It was only in 1972 that one extraordinary player emerged outside the Soviet Union to smash their dominance for one cycle. That was Bobby Fischer and he obliterated the opposition before disappearing from the chess world completely and became the first champion to refuse to defend his title. After doing what he did you could almost imagine he had already declared his mission accomplished. The second stanza of his life was quite bizarre and probably helped create the chess player archetype of an extreme intellect who does not follow conventions. Cue another 30 years of Russian dominance, the summit of which was the Beast of Baku, Garry Kasparov, generally considered to be one of the greatest of all time. It was 2006 before there was another undisputed world chess champion not from Russia. An astonishing Indian, the rival for Garry as the GOAT, the next level Norwegian Magnus Carlson.
Magnus has been the highest rated player in the world and, for parts of that, the strongest player in the history of the world. When someone says the word "unrivalled" it is genuine. All of the contenders who have challenged him have failed in his ten years as champion that ended this year. In the time, he has beaten the challenger, usually a very strong player who successfully outscores the world's other best players in a grueling "Candidates Tournament", winning seventeen games and lost twice over five matches against four different players. In 2022, on a podcast he let drop the megaton news that he was unlikely to defend his title as it was too tiring to prepare for and little interest for him. Some took it as a bluff. He even added some spice to the mix by saying it would only be interesting if it was against a young Iranian-French player who was at the time rocketing up the rankings. In the end, the contender from his 2021 match won the Candidates again and Magnus confirmed he wouldn't defend his title. Instead, a match was arranged between the winner of the Candidates, Ian Nepomniatchi of Russia, and the second placed player, Ding Liren of China.
This made everyone and everything extremely awkward. How can you have a world championships without the strongest player? When Fischer refused to defend his title he wasn't even playing - Carlson is still very active and whoever becomes "champ" will probably be losing to him, and probably not dominating the chess world like a champ. Making it worse, Magnus had dismantled Ian in the 2021 match. But it was a date and Ian and Ding were in for the championships.
Ding Liren is a interesting player. Chinese men for a long time were not in top chess - it was in fact a Chinese woman who did the Fischeresque act of breaking Russian hegemony that had existed from the first champion in 1927 until it was broken by Xie Jun in 1991. Since then China has had the womens crown more often than not. The womens world championship this year will be an all-China affair. Yet the Chinese men for a long time did not have a player even close to the top ten. But in the 2000s the first strong players emerged and in the last five years Ding has been a powerful force. But the Covid period was not kind to him and his chances of qualification for the Candidates. He never seemed supported by the State to begin with and struggled to get outside of China to play chess. (Some other Chinese players managed to base themselves outside and keep active.) He played many online events but to qualify for the Candidates you need to fulfil a complicated set of qualifying categories such as winning the chess equivalent of the Majors. Initially he missed out on that before a Russian player who had qualified said outrageous political comments in relation to Ukraine and was removed leaving a space open. One way for him to qualify was to be the strongest player by rating besides Magnus, which Ding was, and who had also played a minimum required number of games, which Ding had not. In a method that many criticised at the time, tournaments were set up for him to play at short notice for him to play the required number of games. And then after a slow start he won a must win game at the end to scrape into second place and thus put himself in the world championships match against Ian.
Prior to the match there was a lot of speculation that the match would be a fizzer and struggle to grab the imagination. But it quickly became quite the spectacle. In fact, it became quite the slugfest with five decisive games in the first seven, with Ian winning three and Ding winning two. The last of this brutal phase was a loss for Ding where in a strong position he "froze" - he only had four minutes for about nine moves and inexplicably thought for five minutes for one move, a bad one, after which he quickly lost. Ding is quintessentially Chinese from the movies - inscrutable, composed and unflappable; yet he was in a visible collapse. Many thought that the match would be a collapse but a sequence of fighting draws began. It was to be the best of fourteen, and if that was tied, they'd go into a "rapid" play-off (a faster time control). Until the twelfth game, Ian held his lead but in that game, with black, the less advantageous colour, he put Ding's king in a vice and all he had to do is squeeze. Now it was Ian's time to do the unimaginable - he did what has been one of his greatest strengths but also his Achilles heel: he played fast. Ian must be uncomfortable to play because you never rest - he is always thinking on your clock and soon as you move, he sips his tea and then blitzes out a move. Here, a few impulsive moves turned his commanding position into an equal position, and then a single move played after just seconds reduced it to rubble. It was now his turn to visibly shatter. Ding equalised and after two draws, it was 7-7 and they had to go into the rapid play-offs.
The rapids were all played on a single day, for me it was Saturday night. And compared to the play in the "classical" fourteen games, the quality perversely improved with the players having less time to think. Three tough draws led to the final game of the rapid play-off; if this was drawn, it would be down to a blitz play-off that wouldn't end till there was a champ. The final game, Ding with the black pieces, was a complicated affair with Ian strong in the beginning, before Ding wrestled him to equality. It could have been a draw but Ian kept trying to win; it could have been a draw but Ding after wavering decided to play for the win, too. Ding under pressure found some extraordinary moves quickly that Ian, unused to being the one with less time for once, struggled to find responses, too. The final scenes of that game were complete disintegration for Ian. Ding became the champion.
So a spectacle it was between two less than superhuman players of immense chess strength. To be clear, the quality of play was roundly criticised. Magnus matches demonstrate clinical precision; this match was two guys playing below their strength. It remains to be seen whether Ding can regain his previous powers with the title now weighing around his neck.
This weekend I'll complete my 1500th kilometre of the year. This has been my fastest year to this milestone, a whole one month faster than my best previous year, 2019. However, I don't feel as fast as 2019. In that year I did more events by this time whereas this year it has been just training up to this point. In fact, that year I had already completed a 3:27 marathon in Rotorua, my best back then. Would I be able to do that now? I am a bit doubtful but have done some rather good efforts, including conquering the Concrete Monster at a pace that had me doubting my watch. I had a much strong running partner that day, in horrendous conditions, and even towards the end I was able to belt out high speeds. Immediately after that effort though I had my first niggle of 2023, I had some tightness near my left knee, which was actually a hidden muscle knot higher up in my quad. I stopped running basically for five days - it felt like a year - and did other exercises and daily massage until it resolved.
Five weeks to go basically means two more "peak weeks" of 100km/week and then the start of a gradual tapering of training, which focusses on running less but faster, and focussing on rest. I'm looking forward to this as much as the race. I hope I can keep these weeks "clean" of injury and niggles while also getting my confidence to maintain a good pace. I still think it is possible for me to go below 3:27, or even if things go smoothly, set a new PB below 3:22. Tomorrow though is a rest day after seven days "running" so I get a glorious sleep in to 6:45am.
But the Kirikiriroa Marathon is now five weeks away.
