Background

The 2007 World Cup is part of the cycle for the World Chess Championship 2009. Gata Kamsky, as the winner of this tournament, will play an eight game match against Veselin Topalov in 2008, for the right to be the challenger for the World Chess Championship in 2009. This will be a match against World Champion Viswanathan Anand, who successfully defended his title against former champion Vladimir Kramnik at the World Chess Championship 2008.

Chess World Cup 2007

The Chess World Cup 2007 served as a qualification tournament for the World Chess Championship 2009. It was held as a 128-player single-elimination tournament, between 24 November and 16 December 2007, in Khanty-Mansiysk, Russia.In an event attended by most leading players of the world, American Gata Kamsky emerged as the winner. He was unbeaten in the tournament, going into tie-break only once and defeating Spaniard Alexei Shirov, 2.5–1.5, in the four-game final. Two 17-year-old players, Sergey Karjakin and Magnus Carlsen, reached the semifinals. By winning, Kamsky qualified for the Challenger Match, the final stage in determining the challenger for the World Chess Championship 2009. The final four also received direct entry into the FIDE Grand Prix 2008-2009, a qualifying stage for the World Chess Championship 2010.

Chess World Cup

The Chess World Cup is the name given to a number of a number of different chess tournaments sponsored by FIDE, the world chess federation. The format and significance of the tournaments has changed over the years.In 2000 and 2002 FIDE staged the "First Chess World Cup" and "Second Chess World Cup" respectively. These were major tournaments, but not directly linked to the World Chess Championship. Both the 2000 and 2002 events were won by Viswanathan Anand. Since 2005, a different event of the same name has been part of the World Chess Championship cycle. This event is being held every two years. It is a 128 player knockout tournament, in the same style as the 1998, 1999, 2000, 2002 and 2004 FIDE World Championships. The Chess World Cup 2005 qualified ten players for the Candidates Tournament for the World Chess Championship 2007. The Chess World Cup 2007 qualified one player for the next stage of the World Chess Championship 2009. This event was won by Gata Kamsky.

Chess ratings achievements

Kasparov holds the record for the longest time as the #1 rated player. Kasparov had the highest Elo rating in the world continuously from 1986 to 2005. However, Vladimir Kramnik did equal him in the January 1996 FIDE ratings list.He was also briefly ejected from the list following his split from FIDE in 1993, but during that time he headed the rating list of the rival PCA. At the time of his retirement, he was still ranked #1 in the world, with a rating of 2812. His rating has fallen inactive since the January 2006 rating list. According to the alternative Chessmetrics calculations, Kasparov was the highest rated player in the world continuously from February 1985 until October 2004. He also holds the highest all-time average rating over a 2 (2877) to 20 (2856) year period and is second to only Bobby Fischer's (2881 vs 2879) over a one-year period.
In January 1990 Kasparov achieved the (then) highest FIDE rating ever, passing 2800 and breaking Bobby Fischer's old record of 2785. He has held the record for the highest rating ever achieved, ever since (as of 2008). On the July 1999 FIDE rating list Kasparov reached a 2851 Elo rating, the highest rating ever achieved

Post-retirement chess

On August 22, 2006, in his first public chess games since his retirement, Kasparov played in the Lichthof Chess Champions Tournament, a blitz event played at the time control of 5 minutes per side and 3 second increments per move. Kasparov tied for first with Anatoly Karpov, scoring 4.5/6

Politics

Kasparov joined the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) in 1984, and in 1987 was elected to the Central Committee of Komsomol. But in 1990 he left the party, and in May took part in the creation of the Democratic Party of Russia. In June 1993, he was involved in the creation of the "Choice of Russia" bloc of parties, and in 1996 he took part in the election campaign of Boris Yeltsin. In 2001 he voiced his support for the Russian television channel NTV.After his retirement from chess in 2005, Kasparov turned to politics and created the United Civil Front, a social movement whose main goal is to "work to preserve electoral democracy in Russia."He has vowed to "restore democracy" to Russia by toppling the elected Russian president Vladimir Putin, of whom he is an outspoken critic. Kasparov was instrumental in setting up The Other Russia, a coalition which oppose Putin's government. The Other Russia has been boycotted by the leaders of Russia's mainstream opposition parties, Yabloko and Union of Right Forces as they are concerned about its inclusion of radical nationalist and left-wing groups such as the National Bolshevik Party and former members of the Rodina party including Viktor Gerashchenko, a potential presidential candidate. But regional branches of Yabloko and the Union of Right Forces have opted to take part in the coalition. Kasparov says that leaders of these parties are controlled by the Kremlin,despite the fact they are both strongly opposed to the president's policies. On April 10, 2005, Kasparov was in Moscow at a promotional event when he was struck over the head with a chessboard he had just signed. The assailant was reported to have said "I admired you as a chess player, but you gave that up for politics" immediately before the attack.[30] Kasparov has been the subject of a number of other episodes since. Kasparov helped organize the Saint Petersburg Dissenters' March on March 3, 2007 and The March of the Dissenters on March 24, 2007, both involving several thousand people rallying against Putin and Saint Petersburg Governor Valentina Matviyenko's policies.On April 14, he was briefly arrested by the Moscow police while heading for a demonstration, following warnings by the prosecution office on the eve of the march, stating that anyone participating risked being detained. He was held for some 10 hours, and then fined and released. Due to his connection to ultranationalists and hard-left groups, he was summoned by FSB for questioning as a suspect in violations of Russian anti-extremism laws.[This law was previously applied for the conviction of Boris Stomakhin Speaking about Kasparov, former KGB general Oleg Kalugin has remarked: "I do not talk in details—people who knew them are all dead now because they were vocal, they were open. I am quiet. There is only one man who is vocal, and he may be in trouble: [former] world chess champion [Garry] Kasparov. He has been very outspoken in his attacks on Putin, and I believe that he is probably next on the list." In 1991, Kasparov received the Keeper of the Flame award from the Center for Security Policy (a US think tank) for his contributions in development of democracy On September 30, 2007, Kasparov entered the Russian Presidential race, receiving 379 of 498 votes at a congress held in Moscow by The Other Russia. In October 2007, Kasparov announced his intention of standing for the Russian presidency as the candidate of the "Other Russia" coalition, and vowed to fight for a "democratic and just Russia". Later that month he traveled to the United States, where he appeared on several popular television programs, which were hosted by Stephen Colbert, Wolf Blitzer, Bill Maher, and Chris Matthews.
On November 24, 2007, Kasparov and other protesters were detained by police at an Other Russia rally in Moscow. This followed an attempt by about 100 protesters to break through police lines and march on the electoral commission, which had barred Other Russia candidates from parliamentary elections. He was subsequently charged with resisting arrest and organising an unauthorized protest, and given a jail sentence of five days. He was released from jail on November 29.On December 12, 2007, Kasparov announced that he had to withdraw his presidential candidacy due to inability to rent a meeting hall where at least 500 of his supporters could assemble to endorse his candidacy, as is legally required. With the deadline expiring on that date, he claimed it was impossible for him to run. Kasparov's spokeswoman accused the government of using pressure to deter anyone from renting a hall for the gathering and said that the electoral commission had rejected a proposal that separate smaller gatherings be held at the same time instead of one large gathering at a meeting hall

Retirement from chess

After winning the prestigious Linares tournament for the ninth time, Kasparov announced on March 10, 2005 that he would retire from serious competitive chess. He cited as the reason a lack of personal goals in the chess world (he commented when winning the Russian championship in 2004 that it had been the last major title he had never won outright) and expressed frustration at the failure to reunify the world championship. Kasparov said he may play in some rapid chess events for fun, but intends to spend more time on his books, including both the My Great Predecessors series (see below) and a work on the links between decision-making in chess and in other areas of life, and will continue to involve himself in Russian politics, which he views as "headed down the wrong path."Kasparov has been married three times: to Masha, with whom he had a daughter before divorcing; to Yulia, with whom he had a son before their 2005 divorce; and to Daria, with whom he also has a child.

Losing the title, and aftermath

The Kasparov-Kramnik match took place in London during the latter half of 2000. Kramnik had been a student of Kasparov's at the legendary Botvinnik/Kasparov chess school in Russia, and had served on Kasparov's team for the 1995 match against Viswanathan Anand. The better-prepared Kramnik won Game 2 against Kasparov's Grünfeld Defence and achieved winning positions in Games 4 and 6. Kasparov made a critical error in Game 10 with the Nimzo-Indian Defence, which Kramnik exploited to win in 25 moves. As white, Kasparov could not crack the passive but solid Berlin Defence in the Ruy Lopez, and Kramnik successfully drew all his games as black. Kramnik won the match 8.5–6.5, and for the first time in 15 years Kasparov had no world championship title. He became the first player to lose a world championship match without winning a game since Emanuel Lasker lost to Capablanca in 1921. After losing the title, Kasparov strung together a number of major tournament victories, and remained the top rated player in the world, ahead of both Kramnik and the FIDE World Champions. In 2001 he refused an invitation to the 2002 Dortmund Candidates Tournament for the Classical title, claiming his results had earned him a rematch with Kramnik. Kasparov and Karpov played a four game match with rapid time controls over two days in December 2002 in New York City. Karpov surprised the experts and emerged victoriously, winning two games and drawing one. Due to Kasparov's continuing strong results, and status as world #1 in much of the public eye, he was included in the so-called "Prague Agreement", masterminded by Yasser Seirawan and intended to reunite the two World Championships. Kasparov was to play a match against the FIDE World Champion Ruslan Ponomariov in September 2003. But this match was called off after Ponomariov refused to sign his contract for it without reservation. In its place, there were plans for a match against Rustam Kasimdzhanov, winner of the FIDE World Chess Championship 2004, to be held in January 2005 in the United Arab Emirates. These also fell through due to lack of funding. Plans to hold the match in Turkey instead came too late. Kasparov announced in January 2005 that he was tired of waiting for FIDE to organize a match and so had decided to stop all efforts to regain the World Championship title.