Anatolij Karpov chess school was inaugurated on May 30 in Vilnius. The school is established in “Santara” Vilnius secondary school.

Anatolij Karpov chess school was inaugurated on May 30 in Vilnius. The school is established in “Santara” Vilnius secondary school, which is renowned for many youthful talents. Frequent world’s chess champion participated at the ceremony, too. A. Karpov has made every effort as well as his personal means and facilities in order to organise such an event in Lithuania. Young chess players were delighted with the meeting with the chess star. The children were in transports of joy when started playing with A. Karpov simultaneously at 20 chess-boards. As a matter of courtesy the guest turned to a draw one of the parties. Last September Anatolij Karpov chess school for the children and the youth was established in Moscow. Grand opening thereof took place in Moscow, too. Anatolij Karpov was very glad of the achievements. He has got the great plans: “Chess is besides of all a kind of subsidiary tool for mastering a computer. Thus I wish all chess schools in Russia were computerized and bound up into a single network”. By the way, the first schools of such kind were established in Tula, Voronez, Smolensk, and now in Vilnius. In the future the virtual tournaments between all Anatolij Karpov chess schools will be organized at www.chess.lt. Èeslovas Jurðënas, the first vice-speaker of the Seimas of Lithuania, who also took part at the opening of the school, has expressed his thanks to the Russian grand master for the contribution thereof to the chess art development among the youth. The Russian grand master and the world’s chess ex-champion, Anatolij Karpov is also an international grand master, the honoured master of sports, the twelve world’s champion (1975-85), the champion of USSR, owner of the “Chess Oscar”, the president of the International funds’ association (since 1982). The grand master’s father taught him to play chess when he was five. At the age of 9 he got the first grade. He had been learning from the parties of Kapablanka, having got all of them by heart. In the youthful years he amazed everybody with the rational style of his games as well as of the understanding of the subtlety of the end-game. He became a master of sports when he was 14. In 1969 he won the world’s championship among the youth. A. Karpov had been advancing his mastery guided by the experienced soviet grand master S. A Furman who lived in former Leningrad. A. Karpov graduated from the Economy faculty of the University of Leningrad in 1973. “The greatest star” M. Botvinnik calles A. Karpov in this ways after the victory thereof at the sports competition in Moscow in 1971. During 1972-1975 the chess player had passed through all the selections on the way to the play fro championship with R. Fisher. He won the games with such pretenders as B. Spassky, L. Polugajevsky, V. Korchny. After Fisher refused to play the match in 1975 Karpov was declared as the world’s 12th champion. Passion for the collecting Young Karpov had been Collecting the badges and labels from the match-boxes. All the boys from the yard were gripped by this passion, so did Tolia. At the age of ten Karpov began collecting the stamps. The first stamp in his collection was the one with the cannon and the solders from the series “40th anniversary of the Workers' and Peasants'Red Army”. Karpov spent all his pocket money on the books and the stamps. The collection grew up with the years and Tolia decided do not spend more than 3 roubles a month. As soon as Kapov became the master of sports, he had an opportunity to acquire the stamps for the money earned from the chess games. The more successful were the results, the prompter the stamps’ collection grew. The most favourite themes – “Russia”, “Soviet Union”, “Chess”, “Olimpic games”. Karpov’s exposition won the honourable third place at the philately exhibition, which took place during the Olympic games in Sydney in 2000. While playing at the world’s largest chess tournaments Karpov have never forgotten about his collection of the stamps. Before the final party in Los-Palmos (1977) Anatoly asked Furman to проставить на конвертах спецгашения of the tournament. The world’s champion went wrong during the debut and jeopardized the his first prize at the tournament. “How can he remember the versions if he keeps huge stamps’ catalogues in his mind, blast them! – complained Furman. – “Today he was engaged in his philately before the game, too”. “No, I do not play Belot nor do I play cards upon the whole with stakes. I have got such a high sports passion that there is no need in supporting it by any financial reasons. We had been mostly playing bridge 20 years ago. Belot appeared later in approximately 1976. I was one of the first who conceived this game. Belot came from Odessa, it was introduced by the students Vladimir Tumakov and Genadij Kuzmin. They were apparently the first partners of Furman and me”. “...I shall play at the second belot tournament with pleasure. To my mind such an undertaking is to be supported worldwide. I would welcome the invitation of Garry Kasparov to that tournament. We played belot with him during the long distant flights as well as at the rest days during the chess competitions.” “...Give-away play is related to the chess at a certain scale since both demand for the common characteristics: intuition, memory, forethought of the multi-path combination.” The display, which is to be included into Guinness records’ book By the way, Anatoly Karpov will take part at the record display of multi-board chess-play. The display, which is to be included into Guinness records’ book, will take place on the 29th of April in Cuba. This event shall crown the II Olympiad of the Cuban sports. Karpov will play on 12,5 thousands of the chess-boards simultaneously. Organisers of this display of multi-board chess-play are going to break their own record set in Havana on December 7th, 2002. That event is already included into Guinness records’ book. Books about A. Karpov>>>

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