"As a child, Anand was very normal. I introduced him to chess. When the family would play, he’d come and join us. He used to play other sports as well—tennis, table tennis, badminton etc—but he developed a flair and interest in chess.
He never had a coach or anything; he learnt the game really on his own, practising vigorously and reading books etc. That’s the other thing about him. His focus and concentration level in almost anything he does is great. If he read a book, whatever the book may be, he had the ability to completely absorb and immerse himself in it. Nobody and nothing could distract him. He was good at academics as well. He managed to do both, quite effortlessly. If he can do it, I’m sure so can others. He is also a very calm person. I don’t think you need aggression to play chess. What you need is a good memory, positive attitude and the ability to plan your moves ahead. I used to play chess with him when he was young—I’d show him a few games and he, in turn, would show me some; now I just watch his moves. I don’t think there’s really a set formula for success and yet there are some ingredients like hard work, focus, determination etc that go into the making of a champion. I think the one thing about Anand is, even when he was young, he was very respectful of elders and very humble."(susheela ,Vishy's mother).(www.outlookindia.com)


How can someone become World Champion without any coach ?! STRANGE . What do you think guys ??

When I played Anand ;

http://www.thehindu.com/arts/magazine/article3500228.ece

Willempie wrote on 06/08/12 at 07:22:58:


Well, sports vs games are like religions vs cults, basically the same but games and cults are lacking political power. 

brabo wrote on 06/07/12 at 17:26:30:


Chess is often claimed to be a sport, art and science - but it's not really considered to be any of those... It's a game - one of the most challenging games invented, but still just a game.

kylemeister wrote on 06/07/12 at 15:55:03:

As mentioned by TalJechin, cc-chess and otb-chess are 2 different disciplines, needing very different skills. I know some strong otb-players not able to play cc on a decent level.

I also want to add that playing cc hurts otb as playing otb hurts cc. Both types of chess need a lot of effort to reach your best level. When I was playing cc, i spent averagely each day 4 hours on my cc-games. If you have besides that a full time job then it is easy to see that you can't sufficiently work on your otb-chess. After I stopped cc, my otb rating immediately went up with 100 points while during 6 years of cc it was completely stable. 
I talked last to Dutch ex-worldchampion Gert-Jan Timmerman and also he confirmed that playing cc hurts your otb chess. We estimated that IM was certainly a reachable goal without cc for Gert-Jan. Of course we both agreed that a cc-worldtitle means much more than an OTB-IM title.

I would say it's more akin to Usain Bolt losing the 100m to a learner driver. 

Vass wrote on 06/07/12 at 15:29:12:

What are computer chess games? I assume you mean the ones played in the wccc so on an average of 3 minutes per move. I believe some cc-games can also be considered computer chessgames if the human contribution is as low as just inserting positions and copying the output. Of course in such games engines can use sometimes more than 24 hours on 1 move. No surprise that 24 hours of computing delivers on same hardware and software a much higher level of chess than just 3 minutes.