encouraged by the chess community. On 16 April 2006, FIDE President Kirsan Ilyumzhinov announced that a reunification match between Kramnik and Topalov would be held in September-October 2006. Kramnik defeated Topalov to become the first undisputed champion in thirteen years.
Career after the 2006 match
Soon after losing the world title, Topalov participated in the Essent Chess Tournament. He finished third of four players with only 2½ points from 6 games and a 2645 performance. He lost both games against Judit Polgár and one against Shakhriyar Mamedyarov.
In May 2006, Topalov defended his M-Tel Masters title, coming first with 6½/10, a half point ahead of Gata Kamsky (who he beat 2-0). Topalov started the tournament somewhat hesitantly to later record four consecutive wins and clinch the title.
In January 2007, Topalov finished in joint first place (ahead of Kramnik, who finished 4th) at the Category 19 Corus Chess Tournament along with Levon Aronian and Teimour Radjabov.
Topalov won the 14th Ciudad Dos Hermanas rapid, 17–21 April 2008, defeating GM Francisco Vallejo Pons (Spain) 2½–1½ in the final match by winning the first game and drawing the rest. The first round matches of the four-player knockout tournament were won by Topalov over GM Judit Polgár (Hungary) 2½–1½ and Vallejo over GM Alexei Shirov (Spain) 3–1.
In September 2008, Topalov won the Bilbao 2008 tournament. He advanced to first in the world in the unofficial live ratings and in the official October 2008 ratings list.
What’s more, he won the 2008 Nanjing Pearl Spring Chess Tournament. And the second of 2009 Nanjing Tournament, behind Calsen.
2008-2010 World Championship cycle
By losing the 2006 reunification match, Topalov lost his chance to compete in the 2007 world championship tournament. Danailov expressed a desire for a rematch between Topalov and Kramnik, proposing a match in March 2007, though no such match took place.
The issue was settled in June 2007 when Topalov (as well as Kramnik) was granted special privileges in the 2008-09 championship cycle. Topalov was given direct entry to a "Challenger Match" against the winner of the Chess World Cup 2007.
The 2007 Chess World Cup was won by Gata Kamsky. The Challenger Match between Topalov and Kamsky took place in February 2009 in Hall 6 of NDK Sofia. Topalov won the match 4½-2½ and played against the current world champion Viswanathan Anand for the World Chess Champion title. Topalov lost the match 6½-5½.
2010
Topalov won the 2010 Linares chess tournament held from February 13 to 24 in Andalusia, Spain, defeating 2009 Chess World Cup champion Boris Gelfand in his final game.
As the runner-up in the World Chess Championship 2010, Topalov has automatically qualified for the Candidates Tournament for the World Chess Championship 2012, where he will be the top seed. He is scheduled to face American Gata Kamsky in his first Candidates Tournament match.
From wikipedia.org
