Top 10 Chess Player 6.Garry Kasparov

6. Garry Kasparov (1963- ) from Russia, Azerbaijan

Garry Kasparov

• Undisputed World Champion from 1985-1993.
• World Champion of a 'rival' organization to FIDE from 1993-2000.

Kasparov has had a peak rating of 2851 in July of 1999 and by many is considered the greatest of all-time. But he helped in the break-up of FIDE and many top players into two different groups and there were two sets of champions similar to boxing for several years. Currently the title is reunified, but there was a long division and Kasparov contributed to this. Although being a very strong player, in many of his early world championship matches, the outcome was very close, often just barely defeating his long rival, Anatoly Karpov.

Garry Kasparov was born Garry Weinstein (Russian: Гарри Вайнштейн) in Baku,Azerbaijan SSR, Soviet Union; now Azerbaijan, to an Armenian mother and Jewish father. He first began the serious study of chess after he came across a chess problem set up by his parents and proposed a solution. His father died of leukemia when he was seven years old. At the age of twelve, he adopted his mother's Armenian surname, Gasparyan, modifying it to a more Russified version, Kasparov.

Kasparov was the first sitting World Champion to play a match against a chess super computer. The computer programs could analyze millions of moves per second, but Kasparov could still beat the best programs the best computer engineers could produce. This perhaps shows the human potential with the power of creativity and imagination that no computer could match. Although in recent years the computers have become so strong that even the best are having difficulty beating them now.

Here is a game that Kasparov played against the Fritz Computer chess program in 2003:

1. Nf3 Nf6 2. c4 e6 3. Nc3 d5 4. d4 c6 5. e3 a6 6. c5 Nbd7 7. b4 a5 8. b5 e5 9. Qa4 Qc7 10. Ba3 e4 11. Nd2 Be7 12. b6 Qd8 13. h3 O-O 14. Nb3 Bd6 15. Rb1 Be7 16. Nxa5 Nb8 17. Bb4 Qd7 18. Rb2 Qe6 19. Qd1 Nfd7 20. a3 Qh6 21. Nb3 Bh4 22. Qd2 Nf6 23. Kd1 Be6 24. Kc1 Rd8 25. Rc2 Nbd7 26. Kb2 Nf8 27. a4 Ng6 28. a5 Ne7 29. a6 bxa6 30. Na5 Rdb8 31. g3 Bg5 32. Bg2 Qg6 33. Ka1 Kh8 34. Na2 Bd7 35. Bc3 Ne8 36. Nb4 Kg8 37. Rb1 Bc8 38. Ra2 Bh6 39. Bf1 Qe6 40. Qd1 Nf6 41. Qa4 Bb7 42. Nxb7 Rxb7 43. Nxa6 Qd7 44. Qc2 Kh8 45. Rb3 1-0

(Kasparov, playing white, defeats the computer, which was analyzing millions of moves and strategies per second)

Kasparaov has an I.Q. of 190 which places him in the top 10 of the most intelligent living people on the planet.