Mark Taimanov is inducted into the World Chess Hall of Fame Class of 2019 at the Saint Louis Zoo. This induction coincided with the 2019 U.S. Chess Championship Opening Ceremony.

Mark Taimanov was ranked among the top 20 players in the world for over a quarter of a century and is one of the few players to have defeated six world chess champions (Botvinnik, Smyslov, Tal, Petrosian, Spassky, and Karpov). He played in 23 Soviet Chess Championships, a record equaled only by Efim Geller, tying for first in 1952 and 1956. Twice a candidate for the World Chess Championship (1953 and 1971), Taimanov was also a member of the gold medal-winning 1956 Soviet Olympiad team. A prolific and well-respected writer on the game, he was an excellent theoretician best known for the variation of the Sicilian which bears his name (1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 e6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nc6).

2019.03.18
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